May 4, 2018
By
various measures the country is in poor shape. The federal government is mired
in corruption and moral failure. We
might reasonably look to religious leaders for answers and guidance; think of
the civil rights crisis, in which pastors such as Martin Luther King led in
spirit and in action. Unfortunately,
now the most visible religious figures are part of the problem.
Support
for Trump by conservative Christians is a continuing puzzle. Why would they stand behind a man who
embodies, in numerous ways, the opposite of their beliefs and standards? The question swirls around the announcement
in April that "evangelical leaders are organizing a sit-down with
President Trump in June."[37]
"We're very concerned" about the Clifford/Daniels affair, "said
a leader of a faith-based ministry."
That might be expected; Trump’s behavior, alleged and known, should be
offensive to them. Although they are,
as stated, "concerned," that is not, apparently, because of moral or religious principles, at least not
directly. Their reason for the meeting
seems to be anxiety that Democrats might prevail in the midterm election.
"The
source said the combination of the Stormy Daniels sex-scandal allegations and
Trump's continued reputation for divisive rhetoric could suppress evangelical
turnout in the November midterm elections." Granted, they do worry about some specific issues: " ‘It is
a concern of ours that 2018 could be very detrimental to some of the other
issues that we hold dear,’ like preserving religious liberty and restricting
abortion rights, the source noted." In other words, a Republican Congress
and conservative judges are their goals. Trump’s reputation might interfere.
Abortion
is a subject worthy of discussion, and of compromise, although the evangelicals
may be no more inclined to compromise than liberals. "Religious
liberty" likely is a euphemism for freedom to discriminate or to impose
views on others, as in the Hobby Lobby case (which
also involved hyper-conservative abortion views). The religious leaders are willing to empower a man who is so
incompetent and erratic as to endanger the country, in order to pursue a narrow
agenda. The same could be said of
other Trump supporters, but it seems especially odd among people who claim the
moral high ground.
Although
the unidentified spokesman said that "Trump's tone and personal life
remain a concern for many evangelicals," others, including Penny Nance of
Concerned Women for America ("your voice for Biblical values") were
less concerned. As to the Daniels
storm, "I just honestly don't hear hand-wringing over the issue. They're
not surprised," she said, apparently referring to Trump’s Christian
supporters; "they made that decision a long time ago. This president is
not Rick Santorum or Mike Huckabee; he doesn't pretend to be a Bible-banging
evangelical." Support of Trump by any voice for Biblical values, especially
the leader of a women’s group, is puzzling.
"Ralph Reed, chairman of the Faith and
Freedom Coalition, also said it's ‘highly dubious’ that the allegations will
substantially erode support for the president or suppress midterm
turnout." Opportunism becomes a
religious tenet.
A month
earlier, Pastor Robert Jeffress, a member of Trump’s evangelical advisory
board, said: “Evangelicals know they’re not compromising their beliefs in order
to support this great president. And let’s be clear, evangelicals still believe
in the commandment ‘thou shalt not have sex with a porn star.’ However, whether
this president violated that commandment or not is totally irrelevant to our
support of him." That sounds like
compromising their beliefs.
Evangelicals knew they “weren’t voting for an altar boy, he said;” they
support Trump for his “policies and strong
leadership.”[38]
One
meeting of evangelicals, but without Trump, took place last month. "Evangelical" is a term more often
applied than defined; usually it seems to equate to conservative Christian, or
white conservative Christian, and carries an implication more of politics than
of religion. A report of the gathering
this month used the word in a more traditional, literal sense.
The
article, by Katelyn Beaty, formerly managing editor of Christianity
Today, began with a description of the memorial service for
Billy Graham, who was an evangelist, that is a spreader of the Christian
message, with the intent of conversion.
However, "[m]any evangelical leaders, including some in attendance
at Graham’s funeral, were fearful that this association with Trump now
threatened the focus on personal salvation that Graham spent a lifetime
preaching."[39] Accordingly, a meeting was arranged at
Wheaton College, a Christian school in Illinois. The invitation stated that "support of ‘eighty-one per cent
of self-identifying white evangelicals’ for Donald Trump is a call to
self-reflection on the current condition of Evangelicalism.” Indeed.
The
meeting seems to have gone nowhere.
Some participants left in protest of comments critical of Trump. Although a formal statement was
contemplated, none was issued. The
author clearly was disappointed in the result: "Without a statement, and
with the bewildering skittishness about getting political, my time at Wheaton
left me feeling deeply unsettled about the moral and political fortitude of my
spiritual community in the era of Trump and beyond."
Ms.Beaty
wanted evangelicals to take a stand, to do good. "Much of evangelicalism
still functions with a spiritual-secular divide, as if the physical concerns of
this world can be neatly fixed with worship and prayer. But worship and prayer
are not the only things that this Trumpian moment demands of us. Rather, the
moment calls for risk." This calls
to mind the formulistic call for prayer after each mass shooting, a substitute
for action.
She named
some who had taken a stand, who had risked, including King; they "stood against
corruption with courage and grace. They hadn’t been afraid to get political, to
challenge unjust systems and policies. The Church was made stronger for
it." The society was improved as
well. However, there is little sign now
of such an effort.
The
spiritual-secular divide, the flight from dealing with urgent real-world
problems, is exacerbated by the rejection, by many conservative Christians, of
scientific facts. Some, such as
evolution, are opposed to traditional belief, or are thought to be. Others are
politically inconvenient. Senator James
Inhofe, Republican of Oklahoma, cited Genesis to prove that global warming is a
hoax.
In an
excellent article in The Atlantic, Michael Gerson, a
graduate of Wheaton, described one of the sources of modern fact-aversion. In the early twentieth century, "the
religiously orthodox published a series of books called The
Fundamentals. Hence the term fundamentalism, conceived in
a spirit of desperate reaction."
It represented a break with older evangelicalism. "In reacting against higher criticism,
it became simplistic and over literal in its reading of scripture. In reacting
against evolution, it became anti-scientific in its general orientation. In
reacting against the Social Gospel, it came to regard the whole concept of
social justice as a dangerous liberal idea.”[40]
Now, as
noted above, evangelicals have taken another step: establishing a hierarchy of
virtues which relegates personal merit to a lower rank, and threatens to reduce
religion to another, rather hypocritical, special interest. In describing the fall of Alabama Governor
Bentley, in a sex scandal, an article offered this summary: "[I]t had
become clear that for conservative Christians, the cultural and political
issues that define modern conservative politics mattered at least as much as
moral piety. . . .’The idea that moral
hypocrisy hurts you among evangelical voters is not true, if you’re sound on
all of the fundamentals,’ said Wayne Flynt, an ordained Baptist minister and
one of Alabama’s pre-eminent historians. . . .‘At this time, what is
fundamental is hating liberals, hating Obama, hating abortion and hating
same-sex marriage’.”[41]
Many of
the comments by evangelical leaders defy belief. Here are several from Gerson’s article: Following news of Trump’s
tryst with Stormy Daniels and the payment of hush money, Franklin Graham
vouched for Trump’s “concern for Christian values.” Somewhat more evasively, Tony Perkins urged forgiveness or, in
his phrase, Trump should be given a "mulligan" for his fooling around. "Pastor David Jeremiah has compared
Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump to Joseph and Mary: ‘It’s just like God to use a
young Jewish couple to help Christians.’ According to Jerry Falwell Jr.,
evangelicals have ‘found their dream president,’ which says something about the
current quality of evangelical dreams."
Some have
been driven from the fold. Peter
Weiner, a conservative writer, declared in a recent column that he no longer
could call himself an evangelical.
During the Alabama special election, in which Roy Moore was the
Republican candidate, Weiner wrote: "the support being given by many
Republicans and white evangelicals to President Trump and now to Mr. Moore have
caused me to rethink my identification with both groups. . . . I consider Mr.
Trump’s Republican Party to be a threat to conservatism, and I have concluded
that the term evangelical — despite its rich history of proclaiming the ‘good
news’ of Christ to a broken world — has been so distorted that it is now
undermining the Christian witness." [42]
Others
have expressed similar views to him.
One said "the term evangelical “is now a tribal rather than a
creedal description.” Gerson summed
the problem up in similar terms: "The moral convictions of many
evangelical leaders have become a function of their partisan identification.
This is not mere gullibility; it is utter corruption. Blinded by political
tribalism and hatred for their political opponents, these leaders can’t see how
they are undermining the causes to which they once dedicated their lives.
Little remains of a distinctly Christian public witness."
_______________________
37. https://www.npr.org/2018/04/06/599972396/concerned-evangelicals-plan-to-meet-with- trump-as-sex-scandals-swirl?utm_source=The%20Muck%20Rack%20Daily&utm_campaign =068597c810-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2018_04_06&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_ af2b2023a3-068597c810-20027577&via=newsletter&source=CSPMedition
38 http://thehill.com/homenews/media/377559-pro-trump-pastor-stormy-daniels-allegations-totally-irrelevant-to-evangelical
39. https://www.newyorker.com/news-desk/on-religion/at-a-private-meeting-in-illinois-a-group-of-evangelicals-tried-to-save-their-movement-from-trumpism
40. https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2018/04/the-last-temptation/554066/
41. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/11/us/alabama-governor-robert-bentley-sex-scandal.html
42. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/09/opinion/Sunday/wehner-evangelical-republicans.html?em_pos=small&emc=edit_ty_20171211&nl=opinion-today&nl_art=14&nlid=73688601&ref=headline&te=1&_r=0
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