82% of Evangelicals Continue to Embrace Immorality

The results of a new Pew Research Center survey has been released and they again confirm that white evangelicals are the worse hypocrites and modern day Pharisees of any religious group as they continue to support the most immoral individual to ever occupy the White House.  Eighty two percent say they will vote for Trump in November.  The survey take away is that decent, moral people should not be fooled by the false piety and claims of religiosity from evangelicals given that Trump is the antithesis of Christian conduct and Christ's social gospel message. White evangelicals are not the only ones whose claims of being "Christian" should be questioned.  Majorities of white "Christians' also support Trump although not at the levels of evangelicals who, in my view, lead the nation in moral bankruptcy and hypocrisy.   One cannot be a moral person if they support a man who is the embodiment of immorality.   Here are highlights from the survey:

Amid rising coronavirus cases and widespread protests over racial injustice, President Donald Trump’s approval rating has dropped among a wide range of religious groups, including white evangelical Protestants – though they remain strongly supportive.

The same survey finds that if the 2020 presidential election were held today, 82% of white evangelical Protestant registered voters would vote for Trump or lean toward voting for him, while 17% say they would back the Democratic Party’s presumptive nominee, Joe Biden. By comparison, a Pew Research Center survey that was conducted just after the 2016 presidential election among those who were identified as having voted found that 77% of white evangelical Protestant voters backed Trump, while 16% voted for Hillary Clinton.

The June survey was conducted after Trump’s controversial visit to St. John’s Episcopal Church on June 1, and in the immediate wake of the Supreme Court’s landmark LGBTQ ruling on June 15.

Trump’s continued support among white evangelical Protestants – a group that is highly religious and overwhelmingly Republican – is matched by their dislike of Biden.

While no other religious group is as supportive of Trump as white evangelical Protestants – and his rating has slipped among most Christian groups in this analysis in recent months – [Trump] the president continues to garner support from half or more of other white Christians. More than half of white Protestants who do not identify as evangelical (56%) say they approve of the job Trump is doing, as do 54% of white Catholics – and roughly six-in-ten voters in these groups say they would vote for him if the election were held today.

On the other hand, large majorities of Black Protestants (83%), Hispanic Catholics (74%) and religiously unaffiliated Americans (74%) say they disapprove of Trump. Among Black Protestants, levels of disapproval have increased to 83% from 74% in April, but are roughly similar to where they stood in January, when 10% approved of Trump and 87% disapproved. And among Black Protestant voters, just 8% say they would vote for Trump if the election were held today, while 88% would vote for Biden.

Black Protestants, who overwhelmingly identify as Democrats or as Democratic-leaning independents, are the religious group with by far the most positive views toward Biden.

Among religiously unaffiliated Americans, another strongly Democratic constituency, opinions on a possible Biden presidency are more tepid. (The religiously unaffiliated, also known as “nones,” are those who describe their religion as atheist, agnostic or “nothing in particular.”) Fewer than a third of “nones” (27%) say Biden would be a good or great president, while 39% say he would be average and 33% say he would do a poor or terrible job. Nevertheless, this group’s views toward Biden are much more positive than toward Trump: Seven-in-ten “nones” say Trump has been a poor (13%) or terrible (56%) president, and a similar share of unaffiliated voters (72%) say they would vote for Biden if the election was today.

It's telling that the so-called "Nones" are more moral than evangelicals as evidenced by their stron rejection of Trump.

The Case for the Repudiation of Donald Trump in November

Former Republican Michael Gerson - who held positions in the Bush administration - makes the case in the Washington Post of why Donald Trump needs to be defeated in November, hopefully in a sting landslide that will trash his ego.  As I continue to state, the choice in November ultimately comes down to one of voting morality and decency or voting for immorality and hatred.  It's that simple and no desire for lower taxes - something I support, especially after having to write a fife figure check for additional taxes - does not justify voting for a man who is the embodiment of the seven deadly sins. Sadly, most evangelicals have shown they are on the side of immorality despite all of their false piety and self-congratulation.  As Gerson lays out, the Trump/Pence regime has proven to be perhaps the most incompetent and ugly in the nation's history and deserves a resounding defeat that might - I'm not holding my breath given the grip the white supremacists and Christofascists have on the party's base - result in some moral regeneration within the GOP.  Here are column excerpts:

The stage is being set for the repudiation of President Trump in November.

This is not merely because he has faced dual crises — the pandemic and the protests — that would have tested any president. It is because his reactions to those crises have been among the worst performances by any president. Trump’s eventual rejection by the electorate (if it comes) will be due to his own conscious choices in the face of challenge.

Without the pandemic and protests, Trump had a serious chance of reelection, which is a disturbing commentary on American politics. But this is now like saying that Herbert Hoover would have been a spiffing president without the Great Depression. Trump has been similarly and permanently marked by failure.

What other president would have played down the advance of a global health crisis to keep stock prices inflated? . . . . This delay in facing reality was an error on the scale of the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act signed by Hoover, which set off a global round of protectionism that expanded and deepened the depression.

What other president would have fed populist resistance to public health measures as the coronavirus pandemic continued to spread? It was in mid-April that Trump tweeted “LIBERATE MINNESOTA!,” “LIBERATE MICHIGAN!” and “LIBERATE VIRGINIA, and save your great 2nd amendment. It is under siege!” Trump actively undermined advice on lockdowns from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the National Institutes of Health in favor of the fringe views of a small number of armed protesters. And he chose — amazingly, alarmingly — to equate essential health measures with gun confiscation. I can think of no presidential precedent. It is unique in its recklessness.

When it came to the protests, Trump both cowered and raged. What other president would have employed a quote used by segregationists — “when the looting starts, the shooting starts” — in dealing with a national revolt against deadly discrimination? What other president would have turned tear gas and stun grenades against lawful protesters in order to strut across a park and hold up a Bible for the cameras? Not even Richard Nixon made such a public display of his viciousness and crassness.

Trump’s failure to rally the “silent majority” against social disorder is a hopeful commentary on American politics. Most Americans, silent or not, quickly realized that the overwhelming majority of protesters were enemies not of social order but of social injustice. When Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) eventually joined a Black Lives Matter march, Trump was left discredited and largely isolated in his racism.

This is not to say that a repudiation of Trump would quickly lead to a Republican rejection of Trumpism. The president’s use of economic distress, demographic transition and security threats to scapegoat migrants, Muslims and refugees found a deeper resonance among party regulars than I thought it would. Trump’s exploitation of rapid social change to fertilize evangelical Christians’ fears and harvest their support has been a signature success (though it has badly damaged the reputation of evangelicalism in the process).

A Trump defeat would at least begin a GOP debate on its ideological future. If Republicans lose control of the Senate, that debate will be more urgent. But most Republicans angling to be Trump’s political successor (see Sen. Tom Cotton of Arkansas, Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri and even former South Carolina governor Nikki Haley) are embracing key elements of Trumpism — without, presumably, the erratic megalomania.

None of Trump’s flailing and dereliction guarantees reelection defeat. It is not possible to reliably predict presidential weather patterns five months in advance. But on the health of our country, and on the unity of our country, Trump has been a peerless failure. If he loses, it will be because he already belongs on the Mount Rushmore of presidential losers.

Well said.

The Christianity Today Editorial Won’t Sway Evangelicals

Evangelical moral bankruptcy is unabated.

Like many, I welcomed the Christianity Today editorial calling for Donald Trump's removal from office.  That said, I viewed it as doing little to break white evangelicals' unholy alliance with Trump for several reasons.  The first is that Christianity Today, while respected, is not read by many evangelicals.  It is well written and tends to cater to educated evangelicals - to the extent that term isn't an oxymoron given that evangelicals tend to be the least educated of Christian denominations in the USA. The second is that the professional Christians who are driven by money and power rather than the gospel message - e.g., Franklin Graham, Tony Perkins, Jerry Falwell, Jr., et al- are totally unmoved by arguments centered on morality.  Thus, the sad reality is that most evangelicals will be unmoved and will continue to confirm to the rest of society that they are morally bankrupt and have no standing to lecture others on matters of morality or faith.  A column in the New York Times looks at this reality.  Here are highlights:

Thursday night, Christianity Today, long known as the “flagship” magazine of American evangelicalism, broke the internet with an editorial arguing for the impeachment and removal of Donald Trump from office. The piece, penned by the magazine’s outgoing editor, Mark Galli, implored evangelicals to consider the “unambiguous facts” of the impeachment case against [Trump] the president, maintaining his actions not only violated the Constitution, but were also “profoundly immoral.” 

The reaction — particularly from non-evangelicals — was excited and swift. . . . . The magazine’s website, apparently buckling under the unusual spate of traffic, was down for part of the evening, but that did not stop the avalanche of coverage on television, news sites and social media.

For many outsiders, Christianity Today seems to speak for millions of evangelicals. After all, the magazine was founded by Billy Graham, the pastor to presidents since Eisenhower.

That assumption, though, profoundly misapprehends American evangelicalism in the Trump era.

Since his 2016 election, in which 81 percent of white evangelicals voted for him, Mr. Trump continues to enjoy their unwavering loyalty. Three-quarters of white evangelicals approve of his job performance, and 80 percent of them remain opposed to impeaching him.

While many conservative evangelicals respect Christianity Today, it is read by a small slice of them, and is unlikely to make any significant dent in the president’s remarkable popularity. . . . .  It did not take long after the editorial was published for the president’s staunchest evangelical defenders, including Billy Graham’s son, Franklin, to react.

Mr. Graham reproached the magazine for invoking his father’s name to support its position, maintaining that his father, who died in 2018, had supported Mr. Trump as “the man for this hour in history for our nation.” He even accused the magazine of being “used by the left for their political agenda,” and representing “the elitist liberal wing of evangelicalism” — a smear taken up, not surprisingly, by [Trump] the president himself in a tweet.

As I reported the same day the editorial was published, Mr. Trump’s evangelical supporters have built a powerful network of political organizations, prayer warriors, televangelists, religious media, mega-churches and voter identification and mobilization efforts . . . . In this insular ecosystem, [Trump] the president is seen as a divinely anointed leader, sent by God to save America at a critical moment in history, when, supporters claim, their religious freedom is under attack by secularists.

Mr. Trump’s support is not just about anointings and prayers. It is also about personnel, policy and law — in other words, a government led by Christians who will undo, for example, advances in L.G.B.T.Q. rights. The Christian right enjoys not just regular and frequent access to the president, but virtual carte blanche on dictating policy, as top ideologues have been placed in cabinet positions and other political appointments in federal agencies.

Ralph Reed, a leading evangelical activist and supporter of Mr. Trump, has boasted to his followers, “There are more Christians serving” in the Trump administration “than all previous presidents combined.”

Mr. Trump’s evangelical defenders may truly believe he is anointed, or they may just relish the unparalleled authority he has granted them. Either way, this actual mainstream of American evangelicalism is not likely to give up on its divine leader, or on its newfound power, no matter what the impeachment proceedings uncover.