1. G-d and Caesar
– Intro
This is the second of a three part series on G-d and Caesar. It is a look at the way Christian symbols and identification have been utilized in the last three national elections. I thank you for coming this morning to consider these troubling considerations.
2. Review – Nationalism, Deadly Force, Religion
I began this three part series last
week with a quick look at the January 6 Insurrection, the assault on the U.S.
Capitol which was an unsuccessful attempt to stop the certification of Joe
Biden’s presidential election. Within 36 hours, five people died, and many were
injured, including 174 police officers. Four officers who responded to the
attack would die by suicide within seven months. Damage caused by attackers
exceeded $2.7 million.
This attempted insurrection was
marked by three major patterns of expression. The first was the use of
nationalistic symbols. The people who swarmed through broken windows and broke
into Congressional offices widely displayed versions of the American flag and
signs proclaiming their patriotism.
The second mode of expression was
that of death. The chants from the mob as it began to swarm into the Capitol
building spoke of hanging Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi and Vice-President
Mike Pence for their refusal to throw out the votes of the American people and
declaring the electoral loser, Donald Trump, President. That theme was
exemplified by the gallows erected by rioters complete with hanging noose,
surrounded by “Jesus Saves” signs, in front of the Capitol building in which
members of Congress were hiding, not knowing how far the wrath of the mob would
extend.
The third mode of expression
involved religion. Bradley Onishi, a religious scholar and former conservative
evangelical, spoke of the Jericho March the night before Jan. 6 billed as a
prayer rally for those who love the nation. Recalling the story the Israelites
led by Joshua marching around the city of Jericho after which G_d miraculously
causes its walls to fall, Onishi notes: “Once that happens, the Israelites
go into the city — and they slaughter every man, woman, child and animal. Well,
if you have a Jericho March, you're telling me that you're having a prayer
rally, hoping that you have a chance to go in and annihilate your enemies.”
That deadly theme was echoed by
participants who entered the capitol. Jacob Chansley, with his horned fur hat,
bare chest and face paint, entered the US Senate chamber, sat at the desk of
the Senate president and prayed: "Thank
you for allowing the United States to be reborn. We love you and we thank you.
In Christ's holy name, we pray." Upon his
departure he left a note reading "It's Only A Matter of Time. Justice
Is Coming!"
So the January 6 insurrection
produced a bizarre combination of nationalism, deadly force and religion, the
elements that mark Christian Nationalism.
3. Messiahs and
Anti-Christs (plural)
In last week’s talk, I used the work
of biblical scholar John Dominic Crossan to denote the differences between the
kingdoms of Caesar and Jesus’ Kingdom of G_d.
Today’s
portion will utilize the work of theologian Matthew Fox, a former Dominican
friar, Creation Spirituality theologian and now Episcopal priest. He is perhaps
best known for his concept of Original Blessing which reinterpreted the same Genesis
passages from which Augustine of Hippo created his construct of original sin.
4. Messianic
Longings
Messianic longing never occurs in a
vacuum, arising in the context of perceived oppression that only ends when the
deity steps in to clean up the mess. But, such a divine cleanup requires a
human agent to lead it. Hence, Messiahs are believed to be divinely chosen
leaders who will usher in a time of peace, justice, and redemption, essentially
saving humanity from suffering and evil by restoring the world to its ideal
state, led by a savior figure who will bring about a new era of goodness and
harmony.
Middle Eastern Messianic constructs
originated as a Zoroastrian religious belief which was quickly adapted by the Abrahamic
religions. It appears in other religions including Hinduism, Islam, Buddhism
and Taoism.. While Israelites awaited the messiah who would redeem Israel – a
collective vision – the life and ministry of Jesus would ultimately be
constructed through the lens of a new religion, Christianity, which would
interpret the messiah as the means of salvation – an individualistic vision.
5. MAGA
Messianism
The MAGA movement is marked by a
number of messianic elements. Its messianic vision is founded in that of the 1st
CE Hebrew people and, while claiming the imprimatur of Christianity, bears
little resemblance to the Christian construct of the Christ whose sacrifice
provides salvation for repentant sinners. MAGA Messianism operates out of three
basic precepts. One, the situation in which those seeking deliverance is seen
as intolerable and must end soon. Two, that deliverance requires a divinely
anointed agent sent to save the people. And three, the role of those to be
delivered is to swear unwavering loyalty and obedience to the messianic figure
and allow him to do whatever is necessary to save them.
6. A Near Miss
Affirms Messianic Anointing
That Donald Trump is seen in a
messianic role by his MAGA followers is clear. The rhetoric of his campaigns
was often cast in terms of divine appointment: Thank you G-d for sending
Donald Trump. That divine mission was seen as affirmed by Trump’s near miss
in an assassination attempt in Butler, PA last September when he received minor
wounds even as one of his supporters was killed. Donald Trump has been more
than willing to be seen in this manner and his campaign has routinely cranked
out imagery developing this idea.
Once in power, Trump has demanded
total allegiance from his followers and a monopoly on power in decision making.
It is a pattern which results in an infantilized, obedient public as well as an
authoritarian exercise of power with no constraints.
7. Similarities
in Name Only
Most MAGA supporters purport to be Christians. More specifically, they tend to identify as evangelical. In the past three presidential elections, the MAGA candidate has received the vote of 8 in 10 voters who identified themselves as evangelical. Heretofore, such voters were seen as moral values voters, opposing candidates whose lifestyles were seen as ungodly. The 1980s version of MAGA called itself the Moral Majority.
But the adherents of MAGA are
different from their evangelical predecessors. Being evangelical once suggested
regular church attendance. But while stated affiliations with evangelical
bodies has grown slightly over the past five years, attendance is down and
continues to drop.
Evangelicals historically have
been focused on salvation and conversion with strongly held views on specific
issues such as abortion. Their nearly univocal support since 2016 has gone to a
twice-divorced man found liable in a high profile rape case, convicted of 38
felonies involving falsified business records to cover hush money payments to a
pornographic film star. On his second inauguration he refused to take his
latest oath of office on the Jefferson Bible like all of his predecessors. This
pattern is the antithesis of the vision of the Moral Majority.
While church attendance, pietistic
moralism and soul-saving evangelism has marked the evangelical identity
historically, today, it is as often used to describe a cultural and political
identity: one in which these self-described Christians consider themselves a
persecuted minority, in which traditional institutions are viewed skeptically
and Mr. Trump looms large.
8. A Devil’s
Bargain?
The ardent support he received from
evangelical voters in 2016 and 2020 is often described as largely
transactional: an investment in his appointment of Supreme Court justices who
would abolish the federal right to abortion and advance the group’s other top
priorities. In what could be described as a devil’s bargain, “Politics has
become the master identity,” said Ryan Burge, an associate professor of
political science at Eastern Illinois University and a Baptist pastor. “Everything
else lines up behind partisanship.”
While candidate Trump denied knowing
anything about it, many of his supporters and now staff members have sought to
create a theocratic state based in their vision of Christianity found in the
Project 2025 manifesto. Ironically, while MAGA legitimates itself in the name
of a Christ who came to save believers from sin through his crucifixion, its
values bear more resemblance to those of the Roman Empire who crucified the
Jesus the empire saw as a potential threat to its interests than either the long
awaited deliverer of the oppressed Hebrew people or the Christian messiah whose
self-sacrifice provided salvation from sin to those who believed the church’s
doctrine.
9. Apocalypse:
The Vision from Patmos
One of the defining marks of the
MAGA movement is the politics of revenge. A portion of scripture often cited by
MAGA adherents is based in John of Patmos’ Apocalypse, often called
Revelations, the final book of the New Testament. In that vision, the enemies
of G_d’s chosen will get what is coming to them in a massive divine cleanup. Always
seen as controversial, for much of the early church’s debates the Apocalypse was
not included among the books that finally became the canon. While tradition has
held that John’s community, which produced the Gospel of John as well as three
epistles, also produced the Apocalypse, modern scholars are inclined to see the
community at Patmos as distinct from the other books bearing the name
John.
Among the many extravagant images
that comes from John’s Apocalypse is the figure of the Antichrist. Most biblical
scholars are clear that this was a coded reference to Nero, the tyrannical
Caesar of John’s day. Nero reigned in the decades following the execution of
Jesus when the early Jesus movement had scattered across the Mediterranean
basin and begun its long process toward becoming a new religious movement
called Christianity.
John’s Antichrist rides a white
horse bearing an archer’s bow and is described as a conqueror. At the end
of a great tribulation, Jesus returns with his armies to defeat the Antichrist.
Thereafter John tells us there will be a new heaven and a new earth in which G-d
himself comes to dwell among mortals.
There are several aspects of the
Antichrist worth noting. The Antichrist is the antithesis of Jesus Christ. The
Antichrist also masquerades as the Messiah. And the Antichrist inaugurates a
time of wickedness and sorrow.
10. Fox - 18
Signs the Antichrist is Here
Matthew Fox’s recent book, Trump
& The Maga Movement as Anti-Christ, compares the archetypes of the
Christ with those of the Antichrist. Fox argues that the values of the Christ
underscore the practice of democracy. These values are rooted in the dignity of
the individual evidenced by the Jesus movement from which flows the commitment
to community, solidarity and the common good. Among these values, Truth,
Justice, Beauty and Joy, are primary, held by people of many faith
traditions and of many with none.
Among the 18 signs of the Antichrist
archetype, Fox begins with a countless stream of lies, noting that Satan is
often seen as the Father of Lies. The 18 signs include Project 2025, which Fox
sees as a fascist document, the January 6 insurrection in pursuit of the Big
Lie which falsely asserted Trump’s victory in the 20202 election, denial of
anthropogenic climate change and the role of dark money in the electoral
process. High on the list was the role of racism, misogyny, homophobia and
anti-immigrant sentiment used to identify enemies among the body politic, thus
normalizing hate - the antithesis of the Jesus commandment to love one’s
enemies - and a constant threat of violence as the means of attaining and
holding power.
11. Blasphemy as
the Mark of the Beast
Fox focuses on the idolatry around
Trump and the blasphemy of manipulating sacred symbols for political purposes. Chief
among them was the tear gassing of a crowd during the Black Lives Matter
demonstrations which included the clergy and parishioners at St. John’s
Lafayette Square, the historic Episcopal church across the street from the
White House, to make it available for a political message. Ironically, the then
first time resident of the White House used a boarded up parish as his
backdrop, holding up a Bible as a sign of his connection to his evangelical
base.
Consider also the incongruity of the
God Bless the USA Trump Bible. The Roman Empire certainly saw itself as
blessed by the gods. And for the empire, religion and empire were inseparable.
But we ought to ask ourselves what is so special about America that G_d would
bless us separately, if not over and above any other nation-state. And we ought
to consider the implications of a version of scripture that largely serves the
political and economic interests of one of its power holders.
12. Antichrists –
Plural
It’s important to note that Fox’s
critique is not solely focused on Trump himself. While the archetype of the
Antichrist is a powerful image that speaks to our psyches, giving rise to a
wide range of literary and motion picture portrayals, the early church used
that term in its plural form, antichrists.
In the first of three epistles
included within the New Testament under the name of John, the author warns
against the many antichrists, plural, which have appeared at the end of the 1st
CE whom the author said belong to the same spirit as that of the one Antichrist.
Polycarp, a Greek bishop writing in the same era to the Jesus community in
Phillipi, warned that anyone who preached false doctrine was an
antichrist. He believed that the Antichrist was the spirit of
heresy.
Fox’s critique sees the MAGA
movement as driven by this antichrist spirit. And
if that movement is defined as opposition to the teachings of Jesus, perhaps he
has a point. Russell Moore, Southern Baptist editor of Christianity Today,
relates a story he is hearing frequently from evangelical preachers.
When
pastors quote the Sermon on the Mount, people come up afterward and ask, “Where
did you get those liberal talking points?” Of course, they come from Jesus
Christ. So when the pastors say they were quoting from Matthew, they say,
‘Yes, but that doesn’t work anymore. That’s weak…That was fine for those
times. But we’re in a state of emergency now. We live in a hostile culture so
those things don’t apply here.” As if Jesus was delivering his Sermon on the
Mount in Mayberry instead of the Roman Empire.
So if an antichrist is marked by thoughts,
words and deeds that define themselves in opposition to the Jesus of the
Gospels, are we not surrounded by ideological antichrists today who have
supplanted Christian faith with MAGA ideology? And if so, what are the
implications for those of us within the Christian tradition? What should be our
response?
13. QUESTIONS TO CONSIDER
1. If messianic longings arise from a context of perceived
oppression, who are those who see themselves as oppressed in our country? How so?
2. How might Donald Trump be seen as a Messiah? How might
Donald Trump be seen as an Anti-Christ?
3. Where are the values of the MAGA movement consistent with
Christian tradition? Where are they in opposition to those values? How might
MAGA supporters respond to being seen as anti-christs (plural)?
4. What, if
any, response should those who follow Jesus make in light of this reality?
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Harry Scott Coverston
Orlando, Florida
If the unexamined life is not worth living,
surely an unexamined belief system, be it religious or political, is not worth
holding. Most things worth considering do not come in sound bites.
Those who believe religion and politics
aren't connected don't understand either. – Mahatma Gandhi
For what does G-d require of you but to do justice,
and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your G-d? - Micah
6:8, Hebrew Scriptures
Do not be daunted by the enormity of the world's
grief. Do justly, now. Love mercy, now. Walk humbly now. You are not obligated
to complete the work, but neither are you free to abandon it. - Rabbi
Rami Shapiro, Wisdom of the Jewish Sages (1993)
© Harry Coverston, 2025
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