How Trump Has Transformed Evangelicals

Dec 15, 2023 | How did evangelical Christians shift from being reluctant supporters of Trump to among his most passionate defenders? How did some evangelicals, historically suspicious of politicians, develop a “fanatical cult-like attachment” to Donald Trump? And what happened to the evangelical movement, as some bought into Trump’s vision of America and others recoiled?

A few weeks before the Iowa caucuses we talk to Tim Alberta, a staff writer at the Atlantic and author of the new book The Kingdom, the Power and the Glory: American Evangelicals in an Age of Extremism.

Evangelical Christians in the USA | DW Documentary

Evangelical Christians often have a huge impact on American politics. Many of these people are socially conservative, consider themselves patriots, and believe that Americans have a constitutional right to own guns.

This documentary explores the core beliefs of America's fundamentalist Christians - including the concept of creation, as opposed to evolution.

Our report features interviews with conservative evangelicals who, for example, believe that God created the world in six days about 6,000 years ago. Our reporters traveled to the state of Kentucky to visit a Creation Museum and a Christian theme park that features a life-size model of Noah's Ark.

Christian churches in the US play a major social role, especially in rural areas. They operate schools and universities and organize music festivals that celebrate their faith.

Most fundamentalist Christians are opposed to abortion, pre-marital sex, and homosexuality. They believe that those who engage in these activities will be condemned to Hell. And some have formed paramilitary groups to defend themselves against those whom they perceive as enemies - including non-believers, Communists, and Muslims.

Reverend Reveals What Evangelicals Say Privately about Trump

Reverend Rob Schenck, a former evangelical activist, discusses President Trump's photo-op after police forcibly moved protesters and what evangelicals are now saying about Trump.

Evangelical Leaders Say God Wants Them to Protect Trump

Disgraced evangelical leader Ralph Reed has become the most recent member of the “religious right” to come forward and say that God wants us to protect Donald Trump. Reed has a new book coming out that allegedly makes the moral case for Christians to support Trump, but his pleas might be falling on deaf ears, as Ring of Fire’s Farron Cousins explains.

Who’d want to be an American Evangelical Christian? They have such a crazy (mis)understanding of Christianity!

'I'm President, They're Not': Donald Trump at Rally in Washington

Trump declared victory over the press while at the same time claiming it was trying to silence him, at a gathering of evangelical Christians honouring veterans in Washington on Saturday. The president said terrorism is “one of the most grave and dire threats to religious freedom in the world today”.

Read the Guardian article here

Author: What's Good for Evangelicals Is Good for America

Feb. 04, 2017 - 3:09 - Eric Metaxas reacts to Neil Gorsuch's Supreme Court nomination

US Election: Trump Support Plunges as Evangelical Leaders Express Concerns

Donald Trump’s support has plunged in the past week among many groups, but many white evangelical Christians are still standing by him.

Peter Robinson Faces Backlash After Saying He 'Wouldn't Trust' Muslims

BELFAST TELEGRAPH: Petition calls for First Minister to resign after he gave his backing to controversial pastor James McConnell

Peter Robinson has faced an angry backlash from the public and fellow politicians after saying he "wouldn't trust" some Muslims.

Northern Ireland's First Minister made the remark during an interview in which he defended under-fire pastor James McConnell, who gave a sermon in north Belfast denouncing Islam as "heathen" and "satanic".

Mr Robinson said a Christian minister had a right to "denounce false doctrines".

The DUP leader added that he would not trust Muslims either for spiritual guidance, or those engaged in terrorist acts, but would trust Muslims to "go down the shops for me" or to deal with a number of other "day to day issues". » | Claire Cromie | Wednesday, May 28, 2014

Preacher Who Said ‘Islam Is Satanic’ Is Facing Police Probe Over ‘Hate Mongering’

Pastor James McDonnell of Whitewell Metropolitan Tabernacle in Belfast

MIRROR: Fundamentalist pastor James McConnell said he doesn't trust Muslims at church attended by Northern Ireland First Minister Peter Robinson

A fundamentalist preacher who said “Islam is a doctrine spawned in hell” has been accused of “hate mongering” as the police confirmed they are investigating a possible hate crime.

The PSNI launched an investigation after Pastor James McConnell branded Islam “satanic” at the Whitewell Metropolitan Tabernacle Church in North Belfast.

The church, which is attended by First Minister Peter Robinson, heard McConnell say he doesn’t trust Muslims.

Asked about the incident, a PSNI spokesman said: “Police are aware of an incident at premises at the Shore Road on Sunday, May 18. Enquiries are continuing and at this stage, police are investigating a hate crime motive.”

Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness said “this type of hate mongering must be condemned in the strongest possible terms”.

He added: “Coming in the wake of recent spate of disgraceful racist attacks against families in parts of Belfast and elsewhere, such inflammatory comments only serve to fuel hatred.” » | By Mirror.co.uk | Thursday, May 21, 2014



Belfast Pastor Denounces Islam as the Devil’s Doctrine »

Belfast Pastor James McConnell Denounces Islam as the Devil's Doctrine at Whitewell Metropolitan Tabernacle Church Sermon

BELFAST TELEGRAPH: Controversial clergyman tells audience "people say there are good Muslims in Britain — that may be so — but I don’t trust them"

An outspoken evangelical pastor has defended describing the Islamic faith as "satanic" and a "doctrine spawned in hell".

Senior Pastor James McConnell made the remarks as he addressed his congregation at the Whitewell Tabernacle Metropolitan Church on Sunday evening.

They were described as "very offensive", "hurtful" and "irresponsible" by a representative from the Belfast Islamic Centre.

There has also been an outcry on social media, with some calling for a police investigation into his comments.

One posted: "If this was a Muslim Imam speaking about Christianity, he would be arrested for inciting hatred."

During his sermon, the clergyman said: "Islam is heathen, Islam is satanic, Islam is a doctrine spawned in hell." (+ video) » | Claire Williamson | Wednesday, May 21, 2014

US Election 2012: Mitt Romney Rejects Gay Marriage Whilst Courting Evangelical Christians
Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney delivers the commencement address to the graduating class of Liberty University, the world's largest Christian university, telling them that marriage is between "one man and one woman".

Read the article here | Contains video from Reuters | Sunday, May 13, 2012
Lien en relation avec cette vidéo »

Rev. Graham: Obama Seen as ‘Son of Islam’

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Read the MSNBC article and comment here | Becky Bratu, msnbc.com | Tuesday, February 21, 2012
Related »

A Look at Pastor Terry Jones’ Past

Housewives of God
THE NEW YORK TIMES: Priscilla Shirer’s marriage appears to be just the sort of enlightened partnership that would make feminists cheer. On an average morning in their house in suburban Dallas, Shirer and her husband, Jerry, are up around 6:30, fixing breakfast for their three small boys. While Priscilla, 35, settles in to work at home and care for their 2-year-old, Jerry, 42, shuttles the older two children to school and heads to his office. He spends much of the day negotiating her speaking invitations and her book contracts. In the afternoon it’s often Jerry who collects the boys from school. Back home, Priscilla and Jerry divide chores and child care equally. “He will most often jump in and do the dinner dishes,” Priscilla says. “We don’t have, ‘these are wife tasks and these are husband tasks.’ . . . Kids are not a wife-mommy thing.”

Yet Shirer avoids using words like “feminist” or “career woman” to describe herself. She is an evangelical Bible teacher who makes her living by guiding thousands of women through the study of Scripture in her books, videos and weekend conferences — in which she stresses that in a biblical home and church, the man is the head and the woman must submit. She steers women away from the “feminist activists” who tell women to “do your own thing, make your own decisions and never let a man slow you down,” as she puts it. “Satan will do everything in his power to get us to take the lead in our homes,” she wrote in her book “A Jewel in His Crown: Rediscovering Your Value as a Woman of Excellence.” “He wants to make us resent our husband’s position of authority so that we will begin to usurp it. . . . Women need to pray for God to renew a spirit of submission in their hearts.”

Shirer and many conservative Christians believe that the Bible defines gender as a divinely ordained set of desires and duties inherent in each man and woman since the Garden of Eden. Gender is not an act or a choice, but a nonnegotiable gift. To these Christians, the story of Adam and Eve’s creation granted man authority over woman, and they understand the New Testament teachings of Paul and his comrades — in particular, that wives should submit to their husbands — not as cultural relics of the first century but as universal teachings that Christians apply today.

In an era when sexual liberation has saturated American culture, when women are climbing the corporate ladder and bearing fewer children, and mainline churches are ordaining women and homosexuals, conservative evangelicals are escalating their counteroffensive. Many call themselves complementarians, signaling their belief that God ordained complementary — not identical or flexible — roles for men and women. To critics, “complementarian” is code for sexist patriarchy, a license to keep women muzzled and homebound. Yet spending even five minutes with Priscilla Shirer and her husband suggests that reality is far more complicated — not only at home but also in the new “separate sphere” that this theology has spawned: a subculture of Bible studies, conferences, ministries, religious retreats and literature ranging from Christian fitness books to Christian romance novels, all produced by and for evangelical women. >>> Molly Worthen | Friday, November 12, 2010

Congressman Says God Will Save Us from Climate Change
THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: A Republican congressman who believes that global warming is not a threat because God has promised not to destroy the Earth has put himself forward as chairman of a powerful committee that deals with energy policy and its effect on the environment.

John Shimkus, an evangelical Christian representing Illinois, quoted the Bible in a congressional hearing last year on a proposed "cap and trade" legislation designed to limit carbon emissions.

Reading from God's post-Flood promise to Noah in Genesis 8:21, he said: "Never again will I curse the ground because of man, even though all inclinations of his heart are evil from childhood and never again will I destroy all living creatures as I have done."

Mr Shimkus added: "I believe that's the infallible word of God, and that's the way it's going to be for his creation.

"The Earth will end only when God declares it's time to be over. Man will not destroy this Earth. This Earth will not be destroyed by a Flood. I do believe that God's word is infallible, unchanging, perfect." >>> Alex Spillius, Washington | Wednesday, November 10, 2010

Obama has lost his halo. A quarter of Republicans think Obama is the Antichrist, and some compare him to Hitler. Photo: Google Images
A Quarter of Republicans Think Barack Hussein Obama Is the Antichrist
MAIL ONLINE: Americans who suggest Barack Obama should rot in hell are apparently deadly serious.

Nearly a quarter of Republicans believe the Democrat president 'may be the Antichrist', according to a survey.

An even greater number compared him to Hitler.

Mr Obama was jubilant this week after securing his £626billion healthcare reform plan.

But his triumph seems only to have inflamed his critics among the evangelical Christians from America's heartland who kept George Bush in power for eight years and have demonised his successor.

More than half of the Republicans quizzed by Harris Poll, 57 per cent, believed the president was secretly Muslim, something he has consistently denied.

And 67 per cent of Republicans who responded believed Obama was a socialist, despite his central leanings.

The startling results came as lawyers representing 14 U.S. states filed lawsuits yesterday challenging an overhaul of the country's $2.5trillion healthcare system, minutes after President Barack Obama signed the landmark legislation.

One joint lawsuit by a dozen Republican attorneys general and a Democrat claims the sweeping reforms violate state-government rights in the U.S. Constitution and will force massive new spending on hard-pressed state governments. Almost a quarter of Republicans think Obama 'may be the Antichrist' as 14 states sue over healthcare reforms >>> David Gardner | Wednesday, March 24, 2010

The Evangelical Divide on Global Warming
BBC: BBC Washington correspondent Matt Frei goes to Virginia to take a look at how the issue of climate change is dividing America's evangelical movement.

Liberty University, in Lynchburg, Virginia, is one of the biggest evangelical colleges in the world.

With some 5,000 students, it is the creation of the Reverend Jerry Falwell, one of America's most influential Christian leaders.
The technology used here is modern - it uses the latest internet gimmicks and sermons are podcast - but the message is less so.

"The jury is still out on global warming," says the Rev Falwell, in a sermon broadcast on the internet in February this year.

"Despite all the hype by liberal politicians, the media, Hollywood and so forth, it is not yet proven by any means that greenhouse gas emissions are the cause of global warming."

His word is taken as gospel by the university's students. Evangelicals split on global warming (more)

WATCH BBC VIDEO: US Christians split on climate

BBC: US evangelist Gerry Falwall dies

Mark Alexander