Evangelical conservatism in the age of Trump

theQuincunx5 said:

I don't think that is necessarily correct for all people. Especially the most religiously pious. For them it truly IS black and white. Day and Night. Good and Evil.

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Individuals may be described that way, but when the issue is "Evangelical Christians", we are talking about thousands and thousands of people of a number of different denominations.

But that doesn't sound like the Evangelical, Religious Right voting bloc's views. I will gladly agree that Christians differ (even Evangelicals!) But I will not agree that the differences expressed by Evangelicals are left as "You do your thing, I'll do mine".

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No one has suggested that.

NotreDame said:

No. The character of voters has never been an issue.

Specific factual features of a particular kind of voter(s) has been discussed but isn’t an issue or the issue.

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The moment you used the imperative "shouldn't", that was a moral imperative, and whether you admit it or not, moral imperatives are matters of character.

Albion said:

Individuals may be described that way, but when the issue is "Evangelical Christians", we are talking about thousands and thousands of people of a number of different denominations.

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The common point of the Evangelical Voting bloc per se is the reliance on the word of God. While they may have many different interpretations, all of them feel they understand the will of God per their interpretation.

This is very much different from people just making "the optimum decision based on real-world issues".

I am unaware of any Evangelical who espouses moral relativism or anything that would admit of a less than clear, bright-line morality as established by God.

Are you?

No one has suggested that.

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But when you say their morality isn't black-and-white that is precisely what you must mean. Moral relativism is the bete noir of the Religious Right (we hear it literally all the time from them). Moral relativism is the antithesis of their beliefs and is why they feel their beliefs have a significant value, they are informed by the most high authority (God).

Again, can you show me evangelicals who are moral relativists or who feel that God didn't establish the codes for what is right and wrong? OR can you show me Evangelicals who are willing to debate against what God states in the Bible as the rules?

NotreDame said:

... but Daniel was not expected to elevate that earthly authority above God...

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And he didn't. But neither did Daniel say "Nebuchadnezzar is an evil man. I refuse to participate in the government of Babylon. I'll go and find a cave and become a hermit". Instead he applied this principle:

Render therefore to all their dues: tribute to whom tribute is due; custom to whom custom; fear to whom fear; honour to whom honour. (Rom 13:7).

And no Christian in his right mind regards Trump or any president as anything more than what the office is. So who is elevating earthly authority over God? The earthly authorities in fact are appointed by God, and if it so happens that they are in democracies or democratic republics, it is the civic duty of every Christian as a citizen to cast his vote for the general good.

Given the choice between Crooked Hillary and Brash Trump, it was a "no contest". Given the choice between "Make America Deplorable Indefinitely" or "Make America Great Again", it was also a "no contest".

Albion said:

I am saying that the whole thing is problematic. We cannot talk as though what is moral is obvious and that there never are any honest disagreements among people who have read and believe the Bible, etc.

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To the contrary, evangelicals and Christians have vast, wide, and far agreement of what is “obvious” as it pertains to morals, particularly Biblical morals. They have a long history of unifying to collectively condemn or denounce some conduct, behavior, or lifestyle as immoral. So, let’s not erect a facade of no one can question, scrutinize, or criticize evangelical votes for Trump on the basis they at times disagree, all the while ignoring their previous wide spread agreement on a variety of moral issues.

Sure, there may be some disagreement as to whether some specific conduct is morally unacceptable among evangelicals and Christians. However, this isn’t a dialogue exploring evangelical and Christian disagreement as to whether some conduct is morally reprehensible.

Instead, this a more specific inquiry, into very specific conduct, by a specific person, Trump. There is specific, repeated conduct engaged in by Trump which is contrary to a plain, ordinary, reading of the Biblical text.

Did Trump repeatedly lie during the campaign? Yes. Opinion | The Lies Trump Told

Is lying immoral by Biblical standards? Yes. Ageement among evangelicals lying is Biblically impermissible? Yes.

Repeatedly making fun of other people...calling people names....belittling them...repeatedly using foul language and cussing...Biblically not allowed? Yes. Verses? Several. Proverbs 19:29 NIV. Ephesians 5:4. Proverbs 3:34 NASB/NIV

The dialogue is specifically about Trump, his conduct, his words, actions, and whether they are consistent with the Bible. The debate, if any, as to whether there is Biblical ambiguity should be narrowly tailored to Trump, his conduct, words, deeds, etcetera.

Micah888 said:

And he didn't. But neither did Daniel say "Nebuchadnezzar is an evil man. I refuse to participate in the government of Babylon. I'll go and find a cave and become a hermit". Instead he applied this principle:

Render therefore to all their dues: tribute to whom tribute is due; custom to whom custom; fear to whom fear; honour to whom honour. (Rom 13:7).

And no Christian in his right mind regards Trump or any president as anything more than what the office is. So who is elevating earthly authority over God? The earthly authorities in fact are appointed by God, and if it so happens that they are in democracies or democratic republics, it is the civic duty of every Christian as a citizen to cast his vote for the general good.

Given the choice between Crooked Hillary and Brash Trump, it was a "no contest". Given the choice between "Make America Deplorable Indefinitely" or "Make America Great Again", it was also a "no contest".

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This isn’t a dialogue about “participating in government.” The better question is whether Daniel, if given a vote, would have voted for the evil Nebuchadnezzar at all. If Daniel is following the Bible, the answer is no.

Furthermore, Daniel isn’t likely to vote for the wicked Nebuchadnezzar on the basis the other candidate was more wicked. Voting for a wicked candidate is still voting for a wicked candidate, despite the fact the other candidate is more wicked. How is voting for a wicked candidate Biblically allowed? Again, the fact remains in your argument that people are still voting for a wicked candidate.

Your logic leads to the absurd outcome of justifying evangelicals voting for the false prophet because he’s less evil than the Antichrist. Biblically, I’m incredulous voting for the false prophet would be condonable for evangelicals on the basis, although he’s very evil, he’s less evil than he Antichrist.

SolomonVII said:

The age of Obama and Clinton saw the Democratic Party seeing Evangelicals as deplorable, despicable individuals for clinging to their guns an religion and hating women with the insistence that the unborn were human beings.

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No candidate has any business calling 1/4 of the population deplorable. But in fairness, what she actually said was: half of his supporters seem to be racists and the like, but the other half are people who we really need to listen to.

The commentary I've seen says that she embraced "identity politics," and this isn't a good strategy. I agree. Hillary quite likely believes that anyone who takes a conservative position on homosexuality is "homophobic," and hates gays. While I think they've misunderstood what the Bible is and what Paul was saying, they do not hate gays. Many people are quite rightly going to reject such a dismissive attitude. I'm hoping that the Democratic party is going to stop with the identity politics and focus on doing things to help people.

theQuincunx5 said:

The common point of the Evangelical Voting bloc per se is the reliance on the word of God. While they may have many different interpretations, all of them feel they understand the will of God per their interpretation.

This is very much different from people just making "the optimum decision based on real-world issues".

I am unaware of any Evangelical who espouses moral relativism or anything that would admit of a less than clear, bright-line morality as established by God.

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It looks to me that the point was missed. If you have, let us say, ten people who are not moral relativists, that does not mean that they will all interpret every moral issue in the exact same way. Such differences of opinion do not in themselves make any of them moral relativists.

SolomonVII said:

The moment you used the imperative "shouldn't", that was a moral imperative, and whether you admit it or not, moral imperatives are matters of character.

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Follow along partna, the character of voters isn’t an issue.

NotreDame said:

Instead, this a more specific inquiry, into very specific conduct, by a specific person, Trump. There is specific, repeated conduct engaged in by Trump which is contrary to a plain, ordinary, reading of the Biblical text.

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In your personal judgment, that is. I know that all the anti-Trump folks are dead certain that their view of things is above questioning, but if you only could see how much a predisposition to find fault has colored your analysis....

I'm just saying. I know that even a careful, item by item, explanation of why the listed accusations are incorrect wouldn't do any good. Unfortunately.

Albion said:

It looks to me that the point was missed. If you have, let us say, ten people who are not moral relativists, that does not mean that they will all interpret every moral issue in the exact same way. Such differences of opinion do not in themselves make any of them moral relativists.

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And I will contend that you missed my point. I explicitly agreed that they may not all interpret morality all the same but they do all have an inflexible morality meaning each perso has a very b/w morality.

hedrick said:

No candidate has any business calling 1/4 of the population deplorable. But in fairness, what she actually said was: half of his supporters seem to be racists and the like, but the other half are people who we really need to listen to.

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To be fair, the attitudes I am referencing goes far beyond a quote or misquote from Hillary Clinton.The contempt for fly-over country from the urban elites is tangible in all forms of popular culture.
Dennis Prager coined the term SIXHIRB as a means of trying to inform people of this contempt, and this was a decade before HRC was in a presidential run. His comment is that people on the right think that people on the left are wrong, but people on the left think that people on the right are evil. To call someone a racistor bigot, or intolerant or some kind of homophobe or islamophobe or xenophobe is to call someone evil, isn't it?
Here is jsut the latest example. A Parkland survivor, a kid, is not just wrong. He is a Nazi according to those who have the left agenda.
TOLERANCE: Parkland Teacher Slams Student Survivor Kashuv, Compares Him To Hitler In Class

The contempt that wider and wider swaths of the Democratic party holds for Evangelicals is not limited to one comment. It is tangible, and grows incrementally stronger.

The commentary I've seen says that she embraced "identity politics," and this isn't a good strategy. I agree. Hillary quite likely believes that anyone who takes a conservative position on homosexuality is "homophobic," and hates gays. While I think they've misunderstood what the Bible is and what Paul was saying, they do not hate gays. Many people are quite rightly going to reject such a dismissive attitude. I'm hoping that the Democratic party is going to stop with the identity politics and focus on doing things to help people.

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Identity politics may well be a winning strategy for Democrats yet. To the extent that White Identity becomes the official opposition to the rainbow coalition, I think it is a horrible strategy too.
But it is where politics in the West are right now, and will be for the foreseeable future, until and unless people start actually listening to each other.[/QUOTE]

It's my observations that accusations of evil fly in both directions with roughly equal regularity and intensity. It's not a matter of one side thinks the other is wrong, and the other side thinks the first side is evil. Both sides think the other is evil, to some extent.

SolomonVII said:

The contempt that wider and wider swaths of the Democratic party holds for Evangelicals is not limited to one comment. It is tangible, and grows incrementally stronger.

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Have you ever stopped to think why that might be?

theQuincunx5 said:

And I will contend that you missed my point. I explicitly agreed that they may not all interpret morality all the same but they do all have an inflexible morality meaning each perso has a very b/w morality.

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Sorry. Now that I have read your previous post again, it appears that we are in agreement about this much. I can also how I misinterpreted it.

ArteestX said:

30 years ago when Bill Clinton was unfaithful to his wife, evangelicals across the spectrum said Clinton was too ungodly to be in White House....

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Looking back on that situation, much more was involved in their thinking than you are willing to mention--or that you remember. I cannot say which of those it is.

Albion said:

Individuals may be described that way, but when the issue is "Evangelical Christians", we are talking about thousands and thousands of people of a number of different denominations.

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Indeed. In the US, Evangelicals make up over 25% of the population.

Oh, and Happy Birthday, by the way!

Micah888 said:

And he didn't. But neither did Daniel say "Nebuchadnezzar is an evil man. I refuse to participate in the government of Babylon. I'll go and find a cave and become a hermit".

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Good point.

NotreDame said:

This isn’t a dialogue about “participating in government.” The better question is whether Daniel, if given a vote, would have voted for the evil Nebuchadnezzar at all. If Daniel is following the Bible, the answer is no.

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The job of the voter is to pick the least-worst candidate. No more, no less. The candidate doesn't need to be a saint, just have better policies than the other(s).