Publisher's Synopsis
Trump and the Christian right In 2016 Donald Trump was elected president of United States. And following his win he was inaugurated on January 21, 2017 witnessed by a lackluster crowd of relatively small numbers of people. The very next day, in the same location, an overwhelmingly huge crowd of folks, mostly women came as part of a grassroots movement called the women's march, to protest his inauguration. The total number of women in Washington, DC that day was around 1/4 million; but other groups of women gathered around the nation and around the globe in solidarity with this movement was estimated at five million. Many on both sides of the ticket had anticipated Hillary Clinton would be elected the first ever woman president of our country, but it didn't happen. In the shock, horror and frustration of Donald Trump's election this tidal wave of protesters appeared, as if out of nowhere.During the campaign cycle something worth noting, was in the Christian right's (evangelical Christian's) overwhelming embrace of Trump as their undisputed champion for their conservative Christian coalitions. Ordinarily this is not so unusual, but because it was Donald Trump, a despicable human being, it became a very curious deal! If the Christian right was naive about this fact it would be one thing, but this very large and very active ultraconservative group of people openly claim their awareness of his immoral behavior; they claim full awareness that he is a compulsive liar, a shady businessman, a whore monger and a racist! They are aware of all of the factors that make him despicable, yet despite this they still back him 100%. In examining this phenomenon we will ask some basic questions that are apt to bring forth some, potentially, surprising answers. One of the secondary ramifications of his presidency has to do with an ever deepening and widening cultural rift; a rift whose effects have surely been penetrating deep into the folds and recesses of the national fabric and are being felt in faith communities across America, at an intra-congregational level, regardless of denomination. It is effecting worship services and bringing a self-righteous tenor into the sanctuary and leaving varying levels of spiritual incongruity and ill will. And now that it's out of the can, so to speak, is it even possible to put it back in? Would doing so be the best move? Will Christianity as a whole be able to recover from such a rift? If so, what would initiate such a recovery? Would it be some sort of program? If so, which denomination would run things? Is this something so big and so complicated that only God can figure it out?! Will this condition continue until Jesus Himself comes back to put things right?The way Christianity was once divided up into several denominations which featured their own particular talking points, today what seems to matter way more than denominational differences is this rift which divides people in their belief about who God actually is!
