THE TRUMP EVANGELICAL ALLIANCE

Many progressive Christians and political activists have been expressing dismay and surprise at the blind way evangelical Christians have embraced Donald Trump. Their allegiance is in many ways shocking to our contemporary perspective. It is hard to accept the depth of hypocrisy which seems beyond logical comprehension.

However, upon closer examination, it should not surprise us for in many ways this is Christianity as usual. It may not be Standard Operating Procedure, but it is disturbingly frequent operating procedure. It is the exact sort of hypocrisy that has plagued Christianity (and all religions) for centuries.

• It is the Christianity of the Roman Empire slaughtering pagans for the sake of political unity in its territory.
• It is the Christianity of the Crusades.
• It is the Christianity of the Inquisition.
• It is the Christianity of the endless ethnic cleansing of native peoples throughout the world including in North America.
• It is the Christianity of going to church on Sunday and selling slaves on Monday
• It is the Christianity of burning crosses and lynching African Americans on Saturday night and attending church on Sunday.
• It is the Christianity when membership lists of the KKK, Baptist and Methodist churches were synonymous.
• It is the Christianity of the German church during the reign of Hitler and the holocaust when they mostly stood by and watched.
• It is the Christianity of Jim Crow Laws sponsored by many church members who were local government officials.
• It is the Christianity of rioting against school desegregation in Boston on Saturday and going to church on Sunday.
• It is the Christianity of Priests sexually abusing children.
• It is the Christianity of bishops and church hierarchy hiding and enabling the predators.

The alliance between Trump and the evangelicals is nothing new. It has always been thus. When this is properly discerned the surprise is replaced with disgust.

This is the dark shadow, the underside, of Christianity. It speaks of a deep, dark wound at the core within the religion which periodically erupts as a volcano into our lives. It is a Christianity whose real god is a society, naively fantasized as ideal, which arises from the culture of The United States in the 1950’s. It is a Christianity of “My white, male power; First, last and always.” Its idol is “Myself, my world and my power and as long as Trump promises he can retain it I will follow him without question.”

It is a Christianity in which Jesus, The Prince of Peace, plays second fiddle. The real savior of this alliance tries to return to the myths of the 1950’s when men were men, women knew their place and immigrants were white.

In truth it is a pseudo Christianity which is at its heart demonic for it pretends to be religious but is an ego based, a self-centered counterfeit of the real thing. It disguises itself as spiritual. It cloaks itself in the institutional church but is a deep overwhelming heresy. Evil is that which pretends to be religious but merely wraps its hate, racism and ego around Christian teaching to achieve its demonic purposes.

I’m not sure of the church can be liberated from the weight of this corruption. But I am sure it is time for Christians to see their denial and apostasy. It is time for them to reclaim their church or leave and start over. There are progressive voices slowly rising from within the church, but they are few and are mostly drowned out by the heretical cult of evangelical loyalists.

So mostly it is business as usual for Christians.

2/4/20