A new Pew Research survey finds 65% of American adults describe themselves as Christians when asked about their religion, down 12 percentage points over the past decade.
Meanwhile, the religiously unaffiliated share of the population, consisting of people who describe their religious identity as atheist, agnostic or “nothing in particular,” now stands at 26%, up from 17% in 2009.
Attorney General Bill Barr decried attacks on religious values in a speech, tying a movement of “militant secularism” to societal maladies including the opioid epidemic and “an increase in senseless violence,” CNN reports.
Barr said a “moral upheaval” and decades of efforts to undermine religion had given way to growing illegitimacy rates, drug use, and “angry, alienated young males.”
Said Barr: “The campaign to destroy the traditional moral order has coincided and I believe has brought with it immense suffering and misery. And yet the forces of secularism, ignoring these tragic results, press on with even greater militancy.”
“One of Donald Trump’s most prominent Christian supporters will argue in a book due out before the 2020 general election that American evangelicals ‘have a moral obligation to enthusiastically back’ the president,” Politico reports.
“The book’s author, Faith and Freedom Coalition founder Ralph Reed, became a loyal foot soldier for Trump immediately after he nabbed the Republican presidential nomination in 2016 — commanding hordes of white evangelical voters from his perch on the candidate’s religious advisory board to trust that the New York businessman would grow the economy, defend religious freedom and dismantle federal protections for abortion, if elected.”
“The original title for the book was Render to God and Trump, a reference to the well-known biblical verse, “Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s.” The message from Jesus in Matthew 22, has been used in contemporary politics to justify obedience to government — or in the case of Reed’s book, to Trump.”
Evangelist Franklin Graham told Religion News Service that impeaching President Trump could cause the nation to “unravel.”
Said Graham: “Our country could begin to unravel if an elected president is thrown out of office because of lies and the media. It could be a devastating thing. We’re in very dangerous territory. I would encourage all the politicians to look very carefully at where we are and first of all make sure that truth is told.”
In emails to his colleagues over the years, Liberty University President Jerry Falwell Jr has denigrated students and staff at the Christian university he runs, referring to one student as “emotionally imbalanced and physically retarded” and calling the school’s police chief a “half-wit,” Reuters reports.
He also called some Liberty students “social misfits.”
Liberty University President Jerry Falwell Jr. told the Associated Press that he is asking the FBI to investigate what he called a “criminal” smear campaign orchestrated against him by several disgruntled former board members and employees.
Falwell claimed he has evidence that the group improperly shared emails belonging to the university with reporters in an attempt to discredit him. He said the “attempted coup” was partially motivated by his ardent backing of President Trump.
World Red Eye posts photos of Jerry Falwell Jr. partying at a Miami nightclub — photos that multiple Liberty University officials told Politico that Falwell “tried to make disappear.”
Falwell originally claimed the photos are fake.
Politico: “At Liberty University, all anyone can talk about is Jerry Falwell Jr. Just not in public.”
Said on trusted Falwell adviser: “When he does stupid stuff, people will mention it to others they consider confidants and not keep it totally secret. But they won’t rat him out.”
“That’s beginning to change. Over the past year, Falwell, a prominent evangelical leader and supporter of President Donald Trump, has come under increasing scrutiny. News outlets have reported on business deals by Liberty University benefiting Falwell’s friends. Trump’s former personal attorney Michael Cohen claimed that he had helped Falwell clean up racy ‘personal’ photographs.”
“Based on scores of new interviews and documents obtained for this article, concerns about Falwell’s behavior go well beyond that—and it’s causing longtime, loyal Liberty University officials to rapidly lose faith in him.”
“Evangelical leader and prominent Donald Trump backer Jerry Falwell Jr personally approved real estate transactions by his nonprofit Christian university that helped his personal fitness trainer obtain valuable university property,” Reuters reports.
“Around 2011, Falwell, president of Liberty University in Virginia, and his wife, Rebecca, began personal fitness training sessions with Benjamin Crosswhite, then a 23-year-old recent Liberty graduate. Now, after a series of university real estate transactions signed by Falwell, Crosswhite owns a sprawling 18-acre racquet sports and fitness facility on former Liberty property.”
Washington Post: “Trump enjoyed overwhelming support from white evangelicals in 2016, winning a higher percentage than George W. Bush, John McCain or Mitt Romney. That enthusiasm has scarcely dimmed. Almost 70 percent of white evangelicals approve of Trump’s performance in office, according to a 2019 Pew Research Center poll.”
“Interviews with 50 evangelical Christians in three battleground states — Florida, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin — help explain why. In conversation, evangelical voters paint the portrait of the Trump they see: a president who acts like a bully but is fighting for them. A president who sees America like they do, a menacing place where white Christians feel mocked and threatened for their beliefs. A president who’s against abortion and gay rights and who has the economy humming to boot.”
“When Sen. Bernie Sanders brought his presidential campaign to Pittsburgh earlier this year, he quietly added a poignant stop to his schedule: a visit to the Tree of Life synagogue, where 11 congregants were killed in an anti-Semitic shooting last fall,” the New York Times reports.
“But his appearance also came with explicit instructions to his campaign aides, according to two Democrats familiar with the conversation: They were not to tell the news media about his conversation with the rabbi there. Some aides dissented, believing there was a graceful way to disclose the visit. But Mr. Sanders, the only Jewish candidate among the leading Democratic contenders, did not want the visit to be perceived as a publicity grab.”
“Would it be too much to pray for a day when the Bible gets a ‘Book of Trump,’ much like it has a ‘Book of Esther’ celebrating the deliverance of the Jews from ancient Persia?”
— GOP megadonor Miriam Adelson, writing in the Las Vegas Review-Journal.
“President Trump’s re-election campaign is developing an aggressive, state-by-state plan to mobilize even more evangelical voters than supported him last time,” campaign officials tell Axios.
“Trump captured 81% of the evangelical vote in 2016, a huge accomplishment considering they make up roughly a quarter of the electorate and play a prominent role in swing states like Florida.”
“The goal: Paint Trump as a champion of socially conservative issues and warn evangelical voters that his defeat could destroy the progress he’s made.”
The Dalai Lama to the BBC: “His emotions are also a little bit,” he said, making a gesture waggling his finger near his temple.
He added: “One day he says something, another day he says something. But I think there is a lack of moral principle. When he became president, he expressed America first. That is wrong. America, they should take the global responsibility.”
Franklin Graham, a prominent evangelical supporter of President Trump, is calling for Christians across the country to set aside this Sunday as a “special day of prayer” for the president, the HuffPost reports.
Said Graham: “President Trump’s enemies continue to try everything to destroy him, his family, and the presidency. In the history of our country, no president has been attacked as he has. I believe the only hope for him, and this nation, is God.”
Vice President Mike Pence, who has been facing criticisms of his own religious views, warned Liberty University graduates that they have to stay strong against the challenges they’ll face from Hollywood, the media and the secular left, USA Today reports.
Said Pence: “Some of the loudest voices for tolerance today have little tolerance for traditional Christian beliefs. Be ready.”
He added: “Throughout most of American history, it has been pretty easy to call yourself Christian. It didn’t even occur to people that you might be shunned or ridiculed for defending the teachings of the Bible. But things are different now.”
Miami New Times: “Giancarlo Granda, the former Fontainebleau pool attendant whose business bizarrely received $1.8 million in loans from famous evangelist Jerry Falwell Jr., wants the world to stop calling him a ‘pool boy.’ He finds the term demeaning.”
“And, perhaps more notable, he officially denies knowing anything about alleged ‘racy’ photos referenced in a Reuters story published yesterday.”
Mayor Pete Buttigieg suggested that if God did have a political affiliation, it wouldn’t “be the one that sent the current president into the White House,” CNN reports.
Buttigieg went on to say “what we see in the White House is so different than what I hear in scripture when I am in church.”
He elaborated: “I hear about taking care of the marginalized and defending the weak and supporting the poor and visiting the prisoner and welcoming the stranger and humility and decency. These are the things that are taught in Sunday schools around this country. And so the idea that that is the property of the Republican Party, especially this Republican Party and some of the choices they have made in recent years, it just doesn’t add up to me.”
Taegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire, one of the earliest and most influential political web sites. He also runs Political Job Hunt, Electoral Vote Map and the Political Dictionary.
Goddard spent more than a decade as managing director and chief operating officer of a prominent investment firm in New York City. Previously, he was a policy adviser to a U.S. Senator and Governor.
Goddard is also co-author of You Won - Now What? (Scribner, 1998), a political management book hailed by prominent journalists and politicians from both parties. In addition, Goddard's essays on politics and public policy have appeared in dozens of newspapers across the country.
Goddard earned degrees from Vassar College and Harvard University. He lives in New York with his wife and three sons.
Goddard is the owner of Goddard Media LLC.
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