Category Archives: religious news

national news, political news, religious news

Evangelicals’ support of Trump: as perplexing as ever

An article that was published slightly more than a year ago remains relevant today.

It comes from Esquire magazine. The noted documentary filmmaker Ken Burns asks: What is it about Donald Trump that reminds evangelical voters of Jesus Christ?

Burns was troubled a year ago over why evangelical Christian voters glommed onto Trump’s candidacy. I remain puzzled in the extreme as to why they remain loyal to this guy a year later, and six months into his presidency.

Burns said, for example: “The Republican Party has been extraordinarily successful at getting many groups of people to vote against their self-interest. Evangelicals are voting for Donald Trump. What part of Donald Trump reminds you of Jesus Christ? Trump lusts after his own daughter on national radio, talks about women’s bodies and breasts in such a disparaging way, and mocks them. How is this in any way Christian? When you make the ‘other’ the enemy, how is that Christian?”

Check out the Esquire link.

Burns noted a year ago that Trump once lusted after his own daughter, Ivanka. He carried on highly publicized extramarital affairs on his first two wives. Of course, we have that infamous “Access Hollywood” video in which Trump is overheard boasting about how he grabbed women by their genitals.

He routinely denigrates women and there is zero evidence anywhere in his professional or personal history of any commitment to the teachings of Jesus Christ.

But he remains on evangelicals’ A-list. He’s their guy. Their “dream come true,” in the words of Liberty University President Jerry Falwell Jr.

Someone has to explain it to me. I’m all eyes and ears.

national news, religious news

Long live the secular state!

Jon Mark Beilue has done it again. He has written a spot-on column for the Amarillo Globe-News that I want to share here.

I won’t restate my friend’s thoughts, other than to echo his notion that the founding fathers created a marvelous governing document that has withstood many challenges over time.

They knew that the nation’s European immigrants came here to flee religious persecution, so they wrote into the Constitution’s First Amendment that there should be no law that established a state religion; indeed, of all the liberties protected in the First Amendment, they mentioned religion first.

Here, though, is an additional point I want to make above Beilue’s excellent essay.

It is that the United States to this very day remains a significantly more religious country than virtually all the nations of Europe. Americans are more inclined to attend worship services than Europeans. I am aware that church attendance is declining in the United States, but it remains far greater than it is throughout Europe, where worship attendance has plummeted for decades.

Why is that important? Because many nations of Europe have state religions. The United States has none. The Church of England? A state religion. Catholicism is ingrained in the governing documents of several European nations.

I make this U.S.-Europe connection only because those original immigrants came across The Pond from Europe.

The Constitution stipulates that there must be “no religious test” applied to candidates for public office at any level. The word “Christian” does not appear in the Constitution.

Were the founders fueled by their personal religious faith when they wrote the Constitution? Certainly. I don’t doubt that for a moment. However, they knew better than to write their faith into the nation’s government document.

As Jon Mark Beilue writes: “Our Founding Fathers, they knew what they were doing.”

religious news

Smashing of Commandments … an attention-getter

I will stipulate right up front that I don’t get too worked up over displays such as, oh, Ten Commandments tablets being put on public property.

I find the Ten Commandments to be an ecumenical statement for how human beings should live. I don’t see these displays as “establishing a government religion.”

But when someone destroys such a display, as was the case in Little Rock, Ark., then you get my attention.

They put a Ten Commandments tablet at the Arkansas State Capitol. A day later, some guy decided to ram his motor vehicle into the stone display. He destroyed it.

Police arrested Michael Tate Reed and charged him with criminal mischief and criminal trespass.

I guess Reed really and truly dislikes any form of religious statement on government property. He reportedly rammed his car in 2014 into a Ten Commandments display at the Oklahoma capitol.

My gripe with this guy is that he resorts to vandalism to make a point. He destroys public property. His actions call attention to him as much — if not more — to whatever political statement he intends to make.

By my definition of the term, this guy is an exhibitionist … allegedly.

national news, political news, religious news

Trump and evangelicals: strangest union of all

Donald J. Trump has just selected Jerry Falwell Jr. to lead a task force aimed at overhauling public education policy.

The president of the United States has linked arms with the head of a leading faith-based university; Falwell also is the son of the late televangelist who used his pulpit to attack President and Mrs. Bill Clinton throughout the president’s two terms in office.

This appointment brings to mind a curiosity I’ve harbored ever since Trump entered political life, which is when he announced his candidacy for president in June 2015.

Falwell joins Trump team

My question of the moment is this: How does this man, Trump, continue to win the support of many within the Christian evangelical movement?

Falwell Jr. has called Trump a “dream come true” for evangelicals. He just cannot say enough gushy things about the president, who delivered his first commencement speech at Liberty University, the school that Falwell’s father founded.

If you think about it, though, the relationship strains credulity to the max.

Trump has not been known as a major contributor to religious causes; he hasn’t been associated with faith-based charities; his whole life has been filled with glitz and glamor, chiefly through his association with and ownership of beauty pageants; he is married to his third wife and has boasted publicly about his infidelity involving his first two marriages; Trump also has boasted about how he can grab women by the p**** because his celebrity status allows him to do it.

But he’s tough on Muslims, vows to destroy the Islamic State, wants to impose a travel ban on refugees coming here from Muslim-majority nations. Maybe that’s why Falwell and many within the evangelical community are smitten by the president.

I concede that political alliances can take form among groups or individuals one might not imagine banding together. This one, though, baffles me greatly.

The president’s history is full of episodes that would seem to send devoutly religious voters scurrying for someone more, um, to their liking.

Go figure. I cannot fathom it.

national news, political news, religious news, State news

Not sure boycott will do what it’s intended

I dislike boycotts, even when they are launched to promote a cause with which I might agree.

Sometimes they give me heartburn. Take the decision by California officials to no longer send state employees to Texas because of the Lone Star State’s recent legislation affecting LGBT residents.

I might lose some “friends” over this blog post. If so, well, so be it.

The Texas Legislature recently allowed welfare agencies to deny adoptions for same sex couples based on their religious beliefs. California Attorney General Xavier Becerra declared the law to be discriminatory and as a result, the state no longer will send employees on state-funded trips to Texas.

Yes, the law discriminates. I don’t like it, either. It opens the door for folks to declare religious objections when they faith might not be the actual reason. Is a boycott of Texas the most appropriate response? I tend to doubt it. I am open to discussion about this and would invite comments arguing the point.

My concern is that boycotts tend to inflict gratuitous collateral damage. The people who are hurt by them quite often are business owners or residents of the jurisdiction being boycotted; these individuals might happen to agree with the reason for the boycott, so they are caught in a political vise.

California overreacts?

According to the Texas Tribune: “While the California DOJ works to protect the rights of all our people, discriminatory laws in any part of our country send all of us several steps back,” said Xavier Becerra, the California attorney general. “That’s why when California said we would not tolerate discrimination against LGBTQ members of our community, we meant it.”

OK, Mr. Attorney General. I get it. Raise hell about it. Stomp your feet. Pound on your desk. Declare it to be bad law and urge residents of Texas to seek to overturn it. I agree with you!

I just fail to understand how a boycott is going to bring tangible result, other than to inflict damage to private citizens who would benefit from state employees traveling to Texas.

International news, political news, religious news

Melania goes scarf-less? Heaven forbid!

Melania Trump has arrived with her husband, the president of the United States, in Saudi Arabia.

She and her husband, Donald Trump, strode down the stairway from Air Force One and greeted the Saudi king.

Oh, but wait! Her head was uncovered. She wasn’t wearing a scarf, per Muslim custom. Where’s the outrage? The recrimination? The howls of disrespect?

There wasn’t any. Nor should there be.

Hey, let’s hold on! Michelle Obama did the same thing when she and her husband, also the president of the United States, went to the Middle East a couple of years ago. Her head was uncovered, too. Oh, but the conservative media went semi-nuts.

So did at least one notable Republican politician. His name? Donald John Trump! That, truth be told, is what makes this an issue worthy of a brief blog post.

Being of a more tolerant strain as it regards religion, I am not bothered in the least that non-Muslim female dignitaries don’t cover their heads when they travel to Muslim-majority nations. They aren’t “dishonoring” their hosts.

Let’s stay focused on the aim of these visits, which has nothing to do with making fashion statements.

International news, religious news

Get ready for Trump speech on (gulp!) — Islam!

Donald J. Trump is getting ready to climb headfirst into the belly of the beast.

He is planning a speech on Islam. The venue? Saudi Arabia, where two of Islam’s holiest cites are located.

Politico offers a list of do’s and don’ts for the president to follow.

Here it is: http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/05/18/donald-trump-islam-speech-215150

As we know, the president isn’t known for his nuanced approach to foreign policy. He doesn’t seem to have a foreign policy. He doesn’t think strategically. He doesn’t look at the big picture. He speaks in the moment and seems to react to the last person who has his undivided attention.

I feel compelled, though, to remind everyone that he will be speaking to an audience full of people with lengthy memories. I’m quite certain they’re going to remember what candidates Donald Trump said about Muslims way back when, how he intended to impose a blanket ban on “all Muslims” entering the United States “until we figure out what the hell we’re doing.”

He’s backed off of that. He’s tried to impose executive orders banning Muslims from certain countries, only to have the federal judiciary strike them down. Why? They discriminate against people of certain religions, which the U.S. Constitution forbids.

As Politico reports: According to the president’s national security adviser, H.R. McMaster, “The speech is intended to unite the broader Muslim world against common enemies of all civilization and to demonstrate America’s commitment to our Muslim partners.”

Be very careful, Mr. President.

national news, political news, religious news

Trump speech venue laced with irony

One word came to mind when I heard over the weekend that Donald J. Trump would deliver a commencement speech at Liberty University in Lynchburg, Va.: ironic.

There was so much to confound us about the 2016 presidential election that I am hesitant to rank the most puzzling element that arose from it.

I’ll place one development near the top: the support Trump earned from the evangelical community. The president’s Liberty University speech is a continuation of that relationship.

One line has gotten the most attention. It’s when the president said Americans “don’t worship government, they worship God.” Gee, do you think?

Why the ironic view of this venue?

Liberty U. was founded by the late Jerry Falwell, a highly political preacher. Falwell was a sworn enemy of former President Bill Clinton and his wife, Hillary. He once produced a hideous video that purported that the Clintons were complicit in the death of their dear friend Vincent Foster, who committed suicide not long after Bill Clinton became president. That’s not a Godly thing to do, you know?

Liberty is a religious-based university of some renown. Its curriculum espouses conservative values. Biblical studies are required for graduation. All of that is common at faith-based institutions.

Why, though, the embrace of Donald Trump? I’ve never perceived Trump’s life to be necessarily informed by a devotion to the holy word, to the Gospels, to the teachings of Jesus Christ. Quite the contrary, my perception of Trump — and I believe the perception of millions of other Americans — is that he has placed great value on material wealth, on personal enrichment, on self-aggrandizement; he’s also boasted publicly about his boorish behavior and he has routinely denigrated women.

Does Scripture lift all of that up, to be something to which we should aspire? It’s not in the Bible I have read for my entire life.

So there he was, telling the students at Liberty U. about the virtues of swimming against the tide, telling them to be unafraid of criticism. They cheered, clapped and hollered.

Great!

Liberty U. is now run by Falwell’s son, Jerry Jr., who recently referred to Trump as evangelicals’ “dream president.” The younger Falwell must have turned his TV off during the campaign when word leaked out about Trump’s admitting that he has grabbed women by their genital area, that he has forced himself on them because he’s a “celebrity” and a “star.”

Jerry Jr. also must have turned away at the news of Trump’s two divorces and his acknowledged marital infidelity as it regarded his first two wives.

This clown is a dream come true?

Go figure, folks.

national news, political news, religious news

Trump is evangelicals’ ‘dream president’?

Jerry Falwell Jr. attended an executive order signing ceremony today and declared that Donald J. Trump is the “dream president” for the nation’s evangelical Christians.

Wow. Let’s ponder that one.

* Trump has been married three times. I don’t fault him for that, per se. However, he has boasted about cheating on his first two wives.

* The president was riding a bus a dozen years ago with Billy Bush and was overheard telling the “Access Hollywood” host that he grabbed women by their private parts. He said he could get away with that kind of behavior because he is a “celebrity,” a “star.”

* The president has mocked a reporter with a serious physical disability.

* Trump has talked about how he was able to walk in on half-dressed beauty pageant contestants because he owned the pageant.

Today, though, the president signed some executive orders that allows preachers to endorse political candidates from the pulpit. He also signed an order that enables business owners to cite religious objections when they refuse to provide services to, say, gay customers.

He did all this in the name of “religious liberty,” which pleases Falwell, the president of Liberty University.

Thus, evangelicals’ dream has come true. All the other stuff, the boorish behavior, doesn’t matter.

Oh, boy.

local news, political news, religious news, State news

Texas Senate deciding whether to defy U.S. Supreme Court

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I cannot believe the Texas Senate is considering a bill such as the one it is considering.

Senators are debating whether to allow county clerks to deny gay couples a marriage license.

Let’s see. How is this supposed to work?

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled two years ago in a landmark decision that gay marriage is protected under the equal protection clause of the U.S. Constitution. It ruled that every state in the country should allow same-sex couples to marry, which requires them to obtain the legal documentation necessary to become married — just as straight couples are required to do.

The highest court in the nation — to which Texas belongs — ruled that gay marriage is legal.

County clerks, thus, are required to obey the oath they take to honor the laws of the land. Isn’t that right? A handful of county clerks quit their posts rather than perform the duties required of them as a result of the court ruling. Those who remain, though, must fulfill the oath they take — regardless, it seems to me, of their own religious conviction.

Amarillo straddles a border separating Randall and Potter counties. Renee Calhoun and Julie Smith, who serve as county clerks in Randall and Potter counties, respectively, both declared they would issue licenses to gay couples who requested them.

Given the political nature of this discussion, I feel compelled to note that both Calhoun and Smith are Republicans. A healthy majority of Republicans are inclined to oppose gay marriage as a matter of principle, relying on their belief in biblical assertions that marriage should be performed only between one man and one woman.

To my way of thinking, there shouldn’t even be a bill considered in the Texas Legislature that would give county clerks an “out” if they chose to deny gay couples a license to marry.

The Supreme Court of the United States, acting as the final arbiter on these constitutional matters, has decided the issue once and for all. Gay marriage is legal and county clerks ought to be required to do the job to which they swore an oath to perform faithfully.

I must stipulate that they swear their allegiance to the Constitution, as secular a governing document as any ever enacted.