Should our Christianity influence our politics?  Apparently only in some situations.  This is my column in today’s Greenville News.  Not trying to push for one or the other candidate, so I’m not crazy about the title applied to it.

https://www.greenvilleonline.com/story/opinion/contributors/2016/08/14/ed-leap-but-seriously-would-jesus-vote-trump/88514404/

I’ve seen a lot of commentary lately that says Christians shouldn’t vote for Donald Trump. They tell us that he does not, in any way, behave like a Christian. Some of these observations actually come from Christians and are not without merit. But the majority I have seen have been directed from more secular individuals towards Christians.
Instead of WWJD (What Would Jesus Do), the question asked of the faithful seems to be WJVT: ‘Would Jesus Vote Trump?’ And it’s a good question, asked for a bad reason. What bad reason? Manipulation of believers for political ends.
It’s a weird election. I think most of us would like to press the reset button and start all over. But it’s August and these two are the main players in the farce which will raise the curtain on its last act in November. I understand both sides of the argument. In a country sharply divided, Trump and Hillary seem (on the surface) remarkably different. Whether they actually are, we won’t know until later. We’ll have to ‘elect one and see what’s in them,’ to borrow from Rep. Nancy Pelosi.
But I’m troubled by something. The same people who told Christians to take our religion and keep it out of politics (and largely out of public life in general) are now berating Christians who support The Donald because they aren’t properly employing their faith in the realm of politics.

Apparently, Christianity properly applied should be used as a screening tool to decide if a candidate is acceptable based on how closely he or she conforms to the popular notion of ‘Christian’ behavior.
I’m trying to imagine the outcry if, when appointing a Supreme Court Justice, a president opined, ‘I’m really not sure she’s Christian enough for the court.’ There would be no end of shocked citizens, deeply angered by a political decision based on Christianity.
I remember, not very long ago, when Christians applied scripture to the same-sex marriage debate. We were reminded in no uncertain terms that our beliefs had no place in the decision. Ditto for abortion. Christianity, it seems, has no place in policies regarding killing the unborn, and certainly shouldn’t play into decisions about whether or not to provide potentially abortifacient drugs! Take that, Little Sisters of the Poor! Silly Christians, keep your ideas and nutty beliefs to yourselves. This isn’t the year 1000, after all!
That is, unless we’re talking about the current presidential election, which is odd. For the most part, past candidates who were very Christian were also considered very unacceptable in the eyes of the media and the secular world. Candidates, for example, like Mike Huckabee, the Southern Baptist Preacher or Sen. Rick Santorum, the devout Catholic were far too ‘Christian’ to be considered for the presidency. Even Gov. Mitt Romney, Mormon, was just too ‘Mormon’ despite being a very nice, loving husband and father. Good grief, he was the Republican ‘anti-Trump!’
So by now many Christians have learned their lessons. In a grim political and cultural milieu, they have decided that maybe the loud fellow with the bad attitude, who says what many people are thinking, might just be ‘the guy.’ Besides, I don’t really think that Christians voting for Trump are under the delusion that he is representative of Christianity. They just think he might do things that are a little more in line with their beliefs, a little less likely to threaten their values. He might be ‘a little less bad.’ They know they may be wrong, that it’s a gamble. But those of us believers who know our history also realize that our brethren down the ages have been led by far worse (and far less ‘Christian’ ) leaders than either of the current candidates for Commander in Chief. And some of them were quite good for Christians in the end.
I’m not trying to convince anyone to vote for any candidate. Please, vote your conscience. But we should all try to have charity towards those on the other side, who support candidates for reasons probably more nuanced than we believe. (It’s much easier to call our enemies stupid than attribute any intelligent motives to their behaviors.)
And while I believe those who want religion to stay out of politics are ultimately unrealistic, they should at least be consistent. It’s terribly unfair to tell Christians to leave their faith outside the ballot box, but then condemn them for actually doing so.

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