Anthea Butler, the chair of the University of Pennsylvania Department of Religious Studies, doesn't think many Americans know the full extent to which Trump-loving evangelical Christians are devoted to the president-elect.
Writing in the Philadelphia Inquirer, Butler argued that many MAGA evangelicals see Trump not just as someone who will enact their preferred policy agenda, but as "God's man" whose "deification" was ratified by his win in the 2024 election.
"If that sounds crazy and frightening to you, it should," she writes. "For many voters, Trump isn’t just the head of the Republican Party. He is a God-ordained leader, meant to bring religion and morality back to America. Trump now has a divine mandate after this election, in the minds of his supporters, and that will bring havoc to the separation of church and state."
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She then cites quotes from Dominionist Christian leaders who have been crowing since his victory that Trump's victory will usher in "the most supernatural era” and a “higher level of Christianity.”
"What that means is that everything Trump will do in this new administration, including his promise of mass deportations, tariffs, destroying the U.S. Department of Education, and retribution, will have religious overtones and meaning for his loyal followers," she wrote.
As if that weren't disturbing enough, Butler says that these MAGA evangelicals expect Trump to be an Old Testament-style instrument of vengeance upon their enemies akin to a locust plague.
"Understand that this time around, Trump’s religious supporters not only see him as a leader, but as God’s man, ordained to smite those who have persecuted him or stood in his way," she warns. "The language Trump used of 'the enemy within' will become not only a mantra of retribution but of divine justice, wielded by God’s chosen one."
She concluded her article by warning that "the freedom Trump’s supporters want is the freedom to lord it over the rest of us — in the name of their version of the Lord."
