{"id":13074,"date":"2016-02-21T21:10:08","date_gmt":"2016-02-21T21:10:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/?p=13074"},"modified":"2016-02-21T21:10:08","modified_gmt":"2016-02-21T21:10:08","slug":"trump-earns-evangelical-support-how","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/?p=13074","title":{"rendered":"Trump earns evangelical support … how?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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One of the many — countless, it seems — confounding features of this presidential election cycle concerns the support that Donald J. Trump appears to be gathering from a most unlikely bloc of Republican “base” voters.<\/p>\n

I’m referencing here the evangelical voters, those folks who describe themselves as devout, “born again” Christians.<\/p>\n

Trump’s victory in the South Carolina GOP primary this weekend came in good measure from the support he got among evangelicals.<\/p>\n

I don’t pretend to understand all the nuances of every voting bloc in America. Nor will I jump to many conclusions about any demographic group.<\/p>\n

What I know about those who adhere to evangelical Christianity is that they take their Scripture quite seriously. They also prefer that others believe as they do.<\/p>\n

So, what does Trump believe? How has he lived?<\/p>\n

He’s on his third marriage; he’s been divorced twice. More to the point is that Trump has actually boasted — in writing — about the extramarital affairs he’s had with women who were married to other men. Doesn’t the Bible frown on marital infidelity?<\/p>\n

He’s on record at one time as supporting abortion. I haven’t actually heard him say he supports partial-birth abortion, but many of his critics have said as much and I haven’t heard Trump actually deny he ever favored such a thing. I believe evangelical voters vehemently oppose abortion. Isn’t that correct?<\/p>\n

Trump has made a lot of money building hotels — and casinos, where people go to gamble away lots of money and, perhaps, engage in activity that is, shall we say, a good bit less than righteous.<\/p>\n

The man’s lifestyle over many decades has featured a flaunting of vast material wealth. Again, I won’t presume to know what is in the hearts of those who believe in the principles espoused in Scripture, but I doubt seriously that Trump’s opulent lifestyle\u00a0fits the bill.<\/p>\n

And when I hear Trump talk about the Bible and its contents, he sounds for all the world — to my ears, at least\u00a0— as though he’s talking about a paperback novel he bought off the used-book shelf. Am I wrong or does he sound to anyone else as though he doesn’t have a clue as to what the Bible actually says —\u00a0about anything?<\/em><\/p>\n

But here we are. We’ve been through three contested Republican political events; Trump has finished first in two of them. The South Carolina primary took place in a state where New Testament religion plays a major role in the lives of many of those who call themselves Republicans.<\/p>\n

This has been a confounding electoral process so far. Donald Trump’s appeal among evangelical voters within the Republican Party base might be the most perplexing development of all.<\/p>\n

What in the name of all that is holy am I missing?<\/p>\n

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One of the many — countless, it seems — confounding features of this presidential election cycle concerns the support that Donald J. Trump appears to be gathering from a most unlikely bloc of Republican “base” voters. I’m referencing here the evangelical voters, those folks who describe themselves as devout, “born again” Christians. Trump’s victory in … Continue reading Trump earns evangelical support … how?<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[13,14,15],"tags":[610,1424,1653,1963,3272,5956],"class_list":["post-13074","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-national-news","category-political-news","category-religious-news","tag-bible","tag-donald-trump","tag-evangelicals","tag-gop-primary","tag-new-testament","tag-sc-primary"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13074","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13074"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13074\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13077,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13074\/revisions\/13077"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13074"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13074"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13074"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}