When American evangelicals fall out
A twitter-spat over Donald Trump’s immigration policy reveals a deep cleavage in America’s religious right
JULY 4TH of all days should be a time of amity for Americans. So many generations have joined in celebrating “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” as basic human entitlements, whatever the myriad interpretations they have put on those exhilarating words.
At this year’s unusual festivities, featuring a thunderous military parade, President Donald Trump tried to strike a unifying note of sorts: “We all share the same heroes, the same home, the same heart, and we are all made by the same almighty God.” In truth, the nation divides down the middle in its visceral reaction to almost anything he does, and the parade was no exception. America cannot even agree, these days, on whether the signatories of the Declaration of Independence in 1776 were villains or heroes. Incorrigible slave-owners, as many on the left now say, or Christian crusaders?
More striking still is the widening ideological and personal schism within the very group of citizens who should be a conservative president’s most natural supporters. That group is the white evangelical Christians, of whom 80% are thought to have voted for Mr Trump. Leading evangelicals are not just sparring over metaphysics, they are also trading insults. Think of the war of words that erupted after June 25th when Russell Moore, a distinguished theologian who heads the Ethics and Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention, protested over the fate of migrant children on the Mexican border.
Mr Moore (pictured left), whose job involves running the public-policy arm of America’s largest Protestant denomination, had tweeted that conditions for youngsters trapped at the frontier with Mexico should “shock all our consciences” given that all “those created in the image of God should be treated with dignity and compassion.” Jerry Falwell junior (pictured right), president of Liberty University and a champion among pro-Trump evangelicals, shot back with a personal sneer: “Who are you Dr Moore? Have you ever built an organisation of any sort from scratch? You’re nothing but an employee - a bureaucrat.” Other Trump-minded Christians chimed in to say that protesting over the immigration crisis amounted to an unpatriotic slur on the United States Border Patrol.
Mr Moore is a solid theological conservative and a leading figure in dialogue with Catholics, but also a longstanding critic of Mr Trump, in particular his personal morality. Those close to Mr Moore found Mr Falwell’s line of attack a bit rich: after all, he himself inherited the administration of Liberty University from his namesake and father, a pioneer of the Religious Right, rather than starting from zero.
https://www.economist.com/erasmus/2019/07/05/when-american-evangelicals-fall-out?
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