Trump's Going To Hell-- Will He Drag The Evangelical Church Down With Him? Has He Already?

Fascism Comes To America by Nancy Ohanian

Writing for Politico this week, Gabby Orr reported that only 1 in 4 Americans see Trump as a man of faith. Trump uses religion to manipulate his followers. Most Americans don't fall for it-- but 27% (of registered voters) do. 40% of evangelicals believe Trump is a Christian. "During an interview with former White House press secretary Sean Spicer last week," wrote Orr, "Trump, who was raised Presbyterian but infrequently attends church, was asked whether he’s 'grown in his faith' since becoming president. 'So I think maybe I have, from the standpoint that I see so much that I can do. I’ve done so much for religion,' he replied... Despite being perceived as religious by a majority of conservative Republicans, a slew of recent polls show that some key religious demographics are beginning to sour on the president-- a development that triggered alarm bells inside his reelection campaign late last month."

Data released last Thursday by the Public Religion Research Institute showed a 12-point drop in the president’s favorability since 2019 among white Catholics-- 60 percent of whom supported Trump over Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton four years ago-- and a 20 percent decline in his support among evangelical voters since March. In May alone, Trump’s favorability among all white Christians declined from 57 percent to 46 percent, according to the PRRI study.

The erosion in Trump’s support among religious Americans, particularly white evangelical Protestants, disrupts a critical component of his 2020 strategy. To compensate for a staggering decline in the president’s appeal among suburban voters and women, his campaign has worked to strengthen his appeal for the religious right.

Die For Me by Nancy Ohanian

The American Conservative ran a Rod Dreher essay this week, The Coming Christian Reckoning, which begins with a long quote from Erick Erickson's final free post, which we'll get to in a moment. Dreher revisited his own book, The Benedict Option-- A Strategy for Christians in a Post-Christian Nation. "Fair or not," he wrote early in 2017, "conservative Christianity will be associated with Trump for the next few years, and no doubt beyond. If conservative church leaders aren’t extraordinarily careful in how they manage their public relationship to the Trump phenomenon, anti-Trump blowback will do severe damage to the church’s reputation. Trump’s election solves some problems for the church, but given the man’s character, it creates others. Political power is not a moral disinfectant. And this brings us to the more subtle but potentially more devastating effects of this unexpected GOP election victory. There is first the temptation to worship power, and to compromise one’s soul to maintain access to it. There are many ways to burn a pinch of incense to Caesar, and some prominent pro-Trump Christians arguably crossed that line during the campaign season. Again, political victory does not vitiate the vice of hypocrisy."

One reason the contemporary church is in so much trouble is that religious conservatives of the last generation mistakenly believed they could focus on politics, and the culture would take care of itself. For the past thirty years or so, many of us believed that we could turn back the tide of aggressive 1960s liberalism by voting for conservative Republicans. White Evangelicals and Catholic “Reagan Democrats” came together to support GOP candidates who vowed to back socially conservative legislation and to nominate conservative justices to the U.S. Supreme Court.

The results were decidedly mixed on the legislative and judicial fronts, but the verdict on the overall political strategy is clear: we failed. Fundamental abortion rights remain solidly in place, and Gallup poll numbers from the Roe v. Wade era until today have not meaningfully changed. The traditional marriage and family model has been protected in neither law nor custom, and because of that, courts are poised to impose dramatic rollbacks of religious liberty for the sake of anti-discrimination.

Dreher is advocating that conservative Christians turn "inward to build (rebuild) our spiritual houses, and cultivate not passion for 'issues,' but disciplines of prayer, catechesis, and cultivating a willingness to suffer for our faith... Even if Trump is re-elected, don’t be deceived: we are in the twilight of Trumpism. He is a spent force. There’s a report that White House advisers are considering having the president give a speech to the nation on racial unity. The only passions such a pre-discredited speech would inspire would be anger and mockery. Events of this spring and early summer have emasculated him-- that, and the fact that he wasted his presidency tweeting, making a fool of himself, and demeaning the stature of his office. It’s over. Even if the Democrats somehow snatch defeat from the jaws of victory, and America gets four more years of Trump, it’s over. As Erick Erickson points out, not only has Trump done little to stop the forces tearing the church apart in post-Christian America, he has actually accelerated them. To be fair, no politician could have stopped those forces, because they are spiritual and cultural forces, not primarily political ones. Still, he really has hastened the reckoning for believers, in part by anesthetizing a lot of them about the nature and severity of the crisis."

So here's the Erickson essay he referenced, He Cannot Save You, "he," signifying Señor Trumpanzee. Erickson is a conservative Republican and evangelical from Georgia, a former member of the Macon city council, the former editor-in-chief of RedState and, currently, an Atlanta radio host on WSB-AM. He famously described Trump as "a racist" and "a fascist," vowed "I will not vote for Donald Trump. Ever." In February 2019, he endorsed Trump's reelection bid. This week he wrote that he does not recall in his lifetime "seeing a President with so much public loyalty and private revulsion among the same people."

Righteous Violence by Nancy Ohanian

Describing rural Georgia Trump supporters in his new essay, Erickson wrote that "There is no real allegiance to the GOP, just to Trump. Republican candidates are forced to go through bizarre rituals to prove who is the most loyal. Some privately grumble. They know these voters will come for them if they are not loyal enough. There are others who stand with President Trump reluctantly. Frankly, for many evangelicals, the only person they can stand with is Trump even if they resent it. I imagine if he loses in November there’ll be a bit of a scene in some corners, not just among Senate Republicans, like the Witch of the West melting. Once Dorothy threw the bucket of water on her, the loyal soldiers were not so loyal. The flying monkeys might have been, but the soldiers definitely were not. We will see that among many in Washington who even now ostentatiously hump the President’s leg with reckless abandon. A number of begrudging Trump voters will be sad to see him lose because of the policies and appointments of Joe Biden, but even many of them will privately sigh some level of relief that perhaps the chaos and constant rage and rage tweets will subside. The President’s most hardcore voters will have dozens of would-be Trump poseurs to choose from for 2024 arguing over who best humped Trump’s leg or has the most Trumpian policies. The purges will happen with fights over loyalty in one corner of the right and fights over ever actually voting for the man in the other corner."

I have to say something to my evangelical friends-- Donald Trump will not save you. He cannot save you. In the rhetoric, tone, tenor, and levels of support for President Trump, I am struck by how many people still view him as some defense against the left.

True, he is to an extent. But Christians are dealing with spiritual problems, not political problems. They are dealing with the things unseen, not the things seen. Donald Trump is, like the forces they are fighting, of the world. The world cannot protect you from the world.

If you are a Christian voting for Donald Trump because he is pro-life, not at war with Christians through public policy, has great judicial picks, and will defend the police, I’m with you.

But I continue to harbor a great belief that too many Christians are using Trump as a political savior for a spiritual problem both in their own lives and in the life of this country. Trump cannot stop the culture from turning against the faith and, if anything, more and more data shows Trump is a catalyst for the cultural turn. He is increasing the left’s turn against the faith at a more rapid pace as so many evangelical leaders constantly beclown themselves to hump his leg. He is also increasing the right’s turn against the faith at a more rapid pace as more political apparatchiks on the right do what is expedient for political victory, including tossing grace, truth, and love for neighbors to the wind.

I think we are in a great sorting. It is not a sorting of the world, but a sorting of the church. Those of us within the church are being sorted between those of us who truly believe Jesus is the answer and those of us who think we can find stopgaps on the road to glory. I don’t advocate for escalation or to bring on the persecution. But I do worry a lot of Christians have harmed their own witness in how they are engaging in the world and politics. Many younger evangelicals are abandoning even a passing interest in politics and voting.

Too many people, regardless of party, think they can and should behave like the President. They see him as a fighter, so they fight too. They have chosen to divide the world between us and them. They see the political fight of the day as a struggle between their way of life and something anathema to it. To a degree, they are right. But to a greater degree, they are so busy clinging to a way of life they identify as American or American Jesus that they cannot let go to cling to actual Jesus. Too many Americans on both sides of the aisle cling to the sovereignty of the presidency instead of to the sovereignty of God and fight accordingly.

We all get so worked up these days and I keep hearing Republicans say we need to fight like the other side or be like the other side or something else. Democrats, for what it is worth, always think the GOP fights nastier, dirtier, and is more united.

I’d just say we cannot do that. We are bound by a book with key lines carved in stone by the immortal Creator of all things who then carved those lines on our hearts. As we engage the culture, the world, and the politics of the age, we cannot be like those who are not bound by the Word. We shouldn’t even try. “Love must be sincere. Hate what is evil; cling to what is good.” (Rom 12:9)

We are in a period of sorting and trying for the church. Stand for what is true and good, not for any man. If you’re on the right, Donald Trump cannot save you from what is coming. If you’re on the left, Joe Biden cannot save you either. But you and I can all love our neighbors as we go through this turbulent time-- including the ones with whom we disagree on politics, policy, and the future.

I turned to my old friend, Dr. Samir Selmanović, founder of Faith House Manhattan, an interfaith community of Christians, Muslims, Jews and humanists/atheists, who also served on the Interfaith Relations Commission of the United States National Council of Churches and currently chairs Vote Common Good and is a chef and life coach. "These articles," he told me, "show us what the coming reckoning looks like from 'the other side.' This is what the insiders see. Public opinion, progressive and spiritually-grounded Christians, and honest insiders of the Christian Right: all three are in agreement now. It's like watching what's happening in 3D. Christian Right insiders like Dreher and Erickson are bemoaning a number of things and the visceral temptation here is for all sides to turn their post-partisan thumbs up and say 'Finally!' From where I stand, however, as a former pastor, a currently-practicing Christian, and someone who believes that spiritual truth and authority reside in life itself, I am actually grieving. Grieving that the Christian Right has again missed the boat. The Trump debacle has presented an incredible opportunity for the Christian Right to learn something priceless, that for decades seemed so distant and foreign to them, and that they still, even in this sort of spiritual-political crisis, never talk about:  the simple, essential act of receiving."

Babies In Cages by Nancy Ohanian

He was just getting going, noting that "They see society as their project for witnessing, conversion, and service. We, the rest of society, are their object. They give themselves sacrificially (making significant contributions of money, time, and energy) in order to bestow grace and truth upon the world. They see themselves as the ones tasked to change the world. This one-way-street dynamic is a fatal flaw. They cannot comprehend that people outside of their tribe also have grace and truth for them. They cannot imagine themselves as interdependent with the wider culture, in any need at all of insight, inspiration, and blessing from those who are not their kind of Christians. God is not among us, the Other, they maintain. Thus they see only two options: witness or withdraw. Two quotes from Dreher are illustrative: 

"To be sure, Christians cannot afford to vacate the public square entirely. The church must not shrink from its responsibility to pray for political leaders and to speak prophetically to them."

"There is nothing left for us but taking the Benedict Option, which is to say, turning inward to build (rebuild) our spiritual houses, and cultivate not passion for 'issues,' but disciplines of prayer, catechesis, and cultivating a willingness to suffer for our faith."

"Witnessing or withdrawing allows them to maintain their foundational premise that they are the only brokers of God to the world," Samir continued. "THEY are the only legitimate brokers of grace, truth, and love. That's why truth from the outside cannot be acknowledged, let alone received. That's why love and kindness from the outside are always suspect. Any 'outside' virtue is a threat to their elemental construct and must be explained away to preserve the undergirding view of the world as enemy territory. God cannot possibly be in the Other, they still maintain. Unlike Jesus, who was happy to receive from the other and be grateful for the other, the Christian Right has decided that where they are not in charge, God is absent. It is unlikely that the imminent and bitter denouement of their Trump Alliance will shake that. 'The world that God so loved' (John 3:16) is devoid of God, except maybe for beautiful nature, cool movies, and random and accidental kindnesses of the lost. That world, they are certain, has no real grace, real truth, or real blessing to accord them. And for God to reveal things to them from the outside (like God did in the Bible all the time by the way) would be tantamount to the capitulation of their religion to the world. That's what is so deeply sad. What was once a wonderful religion, refusing to deepen, to evolve, and turning on itself. The fear, cynicism, and victimhood will continue as long as they don't know how to receive from that God, the same as theirs, but who is comprehensively resident in the world. I pray every day that I am wrong about this. I fantasize that they will surprise us one day and come out, healed, humble, and all love. Perhaps joining a Jesus who is alive and well outside their churches, in a parking lot, tailgating with all the diverse, beautiful, powerful, and revelatory humans they have been missing out on."