Local opinion: The ideological foundations of Trumpism

Trumpism’s abusive actions do not come from nowhere. They arise from clear ideological foundations. Failure to grasp these foundations and their piercing opposition to Christian faithfulness, as well as human decency, gets us lost in the weeds.

The core ideology is not new. It’s what America’s infernal brand of conservativism has been cultivating for decades. What is new is this: Trump delivers. Full throttle. The nonsense that has been championed by Fox ‘News’ and conservative talk radio, by conservative politicians and religion-istic nationalists, by the Heritage Foundation and Project 2025, Trump is actually doing.

Fiercely so.

Many enchanted by Trumpism are ecstatic. To them, his accomplishments border on the miraculous. Others, although they may admit to discomfort with Trump’s crassness and cruelty, nevertheless adore his "accomplishments."

Trumpism is about empire. He fully operates as an unrepentant gangster in his personal and business life, and a proud Fascist in his political life. He and his accomplices–supporters–excusers utilize dishonorable tactics, including retaliation against opponents, weaponizing justice, falsifying history, attacking museums — National Parks — education, disfiguring Christian faith, and, once elected, corrupting elections and hollowing out representative democracy from the inside.

Furthermore, because of absurd rulings by SCOTUS justices appointed by the Bushes and Trump (Thomas, Roberts, Alito, Kavanaugh), along with McConnell’s illegitimates (Gorsuch, Barrett), no amount of criminality, treason, or ethical depravity can bar a candidate from being on a presidential ballot or from inauguration if victorious in the Electoral College. Nothing.

Unfortunately, history teaches that during similar historical eras, most self-proclaimed White Christians, especially their leaders (pastors, bishops, deacons), were unfaithful failures — inside churches and in the public arena — including:

• Multi-generations of pre- and post-Civil War southern Confederacy (refortified nationally in our time as today's GOP).

• Hitler’s 1920s/1930s build-up of the Third Reich in Germany.

• Generations of land theft and cultural, language, bodily genocide by Whites against Native families under the vile ruse of “Manifest Destiny.”

Are the same failures of integrity and courage befalling America today?

History also teaches that patterns of 'too little, too late' have not just plagued Christian leadership. Other entities have also fallen under the spell of disorienting codes of silence (feigned neutrality?). Today, we need to hear from all of America’s reservoirs of expertise and wisdom — scientists, medical personnel, NGOs, social workers, trades, schoolteachers, business associations, artists, universities, journalists, elected officials, police/national guard/military personnel, immigration workers, seminaries, psychologists, sports franchises, judges/attorneys, retired people. History is loudly demanding a reckoning.

Although many Church leaders hesitate to even utter the words Trump or Trump-ism in preaching, teaching, leading, it is instructive that when Jesus knew the source of an evil, he chose specificity. Named names. Of Herod Antipas he mocked, “go and tell that fox ...” (Lk 13:32). He lamented “Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those sent to it” (Mt 23:37) ... and “unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees” (Mt. 5:20). The angel warns Joseph, “Herod is about to search for the child, to destroy him” (Mt. 2:13).

Yes, Christians are supposed to love our enemies. But we are also called to hate what is evil, and to despise all things inimical to honor and decency. This is today’s test.

Trump is calling the shots. His inexcusable ecological irresponsibility, racism, cruelty toward immigrants, abuse of America’s security forces, distortions of history and current realities, weaponizing of justice, religion-istic Nationalism (Trump-world ideology is as far away from Christian faith as Pluto is from Mars), predatory war-mongering and accompanying human/ecological devastation, and commitment to lying — are all clear-cut. Trump’s accomplices know what he wants (Jan. 6, ICE, etc.), and they have carte blanche to act accordingly. Naming names is crucial.

This is a serious time. Trump-world is a living example of how evil operates. Now is the time for honorable leaders to strategically speak up and act out (always non-violently), with the hope that what has been destroyed can someday be restored, and America will again become a mostly honorable nation striving toward truth, decency, democracy.