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We now read about the Christian pastors who lead the new nationwide organization "Pastors for Trump." The idea is to get "evangelicals" fired-up once again to assert themselves in upcoming campaigns. The focus is on the former president. But that fellow has a great many on his coattails. Where he goes, so many will follow.
Don't something like 60 percent of Republicans still think favorably of the ex-president? So you cannot simply dismiss him, or be amused at my pronouncements here. A part of us might want to think it's "old news." But remember how Trump rose in the first place? Remember how it started with his "escalator ride" that happened to be downward?
Week by week the realization sank in that "this guy has currency." He went beyond being a novelty type of sideshow. Little by little the conservative skeptics from early-on started getting in line. Then they became serious supporters. Trump fed the news cycle every day. Then he eked out his presidential win in 2016. The asterisk would be that he actually lost the popular vote. Try pointing that out and Republicans will pounce on you: "There are reasons for the electoral college." But the Democratic candidate still got the most votes.
In 2020 the advantage of the Democrat was too much for the electoral college to nullify. How much more damn evidence do you want of Trump's damaging influence on the country with his actions on January 6? Should the judgment be prima facie here?
In the old days of the gatekeeper media, wouldn't an attempted insurrection with violence be treated like an abomination for the ages? We would not have had to wait months for a committee to be formed. The American people would have felt consensus. Is the well being poisoned more and more as we speak?
Am I correct in saying that the Judeo-Christian ethic is the foundation for the American legal system? And by extension our whole way of life? I mean, this was a given when I was a kid. Christianity was about loving and showing charity to all. Politics was a largely separate sphere, it really was. I'm old enough to remember that.
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Trump has given his blessing to the "Pastors for Trump" organization. Are these men of the cloth so proud as to show such intense reverence to the ex-president? They must be. The organizing pastor reported that once Trump gave his blessing, "our registration members just spiked."
"I will embrace Christian nationalism," this activist pastor name of Jackson Lahmeyer said. You might be able to guess he's from the southern region of the U.S. He's from Oklahoma. But there is no Mason-Dixon Line in connection with religion and its stance with politics. Maybe the northern region could counteract some of the toxic stuff. But look at the Dakotas, populated I'm sure with fine citizens who'd call themselves "Christian." Seems you only need an 'R' by your name in order to win elections there. Look how Jason Ravnsborg got elected attorney general in South Dakota, and how that state's governor seriously entertained the thought of having Trump's face added to Mount Rushmore.
This is the America of 2022? It's a time when religious devotion overall is dropping, when the term "nones" has entered our popular vocabulary. "Nones" are people with no religious affiliation. They check the "none" box in surveys when asked about religious affiliation. Maybe the rejection has a lot to do with how the faith has become wedded to the most extreme politics. IMHO we can assume that.
Taking the pulse
How is my church of First Lutheran doing in Morris? To be frank, I think not very well. It was a waste for us to even try to have Advent services over this past holiday season. Hardly anyone showing up. It wasn't that many years ago we'd have a soup supper in the fellowship hall before the Advent service.
There should not be two ELCA churches in Morris. I fear that in a few years, one might not cut it either.
Seems the people who remain most committed to this thing called Christianity have bastardized the gospel. Young people are being exposed to Christianity in a way that makes the faith almost morally suspect. I mean, to join hands with Donald Trump? To make Trump essentially the face of the faith?
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| A famous/infamous pose (wikipedia) |
We all might have been rescued from this, if momentum had built in the corridors of power for Trump to be charged legally in some way, shape or form. We have been tortured by news stories that seem to scream at us that Trump is legally culpable. Time drones on. We wake up to the same commentators in the media saying the same things.
Rudy Giuliani should have had hell to pay by now. And if that ever happens, he'll be in a state where he will plead medical hardship - we'll hear about alcohol abuse and some level of dementia. The president's lawyer! And the media will by and large talk about it so matter-of-factly.
The media people have made incredible hay with Trump-ism. They're happy putting in their hours, essentially telling us all we're sheep because we don't just rise up and assert our voices.
The extreme Republicans are in fact letting their voices be heard: no inhibitions there because they give the impression of walking hand-in-hand with Jesus Christ. I'm starting to think this whole abomination cannot be reversed. Leading to what? Heaven help us. Trump defied good sense in 2016 in an incremental way. So no one can say it won't happen again. We are lemmings.
What about this Santos fellow?
Maybe the worst sign is that we are letting go of the Judeo-Christian ethic. My God, we once had the presumption that all good people embraced that. I went through school considering the ethic to be the bedrock. Now I'm 67 years old. It seems almost like "Twilight Zone." And I'll be 68 in late January. So today I'm reading about this nationwide "Pastors for Trump" organization that now has Trump's official imprimatur. So the ranks are swelling, its leader says. So we just read about it and shrug? Is that all?
Exhibit 'A' for how we have rejected the Judeo-Christian ethic: this Republican Congressman Santos of New York. It's not even "alleged" he made up stuff in his bio. In the old days there would have been an instinctive reaction to this. He'd have to resign. Top Republicans evidently knew all along his stories were hogwash. They reportedly just laughed about it, did not publicly comment. Because, they needed power.
This reflects the whole "transactional" ethos that has come to the fore in America now. Its rise was led by Trump, the most transactional human being you could imagine. He got sex from Stormy Daniels. She got money. On and on it goes. And "Christians" are propping him up again all across America.
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| Jackson Lahmeyer, "Pastors for Trump" (facebook) |
True I suppose. But remember the reassuring words we got in 2016 about how Trump would end up just a novelty candidate, good for laughs maybe. Little by little the menace grew. And it's growing again. Trump has huge support in our Stevens County. Our new congressperson Michelle Fischbach voted against certifying the 2020 election results. We must answer for this.
- Brian Williams - morris mn minnesota - bwilly73@yahoo.com
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