Religious Leader: I Don't Get Why Evangelicals Support Trump

[DKW 86 7,410]

 

[Proud Tiger 4,261]

The answer is simple. They supported Trump in the election because the only other choice was crooked Hillary.

[alexava 6,973]

12 hours ago, Proud Tiger said:

The answer is simple. They supported Trump in the election because the only other choice was crooked Hillary.

Primary?

[AUDub 11,131]

You have single issue voters, and Dem voters. For practical purposes, those are the only two groups that exist.

[NolaAuTiger 3,295]

What's the notion though? Is there a threshold of Christian behavior that a candidate has to exert in order for evangelical's support of that person to be validated? If so, who decides what that threshold is? 

[AUDub 11,131]

5 minutes ago, NolaAuTiger said:

What's the notion though? Is there a threshold of Christian behavior that a candidate has to exert in order for evangelical's support of that person to be validated? If so, who decides what that threshold is? 

It's not about morality. It's about politics. 

[NolaAuTiger 3,295]

1 minute ago, Bigbens42 said:

It's not about morality. It's about politics. 

In what way?

I watched about half of the video and it appeared that the speaker was essentially saying, "because Donald Trump has acted in a counter-biblical manner, his vote isn't warranted as pertaining to evangelical Christian voters." 

[TexasTiger 12,810]

On 12/3/2017 at 7:33 PM, Proud Tiger said:

The answer is simple. They supported Trump in the election because the only other choice was crooked Hillary.

Why now?

[Proud Tiger 4,261]

31 minutes ago, TexasTiger said:

Why now?

Because he is trying to keep his promises and is slowly succeeding in spite of congress obstructionists.

[Proud Tiger 4,261]

More than evangelicals support Trump. Bikers do almost 100%

http://www.al.com/

[Grumps 3,693]

13 hours ago, alexava said:

Primary?

Yes, that is the Primary reason! Ha!

[TitanTiger 20,471]

10 hours ago, Proud Tiger said:

More than evangelicals support Trump. Bikers do almost 100%

http://www.al.com/

Relevance?

[TitanTiger 20,471]

13 hours ago, NolaAuTiger said:

What's the notion though? Is there a threshold of Christian behavior that a candidate has to exert in order for evangelical's support of that person to be validated? If so, who decides what that threshold is? 

I'd say the threshold is probably somewhere way before they brag about trying to bed married women and that they can "grab em by the p***y" and they let you do it 'cause you're famous, then write it off as locker room talk when it gets exposed.  It's probably holding a candidate to the same standard that you did the Democrat when there are multiple accusers of him sexually assaulting them (and in this case there were far more than what we had going into the 1992 election), and being consistent in saying such a man lacks the character to be president.

I don't think anyone was suggesting that unless he's a choir boy he's not worthy of evangelical support.  But there were some pretty obvious flashing red lights evangelicals ignored to offer him their support.  And that's just two things.  There were myriad others.

[autigeremt 6,569]

23 hours ago, Bigbens42 said:

You have single issue voters, and Dem voters. For practical purposes, those are the only two groups that exist.

Duopoly statement if I ever saw one.

[NolaAuTiger 3,295]

1 hour ago, TitanTiger said:

I'd say the threshold is probably somewhere way before they brag about trying to bed married women and that they can "grab em by the p***y" and they let you do it 'cause you're famous, then write it off as locker room talk when it gets exposed.  It's probably holding a candidate to the same standard that you did the Democrat when there are multiple accusers of him sexually assaulting them (and in this case there were far more than what we had going into the 1992 election), and being consistent in saying such a man lacks the character to be president.

I don't think anyone was suggesting that unless he's a choir boy he's not worthy of evangelical support.  But there were some pretty obvious flashing red lights evangelicals ignored to offer him their support.  And that's just two things.  There were myriad others.

My point is that if that's the argument - that somehow Trump's actions exceed that which Christians should tolerate, then my next question would be: who hasn't passed that 'threshold?' Maybe none of the other candidate's failures were as public as Trump's - but if we are going to talk about a Christian standard, then we can't divorce our reasoning from sound dogmatics of the Christian faith. The Christian faith teaches that all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. And that no one is good, not even one. Do you see what I am getting at? Also, is there a scriptural premise in all of this? 

In other words, if the permissibility of voting for a candidate was based upon that candidate's particular biblical imitation, Christians could never vote for anyone.  

[TitanTiger 20,471]

51 minutes ago, NolaAuTiger said:

My point is that if that's the argument - that somehow Trump's actions exceed that which Christians should tolerate, then my next question would be: who hasn't passed that 'threshold?'

This is a false standard because it implies that somehow the threshold being set is "absolute moral perfection" when no one has ever suggested anything remotely close to that.  But there are plenty of candidates over the years and even in the past primary cycle who have somehow managed to stay under the threshold of not assaulting women, not cheating on their wives and marrying their mistresses, not bragging about trying to shag married women or grab them by the p***y.  

 

51 minutes ago, NolaAuTiger said:

Maybe none of the other candidate's failures were as public as Trump's - but if we are going to talk about a Christian standard, then we can't divorce our reasoning from sound dogmatics of the Christian faith. The Christian faith teaches that all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. And that no one is good, not even one. Do you see what I am getting at? Also, is there a scriptural premise in all of this? 

In other words, if the permissibility of voting for a candidate was based upon that candidate's particular biblical imitation, Christians could never vote for anyone.  

But that isn't the standard.  No one is demanding perfection.  No one is saying you can never have any bad behavior in your past.  There is a long history of Christians who have assumed leadership roles but prior to coming to faith had lived very immoral lives.  No one is suggesting that a person who lived wild in the past, but left that lifestyle behind long ago, has publicly and privately acknowledged that what they did was wrong and has shown years of evidence of a changed life since cannot be qualified to receive a Christian's vote.

[NolaAuTiger 3,295]

17 minutes ago, TitanTiger said:

This is a false standard because it implies that somehow the threshold being set is "absolute moral perfection" when no one has ever suggested anything remotely close to that.  But there are plenty of candidates over the years and even in the past primary cycle who have somehow managed to stay under the threshold of not assaulting women, not cheating on their wives and marrying their mistresses, not bragging about trying to shag married women or grab them by the p***y.  

 

But that isn't the standard.  No one is demanding perfection.  No one is saying you can never have any bad behavior in your past.  There is a long history of Christians who have assumed leadership roles but prior to coming to faith had lived very immoral lives.  No one is suggesting that a person who lived wild in the past, but left that lifestyle behind long ago, has publicly and privately acknowledged that what they did was wrong and has shown years of evidence of a changed life since cannot be qualified to receive a Christian's vote.

So based on his actions prior to running for office and absence of preferable acknowledgment of mistakes, voting for him is not warranted? I get frustrated when people essentially try to guilt trip evangelical Christians for voting for Trump. Who gets to decide what traits about a person should be considered when deciding whether or not to cast a vote?

It seems your standard would hold that a sound preacher, with bad policy,  warrants the vote of Christians more than a heathen, with good policy. Ted Cruz stayed below this imaginary threshold (which I'm still not sure who gets the right to set), however IMO he wouldn't be as good a president as Trump has been. Why is it problematic for an evangelical Christian to base their vote solely on who they think would make a better president, setting personal failures aside (that really have no bearing on performance as president)???

With that said, I don't mean that your view is unwarranted. I just think there are two plausible perspectives  

 

[TitanTiger 20,471]

14 minutes ago, NolaAuTiger said:

So based on his actions prior to running for office, voting for him is not warranted?

In general, yes, it could be a reason to disqualify a candidate - it depends on some details.  For instance, are his or her actions recent?  Was it a single or short-lived mistake or immoral action, or is it a pattern?  Is there evidence that these actions are firmly in their past and this is not how they behave any longer?  Are they repentant?  Does their life show evidence that any stated repentance was sincere?  If it's something from the distant past, have they ever acknowledged that their actions were wrong and sought to make any appropriate restitution?

As it pertains to Trump specifically, I think there was good reason to question whether several of those questions could be answered in a way that would validate voting for him.  Hell, the man is currently living in his third marriage and at least once if not both times he divorced, he was cheating on his wife at the time with the mistress he married next.  According to the Bible, the man is currently living in a state of unrepentant adultery.

And this is just us focusing narrowly on various sexual matters.  There were a lot of other ethical and moral issues to consider as well.

 

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I get frustrated when people essentially try to guilt trip evangelical Christians for voting for Trump. Who gets to decide what traits about a person should be considered when deciding whether or not to cast a vote?

It's not some unknowable thing, some unfathomably complex and Byzantine thought process to walk through.  I gave a very fast, back-of-a-napkin outline of the way you can work through such a decision.  If I had time I could flesh it out even more, but it is very workable.

 

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It seems your standard would hold that a sound preacher, with bad policy,  warrants the vote of Christians more than a heathen, with good policy. Ted Cruz stayed below this imaginary threshold (which I'm still not sure who gets the right to set), however IMO he wouldn't be as good a president as Trump has been. Why is it problematic for an evangelical Christian to base their vote solely on who they think would make a better president, setting personal failures aside (that really have no bearing on performance as president)???

Because I don't believe as Christians we are free to pretend that moral and ethical conduct is to be isolated from one's stated policy positions.  And I also find it highly hypocritical that we used moral failure to decry Bill Clinton as unfit for the office only to turn around and vote for someone just as immoral just because he tosses out a few right buzzwords and claims some policy positions we like.  

As Proverbs says: 

"When the righteous are in authority, the people rejoice;
    but when the wicked rule, the people groan."

Stated policies and positions do matter, but they aren't the only thing that matters.  Not for Christians.

[NolaAuTiger 3,295]

22 minutes ago, TitanTiger said:

In general, yes, it could be a reason to disqualify a candidate - it depends on some details.  For instance, are his or her actions recent?  Was it a single or short-lived mistake or immoral action, or is it a pattern?  Is there evidence that these actions are firmly in their past and this is not how they behave any longer?  Are they repentant?  Does their life show evidence that any stated repentance was sincere?  If it's something from the distant past, have they ever acknowledged that their actions were wrong and sought to make any appropriate restitution?

As it pertains to Trump specifically, I think there was good reason to question whether several of those questions could be answered in a way that would validate voting for him.  Hell, the man is currently living in his third marriage and at least once if not both times he divorced, he was cheating on his wife at the time with the mistress he married next.  According to the Bible, the man is currently living in a state of unrepentant adultery.

And this is just us focusing narrowly on various sexual matters.  There were a lot of other ethical and moral issues to consider as well.

 

It's not some unknowable thing, some unfathomably complex and Byzantine thought process to walk through.  I gave a very fast, back-of-a-napkin outline of the way you can work through such a decision.  If I had time I could flesh it out even more, but it is very workable.

 

Because I don't believe as Christians we are free to pretend that moral and ethical conduct is to be isolated from one's stated policy positions.  And I also find it highly hypocritical that we used moral failure to decry Bill Clinton as unfit for the office only to turn around and vote for someone just as immoral just because he tosses out a few right buzzwords and claims some policy positions we like.  

As Proverbs says: 

"When the righteous are in authority, the people rejoice;
    but when the wicked rule, the people groan."

Stated policies and positions do matter, but they aren't the only thing that matters.  Not for Christians.

Again, I don't think your view is unfounded TT. I just happen to differ. I think it opens up the door to a slippery slope. Perhaps a Christian should abstain from listening to music based upon the artist that sings it? 

[TitanTiger 20,471]

16 minutes ago, NolaAuTiger said:

Again, I don't think your view is unfounded TT. I just happen to differ. I think it opens up the door to a slippery slope. Perhaps a Christian should abstain from listening to music based upon the artist that sings it? 

This is craziness.  It's a slippery slope to consider a person's conduct in ethical and moral terms before voting for them just based on them parroting the right political buzzwords and positions?  Christians who live in democracies have ALWAYS believed that a person's character and conduct matters when voting for them.  Since when has it come to be that we should compartmentalize such things?

Nevermind:  I know.  It was when "our guy" was the immoral dirtbag running for office and we decided that political commitments mattered more than anything.  

And listening to an artist's music when the artist happens to be immoral, is no where near the same level as choosing a person who gets to make or veto laws, appoint judges, decide when or if to put our servicemen and women into harm's way, issue executive orders and so on.  Talk about false equivalencies.

There's a very easy solution to not having to choose between a Trump and a Hillary, or a Roy Moore vs a Doug Jones in the future:  STOP VOTING FOR POMPOUS, POSTURING, LOW CHARACTER DIRTBAGS IN THE GOP PRIMARIES TO BEGIN WITH.  Then your choices won't be between people like that and a Democrat you can't support.  It will be between an reasonably honorable conservative and a Democrat.

[AUDub 11,131]

28 minutes ago, TitanTiger said:

There's a very easy solution to not having to choose between a Trump and a Hillary, or a Roy Moore vs a Doug Jones in the future:  STOP VOTING FOR POMPOUS, POSTURING, LOW CHARACTER DIRTBAGS IN THE GOP PRIMARIES TO BEGIN WITH.  Then your choices won't be between people like that and a Democrat you can't support.  It will be between an reasonably honorable conservative and a Democrat.

That's the crux of all of this. GOP voters seem to have, by and large, gone off the deep end nationwide. There's a reason "primaried" is now a verb. 

[NolaAuTiger 3,295]

33 minutes ago, TitanTiger said:

This is craziness.  It's a slippery slope to consider a person's conduct in ethical and moral terms before voting for them just based on them parroting the right political buzzwords and positions?  Christians who live in democracies have ALWAYS believed that a person's character and conduct matters when voting for them.  Since when has it come to be that we should compartmentalize such things?

Nevermind:  I know.  It was when "our guy" was the immoral dirtbag running for office and we decided that political commitments mattered more than anything.  

And listening to an artist's music when the artist happens to be immoral, is no where near the same level as choosing a person who gets to make or veto laws, appoint judges, decide when or if to put our servicemen and women into harm's way, issue executive orders and so on.  Talk about false equivalencies.

There's a very easy solution to not having to choose between a Trump and a Hillary, or a Roy Moore vs a Doug Jones in the future:  STOP VOTING FOR POMPOUS, POSTURING, LOW CHARACTER DIRTBAGS IN THE GOP PRIMARIES TO BEGIN WITH.  Then your choices won't be between people like that and a Democrat you can't support.  It will be between an reasonably honorable conservative and a Democrat.

That's not a false equivalence because I'm referring to your foundational premise. Should not such a premise be one that can be applied uniformly, especially for the Christian?!?!?!?

And yes, it is a slippery slope to arbitrarily set a standard that only applies subjectively. 

When did I say that his character and conduct don't matter? I simply don't think those should be controlling factors. You can pull up all of the trash on him, before running for president, that you want. But the difference between him and Bill Clinton is night and day. If Trump has sexual intercourse in the oval office then sure, maybe that comparison will be creditable. 

I refuse to be lectured on why evangelicals shouldn't have supported Trump when those doing the lecturing completely divorce their lecturing from sound theology. Biblically speaking, what candidate is more fit than Trump? Tough question to answer in light of the early chapters of Romans, right? 

I'll be the first to admit that Trump has personal failures, as many of us do. I also recognize how much good he has done. You simply act as if there are no competing factors and only one's failures should be weighted in a vote determination, not his successes.

You obviously have an issue with his failures before running for President. And you think such failures should be taken into consideration when voting. Do his successes count for anything? Am I wrong for giving his successes equal weight? 

 

[TitanTiger 20,471]

18 minutes ago, NolaAuTiger said:

That's not a false equivalence because I'm referring to your foundational premise. Should not such a premise be one that can be applied uniformly, especially for the Christian?!?!?!?

No, not really.  It's a complete non sequitur.

 

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And yes, it is a slippery slope to arbitrarily set a standard that only applies subjectively. 

No, it isn't.  There is no such thing as a purely objective criteria on these matters.

 

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When did I say that his character and conduct don't matter? I simply don't think those should be controlling factors. You can pull up all of the trash on him, before running for president, that you want. But the difference between him and Bill Clinton is night and day. If Trump has sexual intercourse in the oval office then sure, maybe that comparison will be creditable. 

I'm not talking about what Bill Clinton did in office.  This is a consistent arguing tactic folks keep bringing up as if that is the difference.  I'm talking about what we knew about Bill Clinton in 1992 leading up to the election.  I'm old enough to remember what was said and the reasons for not supporting him and one of the biggest things was about character.  Bill was a womanizer who'd been cheating on his wife for years.  That alone was enough for conservatives to say that he was a man of low character who shouldn't be elected.

Contrast that with Trump who cheated on his first wife and married the mistress, then divorced that mistress to get married a third time a few years later, who said the aforementioned things about trying to shag married women and grabbing women by the p***y nine months into his marriage to Melania, who was accused by multiple women of inappropriate touching and even sexual assault.  The things we knew, even just the parts we could prove, were far more than what we knew in 1992 about Clinton.  But many of those same voters deemed Clinton to not have enough character to be president, but voted for Trump anyway.

 

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I refuse to be lectured on why evangelicals shouldn't have supported Trump when those doing the lecturing completely divorce their lecturing from sound theology.  Biblically speaking, what candidate is more fit than Trump? Tough question to answer in light of the early chapters of Romans, right? 

I don't really care what you refuse to listen to.  If a person is going to join a discussion on the matter here, they will either hear it or stop engaging the conversation.  No one gets the option to interject opinions and not hear the rebuttals. 

And no, it's not a tough question at all because you keep setting up a false standard that no one is arguing for.  No one demanded absolute sinless perfection.

 

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I'll be the first to admit that Trump has personal failures, as many of us do. I also recognize how much good he has done. You simply act as if there are no competing factors and only one's failures should be weighted in a vote determination, not his successes. 

We aren't discussing whatever good you believe he has done now, 11 months into the presidency.  We're talking about what we had to go on in November 2016 and the primaries long before that.  So there wasn't any "good" to compare it to when the votes were cast to send this person into the general election, nor during the general election.

[NolaAuTiger 3,295]

34 minutes ago, TitanTiger said:

No, not really.  It's a complete non sequitur.

 

No, it isn't.  There is no such thing as a purely objective criteria on these matters.

 

I'm not talking about what Bill Clinton did in office.  This is a consistent arguing tactic folks keep bringing up as if that is the difference.  I'm talking about what we knew about Bill Clinton in 1992 leading up to the election.  I'm old enough to remember what was said and the reasons for not supporting him and one of the biggest things was about character.  Bill was a womanizer who'd been cheating on his wife for years.  That alone was enough for conservatives to say that he was a man of low character who shouldn't be elected.

Contrast that with Trump who cheated on his first wife and married the mistress, then divorced that mistress to get married a third time a few years later, who said the aforementioned things about trying to shag married women and grabbing women by the p***y nine months into his marriage to Melania, who was accused by multiple women of inappropriate touching and even sexual assault.  The things we knew, even just the parts we could prove, were far more than what we knew in 1992 about Clinton.  But many of those same voters deemed Clinton to not have enough character to be president, but voted for Trump anyway.

 

I don't really care what you refuse to listen to.  If a person is going to join a discussion on the matter here, they will either hear it or stop engaging the conversation.  No one gets the option to interject opinions and not hear the rebuttals. 

And no, it's not a tough question at all because you keep setting up a false standard that no one is arguing for.  No one demanded absolute sinless perfection.

 

We aren't discussing whatever good you believe he has done now, 11 months into the presidency.  We're talking about what we had to go on in November 2016 and the primaries long before that.  So there wasn't any "good" to compare it to when the votes were cast to send this person into the general election, nor during the general election.

I was talking about the lectures in general - including yours. 

You're full of assumptions. That is the issue. You assume that the only way to reconcile a Christian vote for Trump is that the Christian set aside his character. You assume that the Christian did not vote for Bill because of his character. You speak as if there's this objective criteria upon which Christians cast votes - and you're dead wrong. And then accuse me of setting up a false standard, directly after you just said that there's no purely objective criteria on these matters. 

In other words, it's like you're trying to speak for Christians at large - with no regard to their personal reasons for voting for Trump. What about the Christian that didn't blatantly set aside Trump's character as you purport? When Christians hear people like you try to explain WHY they voted for a specific candidate, its frustrating. 

[TitanTiger 20,471]

1 minute ago, NolaAuTiger said:

You're full of assumptions. That is the issue. You assume that the only way to reconcile a Christian vote for Trump is that the Christian set aside his character.

Because they did.  His character in virtually every way was disqualifying from leadership.  The only way you get around that is to basically ignore or seriously downplay that character mattered, and elevate other considerations to higher priority.

 

1 minute ago, NolaAuTiger said:

You assume that the Christian did not vote for Bill because of his character.

I didn't assume.  I know they did.  I paid attention during the 1992 elections.  I heard the reasoning from the horse's mouth.  Not that other issues weren't mentioned, but that one was key.  It's one of the reasons whether not he "inhaled" was even part of the mix.  And it was one of the reasons that Carville coined "(It's) the economy, stupid" as the theme of Clinton's campaign.  They didn't want to run on character issues and that theme crystallized the way they successfully framed Clinton vs. Bush to voters - focus on economic issues and avoid moral ones.

 

1 minute ago, NolaAuTiger said:

You speak as if there's this objective criteria upon which Christians cast votes - and you're dead wrong.

Yet I specifically told you there aren't really "objective" criteria and never have been for the most part.  I mean, sure there are some glaring things that would be, but mostly this requires some discernment, some mature thinking that goes beyond the surface level and looks at the details.  

How is it that I point out the exact opposite of "objective" and you still make this charge?

 

1 minute ago, NolaAuTiger said:

And then accuse me of setting up a false standard, directly after you just said that there's no purely objective criteria on these matters. 

The false standard is that you keep pointing out that everyone will have some flaw, some sin, some behavior in their past, some way in which they aren't living by the Bible or whatever.  And yet, I never set up the idea that someone had to be pure, holy and blameless all the days of their life to be qualified.  You keep putting up "in light of Romans 1" type stuff, not me.