Defendant Trump, like Jesus, is sacrificing himself for us

I recently heard a youngish Iowa voter say on TV that Jesus sacrificed himself for our sins, and now defendant Donald Trump is doing the same thing for our country. He’s running in my stead to save our country.

When I closed my open mouth, I thought, “OMG, defendant Trump has so bamboozled some voters, especially those on the religious right, that they are thinking of him in serious messianic terms — a phenomenon that history suggests always leads to disappointment and disaster in democratic republics. Alabamians ought to know. Why? Because perceiving a political candidate as a religious savior or even as particularly religious is wrong-headed and leads to pernicious consequences.

First, the American Constitution, in setting up a non-religious republic, requires that “no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office … under the United States.” As a result, I believe, it also demands that candidates for political office should not use religion as a reason for voting for them, as defendant Trump regularly does in his appeals to “evangelicals,” one of which he has never been himself, being a non-churchgoer. Moreover, when religion is thus used inappropriately, it inevitably becomes a false “Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval” for some voters, which prostitutes it. Look at the way some evangelicals have twisted scripture in an effort to anoint defendant Trump as “God’s Candidate.” God stopped anointing kings millennia ago and did so then only in the pages of the Bible, which has never favored Republican forms of government.

Second, our time-tested political system, the envy of most of the world before defendant Trump exploited its weak points, was established as a secular one in the world’s first national constitution of its type. It provides for popular elections, not divine appointments, and explicitly forbids the use of religious tests for political purposes. When candidates and their surrogates profess religious anointings, they seek to short-circuit that arrangement with an anti-democratic argument that is powerful for many people. How does a candidate’s opponent rightly oppose “God’s candidate” without appearing “God-less”? That is particularly the case when one examines history.

No candidates for public office have ever been able to demonstrate that their candidacies have been blessed by God (other than via the implication of winning), and their record of service in office has never been shown to be more “godly” than candidates elected without divine intervention. Defendant Trump lost the last presidential election, despite a rehash in 2020 of his 2016 religiosity. Moreover, look at his record in office (2017-2021) — from the “carnage” of his Capitol Inauguration to the “insurrection” in and around the Citadel of Democracy four years later. Other than his appointments of three SCOTUS members, thanks to Mitch McConnell’s misuse of Senate rules and thanks to their prevarications during Senate ratification hearings on the precedential status of Roe v. Wade and the non-religious issue of abortion (it doesn’t involve the termination of human life until viability), what exactly did he accomplish for evangelicals? What other president handled a public health crisis with so much incompetence and lack of caring that 1.1 million Americans died as a result? Who did less for the poor, the focus of biblical exhortations, from millions of whom he tried to take away health insurance; who did more for the wealthy? Who has done less for and to female Americans? Who has been convicted of sexual assault and credibly accused of sexually assaulting many other women? Who made many promises but got nothing done for the environment and rebuilding American infrastructure? Who inherited a stronger economy, while leaving a weaker economic legacy after four years? Who reduced America’s standing in the world more as a moral and military power? Who insulted American military heroes more than Trump, who never served in the armed forces of the U.S.? Who called those who died at Normandy “suckers” and wanted “his” generals to be like Hitler’s? What American president ever envisioned and then executed a plan to steal a lawful election from his predecessor by instigating an insurrection to stop the Congressional counting of electoral college votes? Where in Heaven’s name is God’s hand in any of that?

Third, when a national leader, any leader, is hailed as a “messiah,” his words are taken by many to be “gospel“ and are not to be challenged by us mere mortals. History is replete with examples (recall the “divine right of kings.”) Perhaps the best analog is Adolph Hitler and Nazi Germany in the 1930s, where military leaders and enlisted personnel were required to pledge allegiance to Der Fuhrer, not to Deutschland or its “constitution.” How did that work out? Yet, he wants “his” generals to be like Hitler’s in their fealty to him personally.

If defendant Trump assumes the presidency again, the checks and balances of the U.S. Constitution will not be sufficient to control him. He plans to ignore them and related statutes and to surround himself with sycophants who’ll approve anything and everything he wants to do, including “retribution” against his political enemies (that’s half the country) and withdrawing from the world into fortress America ( “America First,” as it was called in the Thirties). These are not partisan speculations. Defendant Trump keeps saying these things at rallies and elsewhere, where he argues that he enjoys “presidential immunity” for every act in the White House. He tried to so some of them in his first, unsuccessful term. When are we non-MAGA “supporters” going to come to grips with these frightening predictions of outrageous uses of power and stop obsessing over such lesser matters as President Biden’s age (he’s only three years older than Defendant Trump) and inflation, which has dramatically subsided since Defendant Trump’s first term.

Given his character and record, it is incredible that 42% of polled Republicans say that Defendant Trump is a “religious” person and 64% call him “a person of faith,” whereas 26% say that President Biden is, with 13% calling him a person of faith. Democrats have a clearer view, I think, with 14% saying Trump is religious and 10% a person of faith, with 72% saying Biden is religious and 69% a person of faith. The biggest shock in the polling data, however, was WHY Republican respondents gave the answers they did. They said, he was “a person of faith/religious” because he had “a strong moral compass” (43%), was “honest and trustworthy” (49%), “makes ethical decisions” (50%), “defends people of faith” (67%), “supports policies focused on families” (60%), and “cares about people like me” (54%). You can imagine how Democrats polled. As long as enough Americans sadly hold such misperceptions of defendant Trump, he will continue to be a formidable political force in our land.

All of us ought to recall the old saw that President George W. Bush never could get straight: “Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me.”

Dr. Jim Vickrey is a Montgomerian, retired lawyer, emeritus professor of an Alabama university. He served for more than two decades,  former university president, and long-time United Methodist Sunday School teacher.

This article originally appeared on Montgomery Advertiser: Defendant Trump, like Jesus, is sacrificing himself for us