After Impeachment #2, Will Evangelicals Back Away from Trump?
After Impeachment #2, Will Evangelicals Back Away from Trump?
There's no indication of a reckoning yet.
Now that Donald Trump has been impeached in the House (again), the suspense mounts over what the Senate will do. Russell Moore, the head of the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission, has some thoughts on what they should do… and they’re sadly uncommon among his fellow conservative Christians:
“If I were the vice president, I would assemble the cabinet in accordance with the 25th Amendment,” Moore wrote in an email newsletter sent via the ERLC. “If I were a member of Congress, I would vote to impeach. And if I were a United States senator, I would vote to convict.”
“And I would be willing, if necessary, to lose my seat to do so,” he continued. “As a matter of fact, I am willing, if necessary, to lose this seat.”
If you haven’t heard it yet, you may want to check out this NPR interview with another white evangelical, Ed Stetzer, who was asked what Trump had done to the evangelical brand:
If you asked today, "What's an evangelical?" to most people, I would want them to say: someone who believes Jesus died on the cross for our sin and in our place and we're supposed to tell everyone about it. But for most people they'd say, "Oh, those are those people who are really super supportive of the president no matter what he does." And I don't think that's what we want to be known for. That's certainly not what I want to be known for. And I think as this presidency is ending in tatters as it is, hopefully more and more evangelicals will say, "You know, we should have seen earlier, we should have known better, we should have honored the Lord more in our actions these last four years."
He’s right, but it’s appalling that so many white evangelicals still don’t understand that. They’ve had more than four years to distance from Trump, yet they cling to him stronger than ever before.
I don't understand how Oklahoma could be struggling with COVID when Gov. Kevin Stitt called for a "Day of Prayer and Fasting" last month…
Why is Moore’s strong condemnation so encouraging to us? It was already obvious to everyone who’s been paying attention, but Professor Ryan P. Burge of Eastern Illinois University just put the data in writing: Half of Trump’s most hardcore supports are evangelical Christians.
Terrisa Bukovinac, a self-described “atheist, feminist, vegan, Democrat, and consistent life activist,” wants to bridge the gap between Democrats and people who want to take away a woman’s right to choose. Here she is making the logic-defying leap that it’s wrong to have an abortion because she’s a vegan, set to droning ambient music (probably added as a profundity trick).
According to a drunk Kentucky man by the name of Jesse Brown, Jesus told him to drive into an oncoming car and his dead 7-month-old son would be brought back to life. So he did, with the not-at-all-dead infant son seated on his lap. It resulted in a fatal collision with another driver. Thankfully, his son survived the crash and is in stable condition.
Finally, according to the Christian group Open Doors USA, these are the "top 50 countries where Christians are the most persecuted for following Jesus."
Notice that the United States doesn't make the list, contrary to what elected Republicans would tell us. Also, Mexico and Colombia are considered dangerous for Christians despite having heavily Christian populations… which makes us want to ask: What do they think it’s like for atheists in these same countries?
