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The Rev. Canon Dr. Lauren R. Stanley is an Episcopal priest serving in the Episcopal Diocese of South Dakota. She wrote this column for InsideSources.com.
In March, former President Donald Trump began hawking a “God Bless the USA” Bible online for $59.99, a King James Version that also includes the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence and the Pledge of Allegiance.
“Let’s make America pray again,” he said. “We must defend God in the public square and not allow the media or the left-wing groups to silence, censor or discriminate against us. We have to bring Christianity back into our lives and back into what will be again a great nation.”
It makes you wonder if the former president knows anything about the history of religion in this nation. Does he not understand that the Founding Fathers demanded the freedom of each person to determine their own religious affiliation and that the government should have no role in determining a person’s beliefs?
Trump and his MAGA followers have willfully forgotten that the Founding Fathers wanted to make sure this nation did not fall into the religious warfare and bloodshed that ravaged Europe for many centuries. This nation was founded on the belief that people could make their own decisions about God. We have not always been perfect in pursuing this principle, but we have been trying to live up to it since the nation’s founding.
To be clear: What Trump and his followers proclaim is not Christianity — a devotion to following Jesus and his teachings — but to Christian nationalism, something that surely makes God shake God’s head in disbelief.
And: Demanding that every decision by the government be made according to their interpretation of the Scriptures is a violation not only of those Scriptures but also of the Constitution’s First Amendment, which declares that “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof” and which was written to protect people from the tyranny of all religions.
Those who proclaim this is a “Christian” nation do not actually understand either history or the Scriptures. Christian nationalism is nothing less than a willful misreading of the Scriptures.
According to the very Bible that Trump is hawking, God has an overwhelming preference for the poor, the orphaned, the widowed and the stranger in our midst.
All of which, according to Christian nationalism, is wrong.
The Bible declares we are to live together in harmony and peace — which Christian nationalism cannot stand.
The Bible is based on love for all people and for all of creation. Christian nationalism is based on hatred; on white supremacism; on “us vs. them,” even though in God’s very good creation, there is no “us” or “them.” The Bible declares that all are created in the very image of God; Christian nationalism declares that some are better than others.
To be blunt: Christianity is not a national religion, and Christian nationalism has no business running this country. Because Christian nationalism actually has nothing to do with Christianity. It is a perversion of God’s mercy, God’s justice and God’s everlasting love.
Full disclosure: I am an Episcopal priest who strives to align my beliefs and life with the Gospel of Jesus Christ. I fall short all too often, but I do my best to follow Jesus. What I do not do is demand that everyone else believe as I do.
Christian nationalism claims that the laws of this land are determined by so-called Christian principles but fails to recognize that those principles are in direct violation with what the Bible actually says.
If Trump and his followers wanted Christian values to run this country, they would ensure everyone had enough to eat and clean water to drink. They would demand health care for all. They would welcome immigrants and asylum seekers. They would grant women full reproductive rights and control over their own bodies and futures. They would empty the prisons; proclaim jubilee and forgive debts; and make this nation the shining light on a hill that Ronald Reagan proclaimed it was (even though he, too, failed to follow through on this).
If we were to follow God’s laws and desires in this nation, we would all have more than enough. We would celebrate every single person. And we would realize that perverting God’s word to make political decisions and gains is nothing less than sin.
