
The astonishing thing is that more than 80% of American evangelicals are likely to vote for Donald Trump in next month´s presidential election, according to a recent survey by Pew Research.
An article in today’s Guardian gives something of the flavour of the Trump campaign’s use of religious language for their own benefit. At an event in North Carolina billed as an “11th-Hour Faith Leaders Meeting”, a series of conservative pastors warmed up for Trump, including long-time Trump ally, Guillermo Maldonado. “You know, we’re now in spiritual warfare….It’s beyond warfare between the left and the right. It’s between good and evil.” And Donald Trump urged Christian voters to turn out for him, claiming that a Kamala Harris administration would restrict religious freedoms, while casting himself as a protector of Christians.
Earlier yesterday morning, Trump’s son Eric appeared on a streaming service for prophetic voices on the Christian right. “One of the things that really bothers me is: you see a constant war in this country against God, from the current administration, from the Obama administration,” he said. “I don’t think you’ve ever had a bigger proponent of religious liberty than under Donald Trump.” And he went on to claim “there is a hand of God on my father’s shoulder”.
Read the full story here.
That is not to say that ‘Evangelicals for Harris´ have given up the fight. According to a story in last week’s Church Times, they responded to a Trump campaign featuring the late evangelist Dr Billy Graham with an advertisement that splices Dr Graham’s words with quotations from Trump rallies. One clip juxtaposes an excerpt from a Graham sermon — “But you must realize that in the last days, the times will be full of danger. Men will become utterly self-centered and greedy for money”, with a clip of Trump telling a rally: “My whole life I’ve been greedy, greedy, greedy. I’ve grabbed all the money I could get. I’m so greedy.”
On a more bizarre note, it appears that the Trump campaign has published a “God Bless America” Bible – available for $59.99 – incorporating an American flag on the cover and the text of the US Constitution inside. Only later did it emerge that the Bibles had been produced in China. Democrat vice-presidential candidate, Tim Walz, joked at a rally: “Trump had his branded Bibles printed in China. This dude will even outsource God. I don’t blame Trump for not noticing the ‘Made in China’ sticker. They put them on the inside, a part of the Bible that he’s never looked at.”
Read the Church Times article here.
The real issue here is what this use of religious language says to us about our faith and how far we can adapt it for our own purposes, when perhaps it is us that need adapting for the sake of our Christian mission. In the New Testament there is a clear distinction between saying the right words and living them out. Jesus railed again and again against those who went through the motions for their own sake. “‘And whenever you pray, do not be like the hypocrites; for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners, so that they may be seen by others.” (Matthew 6). And the epistles remind us that words without actions are meaningless. ”What does it profit, my brethren, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? …… faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead”. (James 2)
But perhaps what is more at stake is what our faith teaches us as to the stance we should take when it comes to voting for our next government. Politics and faith exist in the same universe and rightly impact on one another. But the abuse of Christianity for political purposes needs to be called out: it is offensive to those who are genuinely trying to live out their faith rather than simply jumping on the band wagon, or absorbing the superficial account that the band wagon has to offer.
So when we go to the polls our focus needs to be on that candidate that will do the most to bring forward God’s kingdom here on earth. And in this respect, our faith cannot be indifferent.