Evangelicals' Love Affair With Trump Will Become a Long-Term Poison Pill for Organized Christianity
January 13th 2020
Vice President Mike Pence delivers remarks during a dinner with religious leaders, Wednesday evening, May 3, 2017, in the Blue Room of the White House in Washington, D.C. (White House)
By integrate (of the Daily Kos community)
I grew up going to Sunday school and church every week — a Christian denomination that was big on humility and where parishioners didn’t much wear their religion on their sleeves except by quietly living a virtuous life.
My father was a lay leader in our church, and the pastor would join the family for lunch every now and then. My parents would put us to bed with “good-night prayers,” and, as a young child, I would sometimes continue to chat with the heavens after Mom or Dad tucked me in and turned out the lights.
Despite what appeared to be a “good start” — I was a skeptic by my late teens, and by my thirties I stopped going to Christmas services and church weddings because whenever the pastor spoke as if he and I had a shared belief in a magical father in heaven, it weirded me out.
I am officially a long-lapsed Christian
Today most of the people in my life are as lapsed as I am. We still strive for a virtuous life, but do not believe in a Lord in Heaven. A few people in my circle of friends and relatives are still attached to the denomination where I grew up, and — as they were taught — they quietly practice generous lives of piety and kindness.
Another few have left the church, but not because they were skeptical about the whole Jesus and God set of beliefs. No — they left the church for the harsher, more aggressive Christianity of the evangelical movement.
Evangelicals are always on the prowl for souls to save. They look for people to “bring to Jesus” with the determination and purpose of a horny teenager looking for… you know what I mean. They are especially eager to bring lapsed lost lambs like me back into the “light of Jesus.”
I always find their aggression discomforting. Offers to “pray for me” when I’m not looking for prayers make me squirm. I am caught between wanting to be polite on one hand and giving in to the impulse to yell “Will you please just S.T.F.U. about God and Jesus and religion… I do not ever want to talk about or hear about God, prayers, Jesus or the Bible from you ever!”
Well I no longer feel uncomfortable telling them off — because I can do so without using F-bombs or allowing myself to lose my temper.
Now I just calmly tell them“Any religion that gets in bed with an unrepentant, flagrant sinner like Donald Trump is a false religion that has no respect for piety, virtue, kindness, truth or love.”
I continue “If Christianity wants to appeal to people like me... if Christianity wants to convert people like me, it first needs to renounce Donald Trump, not celebrate him. Until it does, do not speak to me about Jesus or God or the bible and do not tell me you are praying for me.”
At best — this puts individual evangelists in a position where they have to choose: they can keep trying to do missionary work on me, or they can celebrate Trump… but they can’t have both. If they want to talk to me me, they gotta dump Trump.
At worst — (and this has happened) — after drawing this line in the sand, even if they don’t move away from Trump, they do actually S.T.F.U. I never hear another word from them about religion and all this accomplished without me even losing my temper!
Posted with permission