Evangelicals Campaigning To Flip The House

Kara Eastman rallying with Vote Common Good in Omaha

Saturday after the vile outbreak of anti-Semitic violence at the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh-- 11 dead, many injured-- the Washington Post's Max Boot, wrote that he is "so sad. I am so heartbroken. What is happening to our country? Tolerance for political and religious differences is a non-negotiable part of the social contract in the United States. It is the very core of our national identity, even if it has all too often been honored more in the breach than the observance. We settle our political differences through debate followed by voting. Political terrorism and sectarian bloodletting-- these are the sorts of horrors that occur in the Balkans or the Middle East. Not here. Not in the land of the free. We’re better than this. We’re Americans. Except now the horror show has arrived on our shores." You think any of this is comprehensible to an ignorant, unschooled asshole like Donald Trump-- or the third of the country that worships him? You think he or they understand the concept of a social contract?

After the #MAGAbomber and the #MAGAshooter Trump's political director, Bill Stepien circulated a memo to the White House staff telling them what to expect next Tuesday: defeat at the polls. Basically,, according to Alex Isenstadt at Politico, the memo lowers expectations for retaining control of the House while positioning any wins in the Senate as purely Trump's to take credit for.

Decision Magazine, run by the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association: "The past 22 months have brought significant progress in restoring religious liberty in the United States. But if Christians do not remain engaged, those gains could be brought to a screeching halt or even lost after next month’s midterm elections. If progressives reclaim a majority in Congress, not to mention in state and local governments, believers will once again be open targets for punishment by left-wing activists bent on silencing those who wish to live out their faith in society."

Even before the shooting at Tree of Life,, The Guardian reported that actual followers of Jesus-- as opposed to the fake Christians who follow Trump-- are working towards flipping the House as Christian resistance to Trump, compelled by faith, gathers steam. "Progressive churchgoers," wrote Harriet Sherwood from Greensboro, North Carolina, "are becoming increasingly vocal about 'toxic Christianity' and the 'gospel of Trump' while promoting biblical commands to protect the poor." The topic: the Vote Common Good 30-city tour we've been telling you about for months. Last night they did a rally at Stagecoach Community Park in Carlsbad with Mike Levin. Tonight they'll be at The Wayfarer in Costa Mesa with Harley Rouda. And tomorrow evening they're rallying with Katie Porter at the United Congregational Church in Irvine (on Alton Parkway).

Vote Common Good [is] urging Christians to use their votes in next month’s midterm elections to flip control of Congress to the Democrats.

The message is the most politically explicit of a number of progressive Christian groups seeking to push back against conservative evangelical support for Trump. Whereas most focus on Jesus’s teaching to protect the poor and vulnerable, Vote Common Good is honing in on places that voted in Republican representatives in 2016. Exercise your democratic right to get them out, is the essence of its campaign.

“We have been really dumbfounded and dismayed by the level of support that evangelical leaders have given to Trump,” said executive director Doug Pagitt. “We have a moral obligation and a religious obligation to offer a different voice. Our faith compels us to speak out.”

In the 2016 presidential election, 81% of white evangelical Christians voted for Trump. Two years on, Pagitt estimates that between five and 20% of those voters are “moveable.”

He said: “They may have voted for Trump, but they are not supportive. Many of them had no idea it could be this bad. They’ve watched the rhetoric turn into horrible life implications for people, such as separating children and parents at the border, and they see it as contrary to human decency.

“They are generally silent, and most feel alone and isolated. We want to stand with them, look them in the eye and tell them their faith calls them to do something different in the polling booth this time.”

The resistance of progressive Christians to Trump and his policies is gathering momentum. In May, some two dozen faith leaders including Michael Curry, the Anglican bishop who shot to global stardom after preaching at Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s wedding, launched a manifesto, Reclaiming Jesus.

Warning of a “dangerous crisis of moral and political leadership at the highest levels of our government and in our churches”, it rejected specific hallmarks of the Trump administration. Among them were the resurgence of white nationalism and the use of racial bigotry for political gain; misogyny, sexual misconduct and abuse; growing attacks on immigrants and refugees; reducing programs for the poor while cutting taxes for the rich; the normalisation of lying by the nation’s highest leaders; xenophobia; and environmental mismanagement.

The manifesto was the product of deep concern about “the cultural, political, spiritual and religious climate of this country, and also concern that the moderate religious voice was not being heard in the public square,” Curry, the presiding bishop of the Episcopal Church, told The Guardian.

“Representatives of Christianity were buying into political agendas that very often do not reflect the teachings of Jesus of Nazareth,” he added. Those that did not follow the example of the Good Samaritan, or biblical commands to protect the poor and vulnerable, “cannot claim to be Christian,” he said.

At around the same time as the launch of the Reclaiming Jesus manifesto, another group of faith leaders was attempting to recapture the moral agenda with a revival of Martin Luther King’s grassroots Poor People’s Campaign.

Its demands include a repeal of tax cuts and federal and state minimum wage laws. Liz Theoharis, its co-chair, told The Guardian in May that the campaign intended to have a political impact. “We are surely trying to make sure that our elected officials take these issues seriously. But this goes far beyond any one election or election year,” she said.

Meanwhile, Red Letter Christians has also been actively challenging the dominance of the Christian right. In April, Shane Claiborne, one of the organisation’s leaders, was threatened with arrest and up to 12 months in jail if he attempted to preach on the campus of Liberty University in Lynchburg, Virginia, whose president Jerry Falwell is an ardent Trump supporter.

Claiborne and other members of the organisation were holding a revival meeting in Lynchburg to protest at “toxic Christianity” and the “gospel of Trump”, and promote biblical commands to protect the poor and vulnerable. Another Red Letter Revival is planned for Dallas next month.

“This movement started because the word evangelical had collected a great deal of ugly baggage,” said Tony Campolo, a veteran pastor and activist who helped found Red Letter Christians. “If I describe myself as evangelical, the red flags go up. People immediately assume I’m anti-gay, anti-women, anti-environmental, anti-immigrant, pro-gun-- all these things that I am not.

“The word evangelical had negative connotations before Trump, but it has picked up momentum because of Trump.”

Christians in the US had become extremely polarised, he said. Although there had been strong Republican support among white evangelicals for some time, “never before have evangelical leaders come out supporting a candidate like we saw in the last election. They said things like, ‘This is the man that God ordained for America, this is the saviour that God mapped for our nation, this is the man that’s going to make America Christian again.’

“And that’s scary. Almost implied in all of this is an attempt to create a theocracy here in America. And we are frightened because that’s just the opposite of what America should be about.”

Red Letter Christians was not a partisan organisation, said Campolo. “We want policies that serve the interests of the poor and protect the vulnerable.”

But it was hampered in delivering its message by lack of funds. “We’ve never had the financial support to get off the ground, whereas the religious right owns hundreds of radio and television stations. Their control of the microphone is enormous, and they use it very cleverly.”

Pagitt acknowledged he and his fellow campaigners were facing “an uphill battle, and that the great majority of religious people support Republican candidates. But we will keep on encouraging religiously-motivated faithful voters to consider the common good when [they] exercise their democratic rights.”

It was author, filmmaker and ex-evangelical Frank Schaeffer who introduced Ted Lieu and I to the Vote Common Good folks so that we could help them plan a route and introduce them to candidates. Today he told me that "Trump somehow sunk lower than he ever has before. He treated a string of assassination attempts using bombs against elected officials and former presidents as false-flag conspiracy-theory 'bomb stuff.' After 11 people were killed in Pittsburgh synagogue shooting, Trump says he had to hold a campaign rally tonight because of 9/11. He claims the New York Stock Exchange opened the day after September 11 attacks. It did not. The NYSE was closed from September 11-September 17."

Trump has no class. This is not a president. This is a national sick joke. Bombs sent to Democrats, Jews shot, anti-Semitic violence on the rise. Trump is supported by Nazis. He said some of them are good people. You get what you pay for. Why do white Evangelicals go along? The shooting comes during a sharp spike in anti-Semitic activities in the U.S., according to an Anti-Defamation League report released earlier this year. Evangelicals claim to love Jews. So why do they support the man of blood and evil-- Trump?

Trump has repeatedly slammed "globalists" in his public rhetoric, despite warnings that the term is understood to mean Jews in anti-Semitic circles. Trump is unleashing blood, bombs and death. Trump is an evil man. This is the man white evangelical voters love.

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