Trump Dog Whistles Evangelicals: He’s Their Guy

By guest columnist Al Rodbell

“There's nothing out there about Hillary’s religion, nothing. I think it will be an extension of Obama. At least with him we know what we were starting with and could be alert”.

Interpretation in plain English: “There is no evidence that Hillary is a Christian, and could well be a Muslim, like we know Obama is. But at least we were on the lookout for him, while Hillary is “passing” as Christian. So she could be anti-Christian like that other deceiver.

Evangelists relate to this and know that the Devil is also known as the great deceiver. They know this passage:

But I am afraid that, as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, your minds will be led astray from the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ.
2 Corinthians 11:3

The crowd knew well of Donald Trump's life, his repeated adulteries, which, far from asking for forgiveness, he boasted about on the air. They also knew that for most of his life he had been in favor of abortions, or in their perspective, allowing the murder of unborn babies. But none of this mattered at all.

Trump has done what could not have been done by any atheist, humanist or progressive. He has ripped off the facade of the Christian Right having anything to do with the teaching of Jesus Christ. What it has evolved to in this country is a special interest group, that along with all organizations that say the magic words, “I am a Religion”, are given tax subsidies. And if it’s the Religion of the Majority, the right to allow prayers in government legislatures.

What they have not been allowed to do in order to retain these benefits is to be overtly political, to endorse a given party or candidate. This is basic to the rationale of government subsidizing and supporting religion, in that it transcends these secular mundane battles to look to the higher principle of unification, of loving one’s neighbor and of being responsible to a higher moral authority.

Donald Trump, being what he is, is oblivious to his principle, and so as a special bonus for the Christian Right’s ignoring that his life is the antithesis of Christianity, he promised them he will as president allow churches to become overtly and blatantly promoters of a chosen political movement. Under a Trump presidency, the organized Dog Whistle No More: July 21: There it was in his acceptance speech: "I would like to thank the evangelical community who have been so good to me and so supportive. You have so much to contribute to our politics, yet our laws prevent you from speaking your minds from your own pulpits."
    
Christian religion in America will be part of the the Trumpian regime, with the legal right to preach the message that Christianity is engaged in a war, not with the Devil, but with that other deceiver, Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party.

I realize that it’s difficult for readers here to handle more condemnations of Trump destroying the core values of this country, but this should be a meaningful landmark in his quest to change the essence of this country. His clarion warning against outsiders, Muslims, Mexicans, Blacks and Asians; his opposition to the movement to replace the wars of the previous two centuries with a developing openness to free trade in commerce and ideas, have now been extended. This meeting, this secret meeting, was his message to Christians that even though he isn’t a very good one, he wants them in his coalition.

Mike Huckabee was the M.C of this event, and said words to the effect, “We certainly would not be considering you to be a pastor at one of our churches”. This was acknowledged with laughter from the crowd meaning that we know you are no model of Christianity and maybe not even “born again.” But, so what. They did not want that from Donald Trump. The deal was, we will support you if you give us even more power. We, with the help of your Supreme Court, will be allowed to infiltrate public schools and local city councils and plant the symbols of Christianity, which means America will subtly become what our church is.

We will be closer to the religio-facism of Saudi Arabia and Turkey, if the current neo-Islamist president succeeds in this country, was the meaning of the secret meeting; whereas if Trump becomes president, he will go down in history as one of the markers in the path of transforming this ostensibly secular democracy into something very different.

                       Al's other essays can be found at AlRodbell.com.

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