That time when President Trump thought Presbyterians were evangelicals and had to ask if they were all Christians. Brought to you by the man who claims to be a Presbyterian, and the many “Christians” who voted for him.
It was January, just days before his inauguration, and two Presbyterian pastors arrived at Trump Tower to pray with the President-elect, Reverend Patrick O’Connor, the senior pastor at the First Presbyterian Church in Queens and the Reverend Scott Black Johnston, the senior pastor of Manhattan’s Fifth Avenue Presbyterian Church, MJ Lee describes in a CNN cover story.
“I did very, very well with evangelicals in the polls,” Trump interjected in the middle of the conversation — previously unreported comments that were described to me by both pastors.
They gently reminded Trump that neither of them was an evangelical.
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“Well, what are you then?” Trump asked.
They explained they were mainline Protestants, the same Christian tradition in which Trump, a self-described Presbyterian, was raised and claims membership. Like many mainline pastors, they told the President-elect, they lead diverse congregations.
Trump nodded along, then posed another question to the two men: “But you’re all Christians?”
“Yes, we’re all Christians.”
Lee goes on to report that Trump has no home church and hasn’t been attending church as president, facts which contradict the image he tried to hone on the trail, when he claimed the Bible as his favorite book but couldn’t name his favorite verse. Eight months later, serial adulterer Donald Trump had found his favorite Bible verse, it was “An eye for an eye.”
Trump also said, “And I go to church and I love God and I love my church.”
A pause as we recall that Trump led the conspiracy-oriented birther movement against President Obama, and suggested that maybe Obama was a Muslim and that’s why he was hiding his birth certificate.
In 2011, Trump told Fox News, “He (Obama) doesn’t have a birth certificate. He may have one, but there’s something on that, maybe religion, maybe it says he is a Muslim. I don’t know. Maybe he doesn’t want that.”
As all of Trump’s accusations seem to do, this one is bouncing back to land in his lap. It isn’t Barack Obama whose background is hidden and covered with deception. It is, of course, Donald Trump. The man who isn’t even sure that Presbyterians are Christians.
All Trump understands about Christianity is that he did well in the polls with evangelicals. This seems fitting, as Trump is – by virtue of his deeds and words – not at all embodying the kind of leader any Christian should be voting for, let alone worshiping. And yet they have and are.
For all of his concerns about “unmasking”, it is Donald Trump who is unmasking the craven emptiness of conservative evangelical Christianity at this moment in time. Although Trump claims to be one, he thought Presbyterians were evangelicals.
When it comes to morality, Donald Trump is a walking example of what not to do, how not to act, and in this way serves as a test for those whose proclaimed values clearly clash consistently with Trump’s actions.
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Sarah has been credentialed to cover President Barack Obama, then VP Joe Biden, 2016 Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, and exclusively interviewed Speaker Nancy Pelosi multiple times and exclusively covered her first home appearance after the first impeachment of then President Donald Trump.
Sarah is two-time Telly award winning video producer and a member of the Society of Professional Journalists.
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