Last week, former President Donald Trump shared a new 3-minute campaign ad on Truth Social titled “God Made Trump.” This video has also aired at his official campaign rallies, with some attendees reportedly stretching out their hands in a posture of worship. With stirring music and images (and based on the famous “God made a farmer” ad), the video is worth watching in full to give you insights into Trump, his campaign, and his supporters. Here’s the transcript of the ad:
On June 14 1946, God looked down on his planned paradise and said, I need a caretaker. So God gave us Trump.
God said, ‘I need somebody willing to get up before dawn, fix this country, work all day, fight the Marxists, eat supper, then go to the Oval Office and stay past midnight at a meeting of the heads of state.’ So God made Trump.
‘I need somebody with arms strong enough to wrestle the Deep State and yet gentle enough to deliver his own grandchild. Somebody to ruffle the feathers, tame the cantankerous World Economic Forum, come home hungry, have to wait until the First Lady is done with lunch with friends. Then to tell the ladies to be sure and come back real soon. And mean it.’ So God gave us Trump.
‘I need somebody who can shape an axe, but wield a sword. Who had the courage to step foot in North Korea. Who can make money from the tar of the sand, turn liquid to gold, who understands the difference between tariffs and inflation. Will finish his 40 hour week by Tuesday noon, but then put in another 72 hours.’ So God made Trump.
God had to have somebody willing to go into the den of vipers, call out the fake news where their tongues are as sharp as a serpents–the poison of vipers is on their lips–and yet stop. So God made Trump.
God said, ‘I need someone strong and courageous. who will not be afraid or terrified of the wolves when they attack. A man who cares for the flock. A shepherd to mankind who will never leave nor forsake them. I need the most diligent worker to follow the path, and remain strong in faith and know the belief of God and country. Somebody who’s willing to drill, bring back manufacturing and American jobs, farm the lands, secure our borders, build our military, fight the system all day and finish a hard week’s work by attending church on Sunday.’
And then his oldest son turns and says, ‘Dad, let’s make America great again. Dad, let’s build back a country to be the envy of the world again.’
So God made Trump.
As an evangelical Christian who has been very critical of Trump and his Christian supporters, you might think I would deny the very premise of the ad. And to be fair, I could of course argue that God didn’t send Trump, it’s just that enough Americans voted for him that he was elected–our own free will brought him into office.1 Or I could hypothetically argue, as I did satirically here, that it was Satan who brought Trump into power. Or I could simply focus on how Trump is flirting with blasphemy, since he is saying that he–not Jesus–is a shepherd who will never leave nor forsake us.
I won’t argue either of those today. Instead I’ll just hypothetically wonder: what if God did indeed give us Trump?
In the Hebrew Scriptures (1 Samuel 8), the Israelites ask for a king so that they may be like the other nations. They want a powerful leader, a strongman, to fight for them and defeat their enemies. God names this desire as idolatry, and warns the Israelites of the disastrous outcomes that will follow from having a strongman king. But they persist in demanding it, so he ultimately lets the people have what they want. Sometimes God gives us the thing that we desperately demand, even if He knows it will be bad for us.
Obviously, not everyone in America wanted Trump to be elected president, least of all me. But I wonder if Trump is indeed the incarnation of who we are collectively as a nation. America, like Trump, is:
Sexually impure, adulterous
Self-absorbed, longing to be a celebrity
Addicted to social media and television
Practicesunhealthy eating and sleeping habits
Petty, flippant, and impulsive, yet with the ability to hold grudges for a long time
Cynically using religion as a weapon to win earthly battles
Greedy
Dismissive of the cares of the downtrodden and lowly
So, what if God did give us Trump, to be a judgment on America and reveal what this nation truly is?
Lord, have mercy.
“And on that day you will cry out because of your king, whom you have chosen for yourselves, but the Lord will not answer you on that day.” -1 Samuel 8:18
This is my actual view. I think God gives humans lots of freedom and free will, for better or worse. Sometimes we make good decisions, but sometimes we make bad ones. In other words, ultimately I don’t think God gave us Trump. We did. ↩︎
Last month I enjoyed a fun Memorial Day parade in my hometown of Newburgh, NY. I expected the procession to include a lot of flags, police cars, marching bands, and fire engines—and it did. More surprising to me however, were the large number of Latino evangelicals present in the parade, and particularly the prominent blending of Christianity and American patriotism. There was a Spanish-speaking church with multiple parade floats, led by a trio of Hispanic men blowing shofars, followed by an Israeli flag, the Christian flag, and dozens of American flags. As the lead pastor rode by, dressed in a suit and waving to the crowd, I could read “One Nation Under God” and “In God we trust” written across the side of his van, which was decked out with more American flags. Spanish worship music blared from the speakers.
Seeing this blend of Christianity and patriotism made me reflect on the nature of Christian nationalism. Political science theorist Paul Miller writes: “Christian nationalism is the belief that the American nation is defined by Christianity, and that the government should take active steps to keep it that way.” Christian nationalism has been in the news a lot recently, as it becomes increasingly apparent that many Trump supporters—particularly those who attempted the coup on January 6, 2021—are fervent believers in this ideology. While Christian nationalism has often seemed to the domain of white evangelicals, who form the bedrock of Trump’s support and supported him in record numbers in 2016 and 2020, there are a growing number of Christians of other ethnicities who have also embraced Christian nationalism, including Christians of Spanish descent. Political journalists have noted the massive swing towards Trump that occurred in these communities (especially in Texas and Florida) in the 2020 elections as compared to 2016. While I didn’t see any Trump signs at the Memorial Day parade, I would guess that many of these Latino evangelicals might also fit into that category.
And that brings me to the main point of my blog today. Watching the Memorial Day parade, while fun, brought up some uncomfortable reminders of Christian nationalism, and the dangers that can arise when Christians attempt to coerce others into our faith through political power. I could go on and on about the problems with nationalism generally, and have blogged about it in the past. However, most recent critiques of Christian nationalism in America that I have come across—particularly by those who aren’t Christian— typically focus on three problematic aspects: 1. its connections to white supremacy, 2. the focus on America First, and 3. a centering of Protestant Christianity. All of these critiques are of course valid to a certain extent in the United States, but I want to highlight what I saw in the Newburgh Memorial Day parade as a caution: if your main critique of Christian Nationalism is that it is too centered on whiteness, America, and/or Protestantism, then your critique simply will not apply to many versions of Christian nationalism in our world today.
As the Latino parade marchers illustrate, more and more, Christian Nationalism is NOT a domain of European whiteness- nor even of America. One can look more broadly at the rise of Christian nationalism in Brazil, or African nations like Uganda. There are attempts by more and more non-white peoples around the world to inscribe Christian values into their countries’ laws through legislation and political power. And lest one think that Christian nationalism is a fundamentally evangelical or Protestant phenomenon, one only has to look at the twisted version of Russian Orthodoxy that Putin has mobilized and militarized alongside Russian Archbishop Kirill in order to justify his imperialistic endeavors. Even in America, more and more Catholics are building alliances with their former Protestant rivals in order to fight what they see as rising “wokeness.” Contrary to what one might have heard, Christian nationalism is not a solely white, American, or Protestant phenomenon.
Moreover, these narrow secular critiques of Christian nationalism remind me of the argument that philosopher Susan Sontag had with the poet Adrienne Rich regarding the nature of German Nazis’ ideology. Adrienne Rich had argued that the best way to understand Nazism was solely through the lens of misogyny–she wrote that Nazism was “patriarchy at its purest, most elemental form.” Sontag rebutted that while misogyny was certainly present, to focus on patriarchy over and above other aspects of Nazism (such as racism, anti-Semitism, violence, capitalism, imperialism, etc) is to deny the complexity of the problem. Similarly, to simply denounce Christian Nationalism solely for being too white, or too American, is dangerously myopic, and leaves one open to counter-arguments like this: “Well, we can’t be Christian nationalists because we aren’t white and we aren’t American!” They fail to comprehend the real appeal of Christian nationalism, which is the same appeal it has held for millennia, ever since the Roman Emperor Constantine co-opted the faith in 313 CE and began using it to justify his rule and reign. Christian nationalism is appealing because it is a form of idolatry, of using the name of God to bless one’s empire and defeat one’s enemies (domestic or foreign).
If Christian nationalism is only really wrong because America does it, then your critique can’t go back further than 1776; if it’s only wrong because it’s too Protestant, it can’t go back further than 1517; if it’s only wrong because it’s too white, then you can’t go back further than the 1400s (when the concept of “whiteness” originated). We need to go back further than that.
Thus, to lay my cards not he table, I believe the fundamental weakness of critiquing Christian Nationalism for being too racist, too American, or too Protestant is that it simply does not go deep enough; it fails to address the root of the problem. (And to be clear, the problem is not that Christians are acting voting and acting according to their moral beliefs about what is right or wrong—because that is hopefully true for EVERY. SINGLE. PERSON.) The core problem at the heart of Christian nationalism is this–should Christians be attempting to establish Christianity as the pre-eminent religion? Should Christians ever use political power to coerce people to follow Jesus?
Admittedly, some Christians, particularly those who have a dim view of free will, have no problem with this. They might argue that other religions—notably Islam—spread through the sword, and if governmental power helps people to make other wise decisions (like wearing a seatbelt), then why not use coercion to force people to become Christian? For me and other Anabaptists, however, it is clear from the New Testament that Jesus’ Kingdom is not of this world, and as such he forbids his followers from using the sword to advance their interests. The earliest Christians refused to fight in wars, and would not use force to make others believe. We Anabaptists do not even baptize infants, insisting that they be able to make a free choice to be baptized when they are mature enough to decide for themselves. Thus Anabaptists such as myself would argue that Christianity is always wrong when it uses violence to coerce others into following Jesus, and our critique can go back all the way to the “Christianization” of the Roman Empire in 313 CE, would apply all the way through the Crusades, Inquisition, and European conquests, and will keep on applying going forward regardless what form Christian nationalism takes next.
For example, I think there is a chance, however small, that within the next century China will hit a tipping point where the number of Christians becomes too large for the government to keep repressing. Imagine then a Chinese version of Roman Emperor Constantine, who decides that it is easier to co-opt Christianity to serve his regime rather than to keep fighting it. Imagine that then we see a new version of Christian nationalism that uses the cross to justify Chinese persecution of the Muslim Uighurs, Chinese expansionism in Asia, and even a war against the increasingly non-Christian West. If your critique of Christian nationalism is that it is too white, or too centered on American Christianity or Protestantism, then you would have little to say against a uniquely Chinese Christian nationalism. (Or Brazilian Christian nationalism, or Ugandan Christian nationalism… etc).
However, if instead you have been critiquing Christian nationalism all along because Jesus’ followers are called to never use violence against their opponents, then you actually have a worthwhile—and consistent!—counter-philosophy to offer. That is why I think it is so crucial in this time for Anabaptist Christians to offer up their theology of pacifism (and our connected critiques of Christian nationalism) and spread it far and wide. Lord knows that Western Christians need to understand that Christian nationalism is flawed; but the center of the Church is no longer in the West. Now is the time for Christians around the entire globe to learn from Western Christianity’s mistakes and to reject the temptation to pick up the sword. Otherwise, we will see the heartbreaking cycle of violence continue in a new generation, staining the name of Jesus once more as rising powers in the Global East and South flex their muscles and attempt to build their own Christian Empires.
The sword is a lot easier to carry than the cross. Every generation since Peter sliced off the servants’ ear in the garden of Gethsemane will be tempted to establish God’s Kingdom through violence. But that’s not the way of Jesus. And Christians of every tribe, nation, and tongue need to be reminded of that.
[For a book that does a great job of critiquing Christian nationalism both in principle and as it has been practiced in America, I recommend Paul Miller’s The Religion of American Greatness: What’s Wrong with Christian Nationalism. Paul Miller is himself a practicing Christian so this book is an insider’s view at the philosophical and theological issues with Christian nationalism.]
[For another book that is a bit shorter and less academic, but was written 18 years ago so it’s a bit out of date, I’d recommend Greg Boyd’s Myth of a Christian Nation. This book was one of the biggest influences on how I shifted in my political and religious views away from Christian nationalism and to my current views.]
I left Twitter a couple years ago, but sometimes I have pithy thoughts that are roughly the length of a 280 character Tweet. Here are some of them, in no particular order. [WARNING: As tweets, they are not very nuanced and tend to be pretty black-and-white…so please don’t read too much into them. Any intelligent person, including myself, could probably rebut every single one of these Tweets if given enough time and thought. Moreover, I myself don’t necessarily fully agree with all of them. But I think some of them are interesting and hopefully they provide some food for thought.]
To have CONVICTION is to affirm that everything you believe right now is true. To have HUMILITY is to realize that you’ve been wrong in the past about some things, and thus are probably wrong about some things in the present. To be a healthy pursuer of truth is to have BOTH conviction AND humility, and thus to respect those you disagree with (even if you think they’re wrong—after all, you have also been wrong in the past).
The invasion of Ukraine has simultaneously illustrated the benefits of local nuclear energy (more dependable than oil and gas imports) and the potential danger (intentional or accident incidents threatening to spread radiation).
I’m generally not a fan of how “masculinity” is defined in American culture, but even if I were, it’s strange to me why so many people view Donald Trump as such a manly man. He doesn’t drink alcohol or coffee, doesn’t exercise, wears makeup, is unfaithful to his wife, doesn’t hunt, never served in the military, rarely laughs…
If your theology is far more similar to the theology found among elite, educated, wealthy white American liberals than it is to that found among impoverished, oppressed, and persecuted Christians in non-Western nations, then I have some bad news about how “decolonized” your theology actually is…
People may wonder what a Christian pacifist view of the Ukraine war would be: What would a pacifist (such as myself) do in the situation? Well, given that ~70% of Russians identify as Christian, it can be assumed that if all the Christians in the Russian army held to Jesus’ view on violence (“love your enemies”), they would immediately throw down their arms and return home, ending the war outright.
There are two deep ironies to the Trump presidency. The first is that his most significant historic achievement, Operation Warp Speed, is the one accomplishment that means nothing to his most loyal supporters. The second is that his biggest legacy, the overturn of Roe v. Wade, is destined to hinder his party’s political popularity for a generation.
If you are unwilling or unable to understand the appeal of an ideology that you disagree with, then at best your efforts to oppose it will be ineffective, and at worst they will actually encourage it all the more.
When Democrats lost an important election in 2016, they knitted ‘pussy’ hats, wore black, and cried. When Republicans lost an important election in 2020, they claimed the election was stolen, bought guns, and assaulted the US Capitol. One side is clearly more likely to start a civil war than the other. (Given that fact, there’s probably not a real need to worry about a domestic civil war until liberals start buying guns. That’s when you should start to worry.)
The solution to the age-old Euthryphro Dilemma is similar to the solution of asking , “which side of a quarter is more important?” While the question makes sense on a logical level, the answer is to simply point out that both sides are not just equally important, but inseparable from each other. Similarly for the Euthryphro problem the answer is that ‘God’ and ‘Justice’ are two sides of the same coin.
The sentiment that “I have a right to sex and if I’m not getting any, it’s society’s fault in some way” is a subtly broken sentiment on several levels. While it sounds deeply progressive on the surface, it is also the sentiment at the foundation of the misogynistic and far-right “incel” movement. No one has a fundamental right to sex that must be granted to them by others.
Cattails seeds are like the kingdom of God. They are spread by the wind, and especially after being pecked at by others.
What percentage of people does “The System” have to work for for that system to be worth keeping ? (Assuming that no system can work for everyone). 99% ? 51% ? Something else? We should be cautious before throwing out a system without having a good idea of whether the system that replaces it would work any better.
Putins biggest mistake was not invading Ukraine while Trump was still president. There’s no way the US under Trump would have marshaled the resources that have come through for the Ukrainians in the past year.
I saw a tweet that said that “Any reason to get an abortion is the right one.” But I disagree; I can think of many reasons that a person could get an abortion that don’t seem like great reasons. For ex: 1. Genetic testing shows that I’m pregnant with a female. 2. My boyfriend is telling me to get an abortion or he’s going to leave me. 3. I am afraid my baby is going to be gay. 4. My job doesn’t offer parental leave. Etc.
There’s a loophole in Jesus’ command to “love your neighbor as yourself” in that if you don’t feel like loving them, you can just deport them somewhere else… and then they’re not your neighbor anymore!
The Bible is a bit like an invitation to a wedding. It contains immense value not only because of the words on the page but especially because it points to a wondrous banquet and invites one to RSVP “yes” or “no.”
For many Christians , Jesus is their Savior but he is not their Lord.
To help white people divest from white supremacy, it is not enough to simply love people of color. You must also love white people.
One ironic difference between an unarmed, committed pacifist and, say, one of the heavily armed Uvalde SWAT police officers (who refused to storm the school building while the shooter was inside actively shooting people), is that the pacifist is willing to risk death for the sake of their convictions, and the SWAT officers weren’t.
As we see women slowly gain equality to men in society, will we see an increase in certain rates, such as female murderers, female mass shooters, etc? If not, why not? I actually think the answer really matters, because in it lies the clue for how to help modern men.
I think you can be a pacifist without being a universalist, however I find it hard to believe one can be a universalist without being a pacifist. If you believe no one is unworthy of being in God’s perfect presence in heaven, then how could you believe it would ever be justified to use deadly violence against them on earth? To be a universalist but not a pacifist is essentially to say: “God wouldn’t ever hold any of your sins against you-but I might!”
Elite liberals fixating on school shooters’ access to assault rifles as the most important topic in gun control is an example of the gentrification of an important political issue. Handguns kill far more people through gang shootings, suicides, and accidents, but those get a lot less attention than the specter of a shooter with an AR-15 in a peaceful suburban town.
There’s a perspective among some Christians that hell is not about burning in fire, but is merely just about being separated from God. Well, sure, I could buy that. However, if you believe that being completely separated from God‘s entire is the worst thing in the world, then that is actually worse than being in a lake of fire. If God is who He says he is, it would be far better to burn in fire with God (like Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego), than to live in paradise without him!
Arguments about arming teachers in schools are pretty hilarious to me. When I taught middle school in Baltimore, I safely and effectively broke up 22 fights between students by physically intervening. I also broke up a high school fight on my street in Carlisle two years ago. I cannot think of a single fight where the presence of a sidearm strapped to my side would have made the situation safer, and more likely it would have made it far more dangerous (e.g., if the gun had accidentally discharged, or a student grabbed it in the middle of the tussle.) I think an argument could be made for there to be one or two armed resource officers in a school, but arming teachers–even with training– is just asking for trouble.
There’s actually some key ways that one can use arguments from the perspective of “progressivism/CRT” (loosely defined) in order to defend certain core Christian doctrines. For example, “Oh, you don’t believe in a Judgment Day? That’s a very privileged stance, to believe that no matter what systems of oppression you participate in, that God ultimately just doesn’t care. Most marginalized and oppressed groups long for a day when God judges the righteous and unrighteous.” Or – “ oh, you believe that truth is relative and each individual should figure out what is right and wrong for themselves? That’s a very individualistic, white Western perspective on morality. Most non-white and non-Western cultures have a more group-oriented perspective that takes into consideration the needs of the entire community, and the most marginalized within it, not just whatever a privileged person decides on their own.”
When edgy progressivism becomes the norm and institutionalized, it ceases to feel edgy. Instead it is conservatism that begins to feel edgy.
Christians–whether more progressive or conservative–who portray Jesus as entirely different from the “violent, strict, legalistic” God of the Old Testament are showing how little they understand Jesus’ teachings, and moreover are engaging in theological anti-Semitism. Jews have worshipped the “God of the Old Testament” for 5000+ years, and to simply write him off as a hateful has-been is to indict their entire religion.
Republicans who think we should cut back support for Ukraine and instead “be tough on China” are hopelessly confused. China is watching carefully how the US responds to Russian aggression in Ukraine, and if we are perceived as weak in any way, that will further encourage China to attack Taiwan and other nations. In our broken world, the best way to deter a Chinese invasion is to prove to them that US weapons can defend any ally against any aggressor.
To have any sense of historical memory in America nowadays is to feel like one is slowly going insane. Objective facts, once universally accepted across society, are either completely memory-holed, or twisted to mean the exact opposite. Sometimes I wonder: Am I the crazy one? Or are we all just being gaslit by nefarious actors seeking their own personal gain?
Think back just a few years, to the first Trump impeachment (yes, there were two Trump impeachments). The reason for this impeachment was that Trump tried to violate treaty obligations and withhold military defense aid from Ukraine, a fledgling democracy trying to bolster its defenses against potential Russian military aggression. Now here we are, and Ukraine is on the verge of invasion by Russia, with 120,000 soldiers on its border. Even without Trump in the Oval Office, Putin perceives weakness on the part of Ukraine and America alike, and only he knows what may happen next.
Despite the seeming inevitability of invasion, I would caution Putin to also remember the historical record. A seemingly weak American president choosing to react strongly against a Russian invasion of a border nation? It’s happened before, in 1980 after the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. As I wrote for one of my senior seminars in college:
“President Carter is widely derided by many as a “dove” who let foreign powers walk all over the United States. At first glance, this view may seem accurate. Under Carter, the US economy faltered, Iranian radicals took over the American embassy in Tehran, Sandinista rebels took over Nicaragua, and the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan. However, Carter’s reaction to the latter event would surprise many: he immediately funneled immense amounts of military aid to rebel mujahedeen, threatened to boycott the 1980 Olympics in Moscow, and shut down SALT II nuclear arms reduction talks. This paper shall explore and analyze the Carter administration’s decision-making process in the wake of the Soviet invasion. Carter’s harsh line, seemingly out of character for him, can be explained when one examines the military, political, and societal forces surrounding the situation. Fearing Soviet influence over the Persian Gulf and eager to win back American opinion of his foreign policy, Carter chose to react forcefully against the Russians. Carter’s “hawkish” response to the invasion thus makes sense: the Carter administration was merely shifting in reaction to changes in the global and domestic environment.“
Nothing can unite a country like a military response to a foreign policy crisis (in political science this is known as the “rally-around-the-flag” effect). While Putin may sense an opportunity to expand Russia’s borders, the Biden administration may find that a strong response is not only militarily feasible, but politically popular. In am election year where he is (like Carter) facing inflation, deep unpopularity, and perceived weakness both at home and abroad, Biden may decide to pivot to a more muscular foreign policy in 2022.
Seem far-fetched? I invite you to read the rest of my research paper analyzing President Carter’s response to the USSR invasion of Afghanistan in 1980, and consider: in what ways is this similar or different to a potential Russian invasion of Ukraine? How might Joe Biden respond, both publicly and secretly? What sympathy might images of Ukrainian refugees fleeing Russian aggression generate in the mass media? Post your comments and questions below.
