Letter: Trump does not represent real Christianity

Editor,

I empathize with those Christians (on Whidbey Island and elsewhere in the USA) who follow the Gospel, taking to heart the two key commandments, to love God and your neighbor, and who do not think the Sermon on the Mount is too “woke.”

These are painful and awkward times for these folks since 80% of Evangelicals voted for Trump (as they did in previous elections) and many of them also believe God saved Trump from the recent assassination attempt so that he could be “a vessel” to overcome the dark forces of secularism. Just as absurdly a number of Evangelical pastors have announced that it was God’s will that Donald Trump become president.

But the troubling relationship between Trump and authentic Christianity came into sharp focus on Jan. 21 when Bishop Marianne Edgar Budde spoke directly to the president as he attended a prayer service at the Washington Memorial Cathedral. She implored him to show compassion toward those groups that he has frightened, such as immigrants and gay and transgender people. Trump’s response, the next day, was to call Bishop Budde a Trump hater and an extreme, left-wing Marxist. His response is a reminder that he is morally and psychologically unfit to be president and that he has no clue as to what it means to be a Christian.

So what are the Christians who follow Jesus’ injunction to love God and neighbors to do when the majority of Evangelicals have aligned themselves with Trump and thereby given Christianity a bad name? If someone is a Christian is this someone who loves their neighbor or someone one would not want to meet in a dark alley? I am not in a position to tell mainstream Christians what to do, except to suggest that following Bishops Budde’s example would be a good start. She has spoken truth to power and has provided support and protection for the marginalized for decades. As Jesus said, “By their fruits, you shall know them.”

Steen Halling

Greenbank