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Posted on 06/20/2020 8:33:08 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
A new book consisting of essays by 30 evangelical Christians of different political and professional stripes is calling on white evangelicals to rethink their support for President Donald Trump in 2020 and warns the president is damaging the broader culture’s perception of evangelical Christianity.
The new book, The Spiritual Danger of Donald Trump: 30 Evangelical Christians on Justice, Truth, and Moral Integrity, was released last Monday by Wipf and Stock Publishers.
“Our plea is to white evangelicals to please take another look and ask, ‘Does this person measure up to biblical norms?’” Ron Sider, founder of Evangelicals for Social Action, told The Christian Post. “We are not telling you what to include. But please prayerfully think about that.
Even if you think the book will make you mad, given the title, I challenge you to read it and decide for yourself if there are any valid points that we are making there.”
Wipf and Stock Publishers
Sider, who edited the book, is a longtime evangelical figure and an advocate for biblical solutions to social and economic injustices. He has published over 40 books, including Rich Christians in an Age of Hunger.
Sider said that his call is for white evangelicals to evaluate evangelicalism’s “biblically balanced” agenda before they vote in 2020.
Exit polls from 2016 showed that about eight-in-10 self-identified white evangelicals or born-again Christians voted for the Republican candidate, Trump, in the 2016 election, while just 16% voted for Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton.
Sider said that evangelicals wondering what exactly a biblically balanced agenda is can turn to the public policy priorities of the National Association of Evangelicals, which he says calls for evangelical civil engagement to have a “biblically balanced agenda.”
“The book is not a book to tell people how to vote,” Sider stressed. “It is a book to call people to think biblically about this election and about the character of candidates.”
The book features commentary from Republicans, Democrats and Independents who work in a wide range of sectors: from university professors and theologians to a former congressman and a former CIA analyst.
“We’re not just left-wing Democrats,” Sider said. “We are a whole range of views begging American white evangelicals to ask this simple question: ‘Does Donald Trump’s behavior and policies fit with or contradict biblical norms?’”
Contributors include Baylor University Professor George Yancey, former Republican Congressman Reid Ribble, conservative speaker and author Vicki Courtney as well as scholars like the Ethics & Public Policy Center’s Pete Wehner and John Fea of Messiah College in Pennsylvania, both of whom have regularly expressed their displeasure with the president in the media.
In their chapters, the contributors write about different areas of concern they have with the actions, policies or behaviors of the president.
Topics include Trump’s instances of dishonesty, his past adulterous behaviors, his attacks on the media, the president’s past controversial statements on women, policies restricting immigration and refugee resettlement as well as his administration’s policies to restrict welfare benefits, among other topics.
“One of the most common biblical themes is God’s special concern for the poor. But that doesn’t seem to be a significant part of his policy,” argued Sider, who also serves as distinguished professor emeritus of theology, holistic ministry and public policy at Palmer Theological Seminary at Eastern University in Pennsylvania.
For many conservative Christians, they voted for Trump as a “lesser of two evils” in 2016. During the 2016 campaign, Trump made a concerted effort to appeal to conservative evangelicals’ concerns about the issues of abortion and religious freedom. His administration has done much to follow through with those campaign promises.
However, Sider warns that evangelicals should not be single-issue or dual-issue voters.
“I’ve always said I think those are very important issues. But if we are going to be biblical in our politics, we need to go back and ask: ‘What is it that God cares about?’” Sider said. “God cares about the sanctity of human life and justice for the poor. God cares about marriage and racial justice. God cares about sexual integrity and cares for creation and peacemaking and freedom. It is simply fundamentally mistaken to think that one issue overrides all others.”
In his chapter, Yancey, a Baylor professor of sociology, admits that Trump spoke to the needs of conservative evangelicals in 2016 that were not being addressed by other politicians. They were concerns and fears that he, as an evangelical, shared.
Yancey, an African American, said there is credible fear that the radical political left has become hostile toward traditionally Christian views on issues like marriage and sexuality. Trump vowed to protect religious freedom at a time when many conservative Christians perceived their rights to uphold their beliefs to be dwindling in the face of secular culture and politicians.
“I want to say to my Christian friends, especially the evangelical ones who most support Trump: I hear you. Christianophobia is real,” Yancey wrote. “I have studied and debated it with those who do not believe it exists. Trump has promised to protect Christians. The seeking of political control is one way to try to deal with Christianophobia. But it is the wrong way.”
Yancey contended that Trump “can’t fix what troubles Christians” because he can only offer a political solution while the issue is “cultural.”
“What Trump can do is make the situation worse by turning culture against us further,” he wrote.
He warned that if Christians do not “push back on the disturbing attributes of Trump, then we will own those attributes.”
“For example, if enough Christians accept the perceptions of this leader … then our faith will become known for not caring about the race-baiting statements of our president,” Yancey contended. “This will translate into Christians not caring about racism and people of color. The argument that we must vote for Trump as the less bad option will not save us from being labeled racist if we do not challenge Trump’s race-baiting.”
Yancey drew a comparison to how conservative Christians view Christians who support the Democratic Party.
“Many conservative Christians accuse Democratic Christians of endorsing abortion because they vote for pro-choice candidates,” he stated. “If those Christians stay silent on this issue, then they have a point. But if Democratic Christians vote for Democrats despite and make it plain they opposed that plank of their political party, then they do not own the pro-choice label.”
Courtney, a conservative southern woman and award-winning author who speaks at women’s conferences, challenged evangelical Christians, even those who vote for Trump, to speak out when the president does something that doesn’t meet the biblical standard.
“You cannot stand for moral decency and express outrage over the objectification of women if you are willing to give Trump a free pass,” she wrote. “No one will respect your opinion.
“I recently watched an example of this play out on Twitter in the aftermath of the 2020 Super Bowl halftime show. Franklin Graham tweeted concern that Shakira and J.Lo’s performance was ‘showing young girls that sexual exploration of women is okay.’ I share much of Graham’s sentiment, but many were quick to call him out on a double standard.”
She said some social media users responded to Graham with pull quotes from Trump’s past comments on women.
“The Franklin Graham Twitter exchange perfectly illustrates the larger-scale problem Christians face if they choose to ignore, minimize or make excuses for Trump’s misogyny (and other immoral offenses),” she wrote. “No one will take Christianity seriously if we shout about the moral injustices of past presidents but are struck dumb when it comes to the moral injustices of the current one.”
Sider fears that the “broader culture is developing a negative view of Christianity.”
“Because of the close identity of white evangelicals and the behavior and actions of Donald Trump, I am worried about the long-term effect on the culture’s attitude toward Christianity as a result of the failure of white evangelicals to say, ‘That’s not acceptable,’” he said.
Biden will save your soul!
There are millions of Democrats in evangelical churches, many long-time attendees. Their previous generation helped bring about the election of GA’s Jimmy Carter.
...calling on white evangelicals...
IOW, a bunch of Demwit atheist racists collaborated on a book-length lie.
Said another way, he’s an asshole.
Can I ask a stupid question? Why does he talk about white evangelicals? He mentions white evangelicals more than once. What does race have to do with being an Evangelical Christian?
They make an (lame) attempt at balance, but they don't ask about the same Q of Biden or any other possible candidate...
RE: What does race have to do with being an Evangelical Christian?
Here’s the truth many refuse to face..
ALL LIVES MATTER in the eyes of God.
The Moment you insist on adding a color in front of the phrase, you become a RACIST.
Well, I've thought about it long and hard when "this person" was Bill Clinton, Nancy Pelosi, John F'n Kerry, Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, Harry Reid, Chuck U. Schumer, Adam Schitt, Maxine Waters, Jesee Jackson and just about every one of the "urinalists" on ABC/CBS/CNN/MSNBC/NBC/PBS/Wash Post/NYTimes/LATimes/AP/Reuters/ and on an on...
The honest answer, from my perspective, is they all show up morally and ethically short of Donald J. Trump on any day of the week.
democrat/physician, heal thyself!
Fake Christianity is just as prevalent as fake news. One only has to only read the bible and look back to time when God set the rules for protecting a society and culture. God warned against his people being contaminated by other cultures with completely different standards. And yes Jerusalem had a wall around it.
Fake Christians define the rules by their own standards and not those of God. And they totally ignore the nature of humanity and they they think they can redefine those too. The end result is that every christianly beacon of light is destroyed while they claim it is God’s will.
The choice is clear for me. I will never again vote for somebody with a “D” behind his or her name.
Apostates...all!
So, these ‘Christians’ are telling us that voting for a pedophile who has a serious mental problem is what is ‘godly’ and ‘good for Christians’.
These people have been deceived and should no longer be listened to or even called ‘Christians’.
I don't like to question the sincerity of self identified Christians, but it's unavoidable here. What biblical Christian thinks in terms of asking white evangelicals to consider something when they vote? Do they assume black or Asian evangelicals are already considering that when voting, and whites are failing to do so? That would be kind of racist, wouldn't it?
Or, is it because black evangelicals are assumed to be mainly voting for Biden (maybe they aren't even thinking of Asians, which is typical of leftists)? In that case, why are they not posing this same question about Biden? Why wasn't the book written about both of them? Biden appears to fall far short of biblical norms.
Objectively, there is more information to indicate Biden's a sexual predator and has used his office to enrich himself and his family than Pres. Trump. The only logical reason for not including Biden in this is that they don't care whether he measures up to biblical norms.
I conclude therefore that these Christians are disgustingly insincere.
The Lord detests dishonest scales, but accurate weights find favor with him.
Proverbs 11:1
The Left has taken over all of the Churches.
American Christianity has fallen into the heretical pit dug by marxism, Postmodernism, and critical race theory.
Put another way, they are wrapping a heretical pig in a Christian blanket.
If the authors think “culture” hasn’t been firmly against Christians since Jesus was crucified, then they lack credibility and self-awareness. And the argument that if a Christian doesn’t “own” the abortion plank of the Democrat party if they vote for a Democrat that supports abortion doesn’t hold water, either.
Good catch...I missed that.
I am not impressed by professional religious journals. Subject doesn’t even matter.
I hope the author was paid well by George Soros and the Democratic/Media Party Oligarchs.
These folks are not conservatives. And their logic for voting left while not being truly left on the inside is disingenuous.
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