Not one member of Trump's Evangelical Council has resigned. Corporate America has. So allegiance to profits, not prophets drives morality?— Matthew Dowd (@matthewjdowd) August 16, 2017
John Fea, "Five CEOs Resign from Trump's Manufacturing Council. Zero Clergy Resign From Trump’s Evangelical Advisory Council":
While America’s manufacturing giants take principled moral stands against white supremacy and Donald Trump's failure on Saturday to renounce racists by name, none of the members of his "Evangelical Advisory Council"–the so-called court evangelicals–have resigned their posts. Apparently in the United States it is the manufacturers, not the evangelical clergy who advise the POTUS, who now deliver moral messages to the White House.
The CEO's on Trump's economic councils have deeper moral clarity than his Evangelical Christian advisers. Nothing fills me with more rage.— Nish Weiseth (@NishWeiseth) August 16, 2017
Father George Wilson, SJ, writes an open letter to Trump supporters, especially white Catholic and evangelical ones, so-called "pro-life" voters, asking what it might take to provoke critical reflection about who and what Donald Trump has proven to be (and who and what many of us could see him to be during the campaign):
To extend a blank check of support to a politician represents an abdication of one's personal and civic responsibilities. In fact, for religious people, to rely on a human leader unconditionally is a form of idolatry. Commitment of that kind is due only to the Lord.
I respect you for the integrity of your faith commitment. That is precisely why I take the risk of asking you, respectfully, to explore the foundation of your political commitment, to search for the limit that would protect it and make it a reasonable stance. We are all in this together. If President Trump's performance goes beyond the mere failure to honor some campaign promises and causes existential harm to our country, we will suffer as a single people. Lives may depend on your serious reflection.
We hoped our parish would offer prayers for what happened in Charlottesville, but they didn't.— Zu (@mamafeefee) August 16, 2017
Patricia Miller, "Can the Catholic Church Survive Trump?":
There's a danger for any institution that allies itself too closely with any given political party, a hazard that’s pronounced in the age of Trump, as the raw racial animus at his core becomes impossible to ignore for even those who were determined to avert their gaze.
But that danger is especially acute for religious institutions, which face a special moral hazard in becoming too closely identified with a specific party. And, as political scientist Timothy Byrnes writes in the journal OMG!, no religious institution is in more peril of losing its soul to politics than the U.S. Catholic Church. (Unlike many evangelicals, who at this point appear to have little soul left to loose given their die-hard support of Trump).
In response to Charlottesville and Trump's ugly defense of white-supremacist racism, Rod Dreher tries to change the subject to, drum roll! . . . abortion! . . . and Morgan Guyton counters:
The anti-abortion movement for white evangelicals is a way to change the subject & take moral high ground from the Civil Rights movement. https://t.co/TZx8YP5eTO— Morgan Guyton (@MAGuyton) August 15, 2017
