Baptist News Global: "What the Hell is Wrong With These People?
What's wrong is a relatively easy question to answer, but a difficult problem to solve.
I grew up in an Evangelical church, and denomination, the Southern Baptist Convention, and got my B.A. and one of my Master's degrees from universities affiliated with the denomination, so what I'm saying here is based on experience and observation. The cultural factors that have produced the theology and doctrine of what we label as "Conservative Evangelicalism" have also produced the kind of fantasy imagery that has elevated Trump to what some people now call, in jest, the "Orange Jesus."
The Southern Baptist Convention is the surviving heir to the Confederate States of America. Along with the home-grown collection of Pentecostal and Charismatic churches and clusters of denominations that make up most of what we call American Evangelicalism, are tendencies and patterns of belief that have helped to create what we know as the Trump cult. Their theology and doctrine is not historic or traditional in any sense, in fact, it is quite the opposite of that. It emerged from the American frontier, and from more remote and isolated communities where it was virtually impossible to get educated pastors for churches.
Theology and Doctrine Which Contributes to Evangelical "Apostasy"
In spite of believing in some absolutes which would seem to lead people in the opposite direction of the kind of sinful worldliness that characterizes Trump's lifestyle and is his personal trademark, behavior which at least one Apostle labels as "anti-Christ," conservative Christians gravitate toward that kind of personality in the leaders they choose for their churches.
Southern Baptists have designed a denominational structure that allows strong, forceful personalities, the kind of people who seek power and use leadership to build their own personal kingdoms, to run the show and bypass the few democratic rules and structures they have in place. Over the past 30 years, almost all denominational practice and policy has been shaped by the influence of two men, one the President of a small, broken down Bible college in Dallas, the other a Republican political operative and appeals court judge in Houston. These men pointed to supposed "liberals" in the universities and seminaries, and convinced the uninformed and uneducated people in the pews to use the backward, provincial governing structure of the SBC to appoint trustee boards to fire people they claimed were liberal and to feather their own nests, along with those of their friends.
That, along with the increasing alignment of the Southern Baptist Convention to Republican party politics has brought about a 20% decline in church attendance and membership over the past decade.
The kind of duplicity and hypocrisy this generates is visible in everything these people do. They take a hard line against adultery, but cheer and give unconditioned loyalty to a man who has claimed to have had affairs with literally hundreds of women, at times to openly humiliate one of the three women he's been married to in public, and who not only has not repented of it, as orthodox, conservative Christian doctrine requires, but has openly claimed he has done nothing requiring repentance.
And politics and political affiliation has a lot to do with the standards that are applied. Former President Bill Clinton does not get the same consideration, even though he has repented and acknowledged his need for repentance. Baptist News Global has a good story on what's been going on with Clinton's former church in Little Rock, which you can read Hypocrisy Among Baptists Affected by Politics.
"God Sometimes Uses Evil People to Achieve His Purposes"
Well, depending on how wide open the interpretation of the Bible can get, there's a case that can be made for this argument, except, of course, when the outcome doesn't suit the purpose of the individual who is making the interpretation. This is where hypocrisy happens big time.
Note that none of the arguments used to justify support for an adulterous, womanizing, lying, deceitful, cheating fraud who happens to be a Republican apply to a Democrat who was criticized for many of the same things. So in this particular interpretation, God uses evil people to achieve his purpose if the evil person is Republican, but not if the person is Democrat.
But beyond that, there's not any place in the Bible, even reaching deep into the Old Testament to find those examples of evil people God used to collectively punish Israel for its sins, where God required his people to also give their loyalty and support to the evil person. It should be noted, these are examples from history, and the "evil" people were generally in the form of attacks from surrounding enemies designed to focus the attention of the Israelites on their own sinfulness or to get them to depend on God. In many cases, rather than an actual historical record, the story featuring the evil leader isn't necessarily a historical account, but is a parable for the purpose of illustration.
And then there's the argument that God still used David as a king, even though he wasn't perfect. There's no doubt that David was King, and no doubt that he wasn't perfect, though it is difficult to say how historical all of the accounts are regarding his reign. But there's nothing in that statement that supports God "using" any American President, or excluding any American President for that matter, based on that example. Once again, stories about King David were primarily illustrations, designed to help cope with being a people in Babylon in exile. They're not applicable to modern politics. And the places where the New Testament talks about governing authorities do not distinguish between specific political parties or political ideologies or worldviews from modern times. They simply require Christians to respect all governing authorities as being under God's authority and to pray for their well-being, success and prosperity.
But, for people who hear interpretations of Bible passages always literally applied and always tying everything to some specific example, without any consideration of the Biblical context, this is, quite literally, the gospel. Arguing for a better interpretation of scripture only gets criticized as liberalism, the all-purpose evil that can be used for proof of anything. Support for Republican politicians and politics has been a doctrinal and theological point for some conservative, fundamentalist Evangelicals for a long time. It has never mattered that the President at the top of the ticket was a new ager, like Reagan, a liberal Episcopalian like George H.W. Bush, a liberal Methodist like George W. Bush, a Mormon like Romney or a worldly, womanizing heathen like Trump.
An Abandonment of Spiritual Power for Political Power to Get Things Done
All of this rhetoric serves the purpose of confusing spiritual power with political power. If it's all under the umbrella of "the will of God," then abandoning principle and doctrine in favor of pragmatic outcomes is just fine. Immorality becomes irrelevant. Leaders are not required to understand or lay claim to a Christian "conversion experience" to be leaders, it's the results they get, mainly empowering the politics of far-right wing conservatives, that make them leaders.
Nor does the governing structure matter much, either. Churches and denominations are not democracies, they are oligarchies and confederacies designed to provide a privileged few with their own perks, benefits and ability to establish their own personal kingdoms that everyone else supports and defends. Do you see why that fits so well with the Trump cult? This is pseudo-Christianity that has destroyed much of American Christianity and is aiming to destroy American constutitional democracy and the rights of individual Americans.
Thankfully, there are voices coming from inside this movement that are helping to undermine the politics with as little further colateral damage to the faith as possible. It's likely that many of the churches and denominations that have fallen victim to this temptation to political power will not survive, and that may be a good thing. The third temptation offered to Christ was the same kind of worldly power and when he turned that down, it made the formation of the Christian gospel and the church possible.
It is now sorely in need of a restoration.
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