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As Donald Trump increasingly infuses his campaign with Christian trappings while coasting to a third Republican presidential nomination, his support is as strong as ever among evangelicals and other conservative Christians.
“Trump supports Jesus, and without Jesus, America will fall,” said Kimberly Vaughn of Florence, Kentucky, as she joined other supporters of the former president entering a campaign rally near Dayton, Ohio.
Many of the T-shirts and hats that were worn and sold at the rally in March proclaimed religious slogans such as “Jesus is my savior, Trump is my president” and “God, Guns & Trump.” One man’s shirt declared, “Make America Godly Again,” with the image of a luminous Jesus putting his supportive hands on Trump’s shoulders.
Many attendees said in interviews they believed Trump shared their Christian faith and values. Several cited their opposition to abortion and LGBTQ+ rights, particularly to transgender expressions.
Nobody voiced concern about Trump’s past conduct or his present indictments on criminal charges, including allegations that he tried to hide hush money payments to a porn actor during his 2016 campaign. Supporters saw Trump as representing a religion of second chances.
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Sometimes I wonder what it’s like to be this dumb.
My life is needlessly difficult because I try to understand stupid people. It wears me out.
It’s like somewhere in the ancient past someone wished that stupidity was painful, but forgot to specify who it should be painful for.
I REALLY hate genies…
A historical context helps out with this. They’re just us from 500 years ago. Even this divinely ordained stuff is straight out of history textbooks, the divine right to rule that medieval kings claimed.
yea, sometimes these guys sound like the christian mobs from the early “dark ages”, the ones who destroyed pagan symbols e.g. Hypatia.
Same here. The other night I had to ask myself repeatedly “if I was awful at my job, where would I have put…” and it hurts. Being competent comes naturally to me so, to me, it seems that it takes way more effort to be that dumb.
The irony being that the only way to understand it is to be that dumb. But if you were that dumb, you wouldn’t understand it nor would you try to because you’d think you are smart.
Some people are completely lost in the modern world. They shut down completely whenever anyone aims any critic at them and congregate to unquestioningly hold on to what they recognize. It is basic human instinct and being smart sometimes just pushes some of these people into taking advantage of the system and leading this herd mentality, instead of taking a risk trying to wake them up.
Unfortunately, it’s well understood that political engagement especially when in a debate is an emotional undertaking.
Complicated further by the fact that we tend not to change our assumptions even when presented with data that proves otherwise.
We are a tribal species whose emotions are not geared towards understanding the far reaching and nuanced decisions we are faced with.
Jesus was an anti-war, anti-capitalist, inclusivity-preaching socialist who gave free healthcare to the sick and free food to the hungry. Maybe they should crack open that book they always talk about.
If “anyone can talk to god, you don’t need all the ceremony” can turn into the Catholic Church et al for 1,900+ years, I don’t think they’re gonna read for comprehension on inclusion.
“anyone can talk to god, you don’t need all the ceremony”
That’s really close to why the Protestant Reformation happened, out of which all sorts of other lunacy has sprung. I’m not defending the Catholic Church by any means, but this particular criticism might not hit as hard as you intended it to.
You left out the apocalyptic zombie cannibal cult part.
That came later, really just all the blame on Constantine.
John the Baptist was an apocalyptic Jew. I think it was there from the beginning. The apocalyptic Jewish sects make sense when you consider that they started their religion during the tail end of The Bronze Age collapse. They had just watched all the major powers implode, and tons of knowledge went with them. Makes sense that they would think the world was about to end.
The problem is it’s got a lot of convenient contradictory statements in it.
For example:
He said to them, “But now, the one who has a purse must take it, and likewise a bag. And the one who has no sword must sell his cloak and buy one.
- Luke 22:36
This part isn’t in Marcion’s version of Luke, which is probably the earliest extant version. But it is in the canonical version.
Something very convenient given it reversed the ban found across the Synoptics on carrying a purse when ministering, which necessarily prevented taking people’s money.
Just a bonus that it also allowed for the church to take up swords too right around before the time they start executing people for ‘heresy.’
There’s plenty of problematic passages added in over the years:
Just then a Canaanite woman from that region came out and started shouting, “Have mercy on me, Lord, Son of David; my daughter is tormented by a demon.” But he did not answer her at all. And his disciples came and urged him, saying, “Send her away, for she keeps shouting after us.” He answered, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” But she came and knelt before him, saying, “Lord, help me.” He answered, “It is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.”
- Matthew 15:22-26
So inclusive.
Why did you stop at verse 26?
27 “Yes it is, Lord,” she said. “Even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master’s table.”
28 Then Jesus said to her, “Woman, you have great faith! Your request is granted.” And her daughter was healed at that moment.
Because the woman calling him master and him then giving in is irrelevant to her being called a dog compared to children beforehand.
The author of Matthew has a clear agenda, and the passage excerpt stands on its own.
You really don’t think the context of the woman correcting him, Jesus accepting the response of a canaanite woman, admitting fault, thanking her for her faith, and then rewarding her doesn’t change the context of “Jesus compared a woman to a dog” just a little bit?
He didn’t admit fault. He said she had enough faith to justify his taking action. But nothing about his own initial answer being unjustified. You are reading that into the text when it isn’t there.
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Yes… I wonder what that agenda might be, when a few chapters later, Jesus/revelation-by-spirit suddenly says that his disciples should go to the gentiles and minister to them rather than the jews, because the jews rejected him.
…Almost like there was a specific arc being set up to contrast one position with the next in a dramatic fashion.
What is up with people reading things into the text that aren’t there?
Where in Matthew does Jesus have a revelation-by-spirit where he says not to minister to the Jews because they rejected him?
[28:18] Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
I don’t know where he got that RATHER than the Jews from the book of Matthew, since I read that as more of an AND, but the rest is from the end of the book of Matthew.
Now please go be a teenage atheist edgelord somewhere else. We’ll be here when you want to have a discussion in good faith, but for now, go sea-lion somewhere else.
Yes, at the end of Matthew is a declaration to go out to the world, but absolutely jack shit about a refusal towards the Jews, undermining the point the commentator was making about the very strong pro-Jewish attitudes in Matthew being part of a reversal arc.
As I said, they were reading things into the text that weren’t there.
Now please go be a teenage atheist edgelord somewhere else. We’ll be here when you want to have a discussion in good faith, but for now, go sea-lion somewhere else.
Lol. Last I checked this was /c/news, not /c/Christianity.
And being specific around the texts in question and the contexts they arise in isn’t sealioning dude. I spent several years participating every day in /r/AcademicBiblical and just very much give a crap about accurate vs inaccurate representations of the material.
You can think you are circling the wagons to defend the scriptures, but I’m not the one in this thread misrepresenting them and the intentions of the respective authors. And while you can be free to do you, there is a certain wisdom regarding not blindly following the blind that extends to blind faith (and before you counter with doubting Thomas and the benefits of faith unseen, just know that the entire history of Thomasine Christianity and its relationship to early canonical Christianity is the topic I’ve spent six years studying in depth, so you will definitely get a mouthful back on that invocation and its post-30s CE historical context).
If Trump hasn’t paid for a dozen abortions I’d be surprised.
How do people look and listen to the guy and project all these values that they think are good on him?
i see it as validation that religion itself is a grift… an exploitation of a crack in the human psyche.
the same mechanism that helps people ignore the ridiculousness of %religion% lets them ignore the terrible behaviors of its participants.
maybe add a dash of mass-psychosis… throw in a huge, daily serving of faux news propaganda and here we are
I take them at their word - he’s their true selves revealed.
I have never heard an interviewer ask if he has ever paid for an abortion. I mean I know he wouldn’t answer honestly, but they never even ask.
They think he’ll be good for them, so they lie and say he’ll be good for us
I wouldn’t - when has he ever paid for anything?
If Trump shares your values, fuck your values.
How the hell am I living in the same reality as these people? Where do they get their info from?
Church.
This behavior is the purpose of religion.
His actual actions aren’t important, because his results are “holy.”
If you asked them about a “demon rat” that had doen exactly what their “holy” man had done, they would rant endlessly about his vile acts and his damnation.
Their zealotry is transactional, that’s all. Give them what they want, and you can be their savior too.
Obama wore a suit, and he got shit because they didn’t like the color.
Trump on the other hand, wears diapers and has inspired his moronic base to wear them publicly as well. Not just, under their clothing like a normal person, they think its better than pants.
-Written from a republican hell hole.
well, their problem wasn’t exactly because of the color of the suit
Fox “News”
Russia
Trump supports Jesus
Trump supports putting Jesus, the immigrant, into a deportation camp.
His base doesn’t even realize Jesus was an immigrant
His base thinks that Jesus was a white, English-speaking American who hated poor people and taxes.
Taxes on the wealthy and corporations
TIL fucking a porn star while your wife is pregnant is within christian values.
And stealing from cancer charities. trump may as well just change his name to Jesus.
Trump’s father’s name was legit Fred Christ Trump, a racist POS.
Not only within, but way above average. If not, they wouldn’t look up to him like this.
That said, I have read some of them call Jesus too woke to be Christian
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it feels like we’re on the highway and 60% of drivers are blindfolded and smiling
Thats okay because Jesus took the wheel for them.
Unfortunately for them, Jesus never got his driver’s license.
It’s amazing… stupid people who think invisible sky wizard is guiding their life and stupid enough to think that Trump ever thinks about them. God it’s like half this country gets off on being a cuckold without knowing it.
Stupid people are actually controlled by rich oligarchs through news and right wing propaganda but they think they are independent rebels.
If Apple can become a $2t company by convincing people that buying the same product as all your friends is “thinking different” anything is possible.
Amen! I mean, Word!
Name something that Jesus would love about Donald Trump.
He’s a child of God and therefore worthy of love. Trump obviously sucks, but Jesus said “love your neighbour” and that includes Trump. Of course, God would send Trump to hell when he dies so bit of a mixed message there. Religion is weird sometimes…
“Jesus loves sinners” but that’s about it and a bit of a Catch-22 at it.
He hates the same people that Supply Side Jesus, the version they worship, hates.
Easy. His, erm, broad stature makes him an easy whipping target when it comes time to drive the capitalist pigs and their market stands out of the temple
they’ll wiggle out of that with the “broken vessel” theory (Jeremiah 18:3)
I think he would love trump because trump loves children, and jesus was all about loving children.
spoiler
I feel sick even typing that
Every comment I have seen so far, has the wrong take on this. Christians aligning with Trump is basically the same thing as when the Christians aligned with the Nazis. They are both selling the same shit, a return to a time where the father was dictator of his own home and ruled with an iron fist. All you have to do is embrace the dictator of the country, and you can have that.
That’s half the reason Christians are Christians in the first place. Fascism just makes those ideas more mainstream and allows for the laws to embrace the concept.
The doublethink these “Christians” maintain to avoid cognitive dissonance and critical self reflection are staggering
They’re idiots. They say a lot of very stupid things.
You’ve got to remember that these are just simple farmers. These are people of the land. The common clay of the new West. You know… Morons
How fucking gullible can you get? Either that or they’re being major hypocrites.
it just boils down to him hating and hurting the ‘right’ people.
On brand.
People will believe anything to avoid feeling chronically anxious and afraid, even things which are demonstrably untrue.
People believe things when that belief is useful to them. There is a large overlap with “usefulness” and “accuracy,” but usefulness always wins.
Whaaat? He has his own Bible. How could he be fake??!!??!! ….
