"Mr. Face, I believe you know Mr. Palm."
Christianity Today just published another Trump/evangelical piece and this one is monumentally dumb. It's a particularly long piece so I'll just give you a taste.
Popular evangelical New Testament scholar Scot McKnight has written a contradictory piece defending Mark Galli and Timothy Dalrymple's call for evangelicals to remove Trump from office in Christianity Today (Galli retired as editor-in chief; Dalrymple is the new president and CEO). Entitled “Christianity Tomorrow,” it is McKnight’s first post on his new blog at CT. McKnight dredges up a dirty word, "statist," tinges it with associations of idolatry, and then uses it to beat any evangelicals who disagree with his point of view.
Although “statism” normally refers to the massive centralization of power in the state, not to attempts to curb such centralization, McKnight comes up with own self-serving definition: Statism is thinking that "the solutions to our problems are anchored to the one leading the White House." "Statism as I am using it here is the idol of making a human the world’s true ruler. Statism exalts humans and human plans and voting. Statism centers its faith in the future on who rules in D.C. Statism makes government a god."
So who are the statists par excellence in McKnight’s world? Unsurprisingly, while he several times gives lip service to coupling the evangelical left and right, he primarily targets evangelicals opposed to Trump's removal. This is another variation on the recurring (and nauseating) CT theme that evangelical Trump voters are hypocritical idolaters (a mantra since 2016, appearing too in Galli’s swan song op-ed).
Evidently, this is what Timothy Dalrymple had in mind when he said—ironically, after intimating that evangelical Trump voters have transferred “their unconditional loyalty” from God to Trump—that he would invite contributions on evangelicals and Trump from authors who engage “in a . . . charitable manner.” An inference that I am an idolater along with all other evangelical Trump voters is not my idea of charity.
This is so stupid on so many levels that it's hard to know where to start. The authors of this piece claim to be Christians yet insulting fellow Christians simply for disagreeing with their views about the issues of the day. And it's interesting that these tools believe that they can read the minds of conservative Christians and know exactly why they support Trump.
And why is that? It's because conservative evangelicals have abandoned the will of God in favor of that of the Antichrist. How do they know that? Because the will of God should be perfectly obvious to any Christian. That the perfect will of God just happens to be the entire leftist agenda all the way down the line is a coincidence. Since these evangelicals don't believe that, since they support Trump, evangelicals have obviously abandoned God.
Pay attention. Conservative Christians do NOT support Donald J. Trump for ANY religious reason whatsoever. Although there are other factors involved (looking at you, GOP/conservative establishment), the reason why Trump won that election was not "Christian" at all.
A great many of us finally realized this basic fact. The President of the United States is not the Presiding Bishop of the United States. The President of the United States is the first US government employee, the First Civil Servant if you like.
Nothing more.
Christianity Today just published another Trump/evangelical piece and this one is monumentally dumb. It's a particularly long piece so I'll just give you a taste.
Popular evangelical New Testament scholar Scot McKnight has written a contradictory piece defending Mark Galli and Timothy Dalrymple's call for evangelicals to remove Trump from office in Christianity Today (Galli retired as editor-in chief; Dalrymple is the new president and CEO). Entitled “Christianity Tomorrow,” it is McKnight’s first post on his new blog at CT. McKnight dredges up a dirty word, "statist," tinges it with associations of idolatry, and then uses it to beat any evangelicals who disagree with his point of view.
Although “statism” normally refers to the massive centralization of power in the state, not to attempts to curb such centralization, McKnight comes up with own self-serving definition: Statism is thinking that "the solutions to our problems are anchored to the one leading the White House." "Statism as I am using it here is the idol of making a human the world’s true ruler. Statism exalts humans and human plans and voting. Statism centers its faith in the future on who rules in D.C. Statism makes government a god."
So who are the statists par excellence in McKnight’s world? Unsurprisingly, while he several times gives lip service to coupling the evangelical left and right, he primarily targets evangelicals opposed to Trump's removal. This is another variation on the recurring (and nauseating) CT theme that evangelical Trump voters are hypocritical idolaters (a mantra since 2016, appearing too in Galli’s swan song op-ed).
Evidently, this is what Timothy Dalrymple had in mind when he said—ironically, after intimating that evangelical Trump voters have transferred “their unconditional loyalty” from God to Trump—that he would invite contributions on evangelicals and Trump from authors who engage “in a . . . charitable manner.” An inference that I am an idolater along with all other evangelical Trump voters is not my idea of charity.
This is so stupid on so many levels that it's hard to know where to start. The authors of this piece claim to be Christians yet insulting fellow Christians simply for disagreeing with their views about the issues of the day. And it's interesting that these tools believe that they can read the minds of conservative Christians and know exactly why they support Trump.
And why is that? It's because conservative evangelicals have abandoned the will of God in favor of that of the Antichrist. How do they know that? Because the will of God should be perfectly obvious to any Christian. That the perfect will of God just happens to be the entire leftist agenda all the way down the line is a coincidence. Since these evangelicals don't believe that, since they support Trump, evangelicals have obviously abandoned God.
Pay attention. Conservative Christians do NOT support Donald J. Trump for ANY religious reason whatsoever. Although there are other factors involved (looking at you, GOP/conservative establishment), the reason why Trump won that election was not "Christian" at all.
A great many of us finally realized this basic fact. The President of the United States is not the Presiding Bishop of the United States. The President of the United States is the first US government employee, the First Civil Servant if you like.
Nothing more.
4 comments:
I can't agree that I had no religious reasons for voting for Trump. He promised Supreme Court appointments which would protect religious freedom. Since inauguration, he's been the most pro-life president in recent years, if not ever. The protection of my freedom to practice my religion, and the effort to save infant lives, are religious issues.
The other stuff, leftist policy vs. more free-market policy, and the reduction of regulations, are not religious matters directly, with one exception: Centralized state authoritarian regimes have consistently shown themselves to be repressive of religion and religious believers in the service of what they think are more important issues.
You're absolutely right, Katherine, I phrased that badly(wouldn't be the first time). I guess what I was objecting to was the overtly-believed assertion by the authors of this birdcage liner that if you support Trump at all, you might as well start worshipping Thor again for all the good it will do you. Of course, I think that's what the Christian left has always thought, long before Trump was elected, but it's interesting to see the Christian left come right out and say what was always believed but never spoken.
One thing that's been increasingly plain is that Vichy evangelicals are the modal element in quite a menu of historically evangelical institutions.
The idea is, I guess, that because Trump has been a sinner in his personal life in years past, and because his Twitter account offends the elite on style points, we must be committing idolatry to vote for him. This is illogical nonsense. You rightly point out, Chris, that what he does as Chief Executive is what matters. His personal life is Melania Trump's concern and not ours.
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