In 2024, conservative Catholics, Fundamentalist Christians, and Evangelicals have amassed political power if not Defacto control over the Republican Party and Supreme Court in their acknowledged Crusade to Christianize America and eviscerate both the First Amendment’s “Establishment Clause” and Article VI Clause 3 of the Constitution that prescribes, “…but no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States”. The 2024 election must be recognized in the deepest and most important sense to be a battle for the survival of the Madisonian principles of separation of church and state, upon which this Country was founded.
Particularly concerning is the nomination of Donald Trump, the Religious Right’s “useful idiot” in their Crusade. You’ll strive in vain to find a single adjective describing Jesus Christ that can be applied to Trump except when adding “un” at the beginning of each word. There are only a couple of the Ten Commandments Trump hasn’t violated and he continues, unapologetically, preaching demonstrable lies daily to the Republican flock as if the unassailable Gospel truth.
Not coincidentally, Trump ticks all the satanic boxes for being The Anti-Christ. He’s a pathological liar, venal and vindictive, hateful, arrogant, narcissistic, vain, an adulterer, unforgiving and uncharitable, a cheat and money changer who denigrates the poor, hungry, and powerless, a Philistine in all categories. Were Christ to cross the southern border tomorrow seeking to feed the hungry and clothe the poor, Trump would deport him.
Trump openly idolizes and panders to the world’s worst dictators and is obsequious to and covetous of the power they wield. This does not concern the Christian Right for obvious reasons. Democracy, a creation of the Ancient Greeks, predates Christ. Not once in the Old or New Testaments with all their Books does God through his prophets, priests or rabbis teach the divinity of "one man-one vote" or command democratic institutions. The Israelites didn't get a vote on roaming the desert for 40 years although there was that nasty idolatry incident with the Golden Calf. Solomon didn't submit whether to cut the baby in half to a “yea or nay” vote in the hall and Jesus never took a poll on who should cast the first stone. In fact, the only vote I recall occurred in the New Testament when the crowds chose Barabbas and frankly that did not work out too well for the Good guys.
I look at it this way, if the crowds hadn’t chosen Barabbas in 33AD, Christ never would have wound up on the Cross on Good Friday or arisen on Easter and poof! no miracle ending, no Sign of the Cross and no Cross to Bear. In 2024, the Republican crowds have chosen Trump. If he wins, it will be the Constitution that gets Crucified.
Abortion is but one area where faith alone drives policy in denying women fundamental rights over their own bodies, health care, and contraception. The Supreme Court majority, 6 of 9, is dominated by conservative Christians, 5 practicing Catholics and an Episcopalian ex-Catholic. They have imbued their rulings with conservative Christian and Catholic theology effectively bestowing living Rights on fertilized eggs while simultaneously denying the rights of a pregnant woman over her own body by any State based solely on theology.
Abortion predates Christ and existed during His time on earth, yet the word “abortion” in any translation never appears in either the Old or New Testament. Abortion existed in the 1700s. If the rights of the unborn, the fertilized, and ill-conceived were of concern, James Madison could have included “The right of the unborn to be secure in the womb”, as his 11th Amendment. He didn’t and consequently, there is no “Incubation Clause” in the Bill of Rights.
Whether the issue relates to federal or state control over abortion, gender identity and sexual practices, same-sex marriage, pornography, women’s status, contraception, right to die, sinful conduct, or teaching Creationism in the schools, the Christian/Republican Right intends to impose policy and enact legislation grounded in fundamentalist Christian concepts, defining and punishing sin, and even criminalizing personal conduct. They accept Trump as their divine means to achieve that end. I guess I should note that none of the Seven Cardinal Sins is a criminal act, pride, greed, wrath, lust, envy, gluttony, and sloth. Trump, although guilty of them all, is safe from prosecution on those counts.
By Weaving religious faith into party politics Republicans have organized their campaign on the Christian Right’s narrative of a religious war, stoking a culture crusade grounded not in policy or debate but on a narrative that literally demonizes the opposition and pitches the 2024 election as a battle between the forces of good and evil, an American Armageddon. It would be a mistake to think this election’s outcome depends on policy arguments or persuasion alone when the Republican opposition literally believes God created the world in 6 days in 5005 BCE and re-nominated the Anti-Christ as their candidate. T-shirts emblazoned, “Jesus is my Savior, Trump is my President” illustrate how entrenched the narrative is and how impossible it is to refute with the facts.
A Republican victory in the November election will bring this Country one giant stride towards the establishment of Christianity as the State Religion and the dismantling of our democratic institutions with a sociopath at the helm. This alone should be motivation for Americans across the political spectrum to fear the foreseeable consequences of turning the Country over to a party beholden to fundamentalist Christian crusaders who reject an American political system conceived principally by secular humanists, deists, atheists, and philosophers. Contrary to opinions on how Trump and Republicans are infusing Christianity into the campaign, the facts are it is quite the opposite. That should deeply worry the rest of the electorate when casting a vote in November.
The election cannot be won simply by proving Trump gets his facts wrong, scored low on a truth meter, or earned four Pinocchios in the press. There are legitimate policy issues as well. However, powering Trump’s campaign are fundamentalist and conservative Christians outspoken in their faith-based objections to the “Establishment Clause” and Article VI, clause 3 of the Constitution’s prohibition of religious tests for office holders and officials. To prevail in November, Democrats must change the narrative to make clear that the 2024 election is a determined fight to preserve the Constitutional Separation of Church and State, an American Armageddon.