White evangelicals always want to be characterized by their deep, abiding faith. Why, then, do they come off as being incredibly fearful about threats that don’t exist?
That’s a question I kept asking myself as I read Greg Sargent‘s editorial in the Washington Post about why evangelicals are Donald Trump‘s last line of defense in support of his border wall:
Why does President Trump continue to keep the government shut down over his demand for a border wall, when large majorities oppose it? The most obvious answer is that he senses his long-term political survival depends on keeping his wall-adoring base behind him as his legal travails mount.
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On Wednesday, Trump will meet with Democratic leaders over the shutdown and the wall. Axios reports that Trump will stage this meeting in the Situation Room to dramatize “security concerns at the border,” which is absurd, since in reality the wall has little to do with border security and is only about giving him the win he thinks he needs.
Among white evangelical Christians, support for the wall has risen nearly 10 points since Trump campaigned on it. In the most recent Public Religion Research Institute poll, in September 2018, a staggering 67 percent of them favor Trump’s wall.
There’s a lot of irony in how the same people who trust God to guide them into marriage, resolve their health problems, keep tornadoes away from their homes, and provide them with a job suddenly don’t trust God to protect them from refugees who just want to live in a safer place. Indeed, even Chris Wallace at FOX News pointed out that the supposed threat from these refugees was lacked any “credible evidence.”
It all leads to the natural conclusion that conservative Christians’ support for a border wall has less to do with safety concerns and everything to do with letting American citizens know who really runs this country.
That’s a far cry from the savior they worship who preached that true power is found in weakness.
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