This is fun. A pastor writing at SBC Voices nails the role of evangelicals in this year’s election.
Simply put, if Donald Trump becomes the GOP nominee, American evangelicals will be largely responsible. There is simply no excuse for this.
Now, recall Albert Mohler’s remark to NPR a few days ago.
We have taken comfort in the fact that there have been millions and millions of us in America. And a part of that evidence has been the last several election cycles, with the evangelical vote being in the millions. And now we’re having to face the fact that, evidently, theologically-defined — defined by commitment to core evangelical values — there aren’t so many millions of us as we thought.
Scan the comments (most of them by pastors) at the SBC Voices post I linked to above, and you’ll see they are nearly unanimous that Trump is unfit for the presidency.
Even stopped clocks are right twice a day, et cetera, et cetera.
Here is what strikes me: The pastors know so little about their flocks, and have so little influence. They don’t understand Trump’s appeal; or that Trump is the voice of their congregations’ subterranean envy and resentment and malice; or that Nietzsche was right: Christianity is the revolt of everything that crawls against everything that soars. Of course their flocks are wild for The Donald; he’s trashing their betters.
I can sympathize with the pastors’ confusion — a little. You can’t blame a pastor for wondering, Why do they come sit in my church every Sunday morning when their idea of a great man is a cheap blowhard like Donald Trump?
I’ve wondered for years: Are these guys idiots who actually believe all this crazy stuff, or are they cynical whores who service idiots who actually believe all this crazy stuff? Given what I am convinced is genuine bafflement at Trump’s appeal, I think the answer must be the former: They’re idiots. They’ve no idea who is sitting in their pews, or why they’re there.