Viewpoint: Trump not following Christian values – Missoula Current

David James
America must resist the temptation to allow Trump to establish the direction for Christians in America. Without Christian support, there is no President Trump. Well-meaning Christians might reexamine the role of their support for Donald Trump.
Starting with the January 6th disgrace. The name of God was everywhere during the insurrection, carrying signs and flags saying “Jesus Saves” and “God, guns, and guts made America, let’s keep all three.” American citizens attacked their government using terrorism to stop a democratic election they did not like. They beat, bloodied, and killed police, not to ’Back the Blue’. They stormed the Senate floor and tried to hunt down and kill the Speaker of the House, and built a gallows to hang the Vice President. They did all this because of continuous lies from Trump, the conservative news, radio talk shows, and evangelical Christians.
Influential Christian and local leaders publicly supported Trump, and it takes a particular Christian leader to help a man like Trump while he constantly lies publicly. Trump's support requires a gross misunderstanding of the mission of God’s people on earth to love thy neighbor. Christian leaders have minimized his sexual improprieties as “schoolboy transgressions” or his business corruption because he is pushing “pro-Christian policies.”
When a Christian resort to tortured logic to excuse the inexcusable, they have lost the true meaning of Jesus. Many who subscribe to this twisted logic are Republicans who have a desire for worldly power. The voters who gave us Trump once again believe they’re following Jesus, but they have saddled themselves with a man who abuses their trust and makes a mockery of the God they claim to serve.
The Republican Party of today is broken. They falsely entice Christians into thinking that the party is pro-life to get the evangelical vote, when the purpose of their position is to gain political power. The party is pro-birth, not pro-life. Their view of the poor, immigrants, aged, sick, and downtrodden is not pro-life or Christian. A party that comprises people like Marjorie Taylor-Greene, Loren Boebert, and Donald Trump is one of the most un-Christian parties in my lifetime. They hope to advance their cause with cruelty while mocking the faith they claim to serve.
The Republican government under Donald Trump illegally arrests, detains, separates, and imprisons hundreds of families perceived to be enemies of the State, sending fathers to die in notorious, vile prisons without cause or hope of return. Their inhumane cruelty is not what Jesus would do. In addition, ending USAID means allowing mothers and children to starve in Gaza and Africa, while tons of food rot in storehouses here at home. We can do better.
All with Christian support.
David James teaches history and lives in Eureka

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