Are MAGAs Christian?

I spent my entire life having no lasting friendships. I found few people I could connect with; people who shared my passions, and with whom I could have the intellectual conversations I craved. Then I got on the Internet and everything changed.

I found several forums that aligned with my interests, met people who were like me in many ways, people who were smarter than me about many things, which I liked, because I could learn from them. Many of the people I became online friends with were pretty wonderful Christians.

Then Facebook came along, and I began hanging out there, along with a few hundred people who followed me there from several forums. I met more people, and found groups full of smart people I could identify with. Things were great – until they weren’t.

The 2016 presidential race began. Hillary was running against Trump. Both were well known, but did either one have what it takes to run the country? Hillary had a shadow following her, rumors of unscrupulous activities. Trump was a businessman, not a politician.

I began evaluating them against each other, looking for good and bad. I did see some redeeming qualities in Hillary, but I just wasn’t sure about her.

Many of my friends began backing Trump. I was open to giving him the benefit of the doubt, but I wasn’t entirely convinced. Now and again, he would say something that sounded good, which gave me some hope. If he would do some of things he was promising if he became president, I was all for it. I even posted statements on Facebook along the lines of, “Look, if he does this thing he says he’ll do, I can get behind that”. But I never threw my support behind him. I couldn’t shake a growing niggling doubt.

Many of my friends seemed to be developing a kind of fanaticism about Trump. I began feeling something wasn’t right. As the weeks and months passed, my unease grew. I began detecting cracks in Trump’s facade. He was not the person he was claiming to be.

I made some negative posts about Trump on Facebook. Apparently, that was a mistake. People were raking me over the coals! Horrible fights broke out in the comments. People who had been my online friends for up to 15 or more years, many of them Christian, began unfriending or blocking me because I didn’t support Trump. I was stunned. What was wrong with people? I didn’t understand. I had to delete a lot of threads and stop posting anything at all about Trump.

It was insane! People lost their minds! Even my awesome Christian friends who had always been even tempered with feet firmly on the ground, got caught up in the Trump frenzy and would bite my head off if I said anything against Trump. It was downright frightening the way people were. It made me think of how people had followed Hitler.

Good Christian people I had so greatly admired lost their ever-loving minds.

I don’t think they lost their salvation, but some (not all) Trump-supporting Christians have taken a turn down a dark road and don’t even realize it. Their heart is becoming hard, and this is perilous to their spiritual life. It’s like a cancer spreading throughout the Church. Satan must be cackling with glee.

Before I continue, I want to clarify a point. Many of my Trump-supporting Christian friends are still amazing people. I value my friendship with those people, and have nothing bad to say about them. The MAGA Christians this post is about are the ones who have become hateful; those who viciously attack anyone who speaks against Trump. So when I say “MAGA Christian”, I’m only referring to those who have gone over the edge and no longer act like Christians are supposed to.

It’s pointless to argue with them. Even when I can present 100% undeniable proof that the meme they are sharing is a lie, they will do one or more of the following:

Call me a libtard
Get angry and find some way to justify the lie.
Get angry and try to divert my attention.
Suddenly go silent and leave the conversation in which they were vociferously participating.
Dirty delete their meme and comments
Unfriend me.

And then there’s variations of this bizarre comment I’ve seen several times: “How can anyone call themselves a Christian and not support Trump?”. That one always leaves me speechless. I want to know how a Christian can support Trump. Oh, I know. Because MAGAs see things the way they want to see them; not the way they really are. And MAGAs remember events the way Trump remembers them, instead of the way they really happened. Anyone who claims to follow Jesus while supporting Trump are morally confused and spiritually disoriented, or just willfully ignorant.

When you confront MAGA Christians with the teachings of the Bible, they toss out random Bible verses all out of context. If you want to see them go berserk, just tell them that Trump isn’t a Christian.

A MAGA Christian epitomizes cognitive dissonance. They are unable to perceive their own hypocrisy. Their adulation of Trump gives them the excuse they need to foment hate against anyone who doesn’t agree with them, all in the name of God.

I grew up in church. My grandaddy was a preacher. Most congregants were very nice, loving people. But almost every congregation had at least one mean old biddy. They could sing hymns enthusiastically, they could pray loudly, and they could quote Bible verses. But they were hateful, self-righteous, critical, and would stab you in the back when it suited their purpose. I look back on those people and think, they weren’t much different than today’s MAGA Christian.

In the New Testament, Jesus clashed with both the Pharisees and the Sadducees (Jewish sects), but it was the Sadducees who entrenched themselves into Roman politics. They were sanctimonious, and Jesus called them hypocrites. Those politically-minded religious nuts killed him.

The Bible is full of stories about religious hypocrites who hurt those God wanted to help. MAGA Christians are unable to see themselves acting out the very behaviors that the Bible warns against.

MAGA Christians are succumbing to Christian nationalism. This corrupt faction is contrary to everything Jesus taught. It’s a movement designed by the ruling class to keep the working class downtrodden, to make the rich richer.

In his very first sermon, Jesus made clear that he stood with the poor, the oppressed; those exploited by imperial, commercial, and religious social control. Jesus quoted Isaiah when he announced that he came to proclaim good news to the poor, to set the oppressed free. (Luke 4:18). He was talking about liberation from the very real system of Roman oppression, which is disturbingly comparable to today’s government.

All my life I heard how Christians would be fooled by the antichrist. I always wondered how Christians would be deceived so easily. Now I know. No, I don’t think Trump is the antichrist, but the MAGA Christian movement is precursor to the real thing.

The day MAGAs anchored their convictions to Donald Trump, they doomed themselves to moral confusion and they know it not. Their spirituality is compromised. They have made a deal with the devil.

All I can do is pray truth comes out, that leaders grow a spine and that MAGAs overcome their brainwashing. I keep hoping that Trump will say something that will open people’s eyes. Maybe a recorded phone call will get leaked, or he’ll think the mic is off when it’s broadcasting. Something… anything!

I just hope enough MAGAs wake up before it’s too late to save the country.