The Golden Calf with a Golden Toilet Is Signing and Selling Bibles
The grievous Christian hypocrisy of Trump’s latest gimmick
A twice-impeached former president, the cherished candidate of the American Evangelical right is campaigning for a second term from multiple courtrooms.
And between hearings, he is signing and selling Bibles.
My fellow Christians, is this not blasphemy?
My friends. In addition to his shameless monetization of our Holy Scripture, his avalanche of charges, indictments, and convictions reveals a most un-Christlike pattern of personal and professional decisions.
Some American Christians proclaim Trump is being unfairly targeted and personally persecuted by “political witch hunts” and a “weaponized legal system.”
Other Christians (as well as not religiously affiliated voters) are stupefied and heartbroken that a philandering grifter is the resounding choice of the Evangelical right and other Christian voters. Again.
We Christians used to be mocked for being too prude, too naive. For a brief moment in the violent and sordid history of Christianity, back when “square” was a colloquial insult, social naivete and myopic sexuality were American Christians’ greatest failures.
Now, it’s our hypocrisy. We are not the victims, my friends. In worshipping a golden calf, an unrepentant career criminal, we have again become the perpetrators.
As part of his current campaign, Trump, in between his four current criminal trials, is not only signing Bibles, he is now selling them.
Scholars estimate that the Bible was written across cultures for some 1,500 years by 36–40 authors originally written in three languages and now translated into more than 700.
Whether or not Trump read the Bible, a claim contested by many, he didn’t write it. Why would he sign it?
“Presidents have a long history of signing Bibles, though earlier presidents typically signed them as gifts to send with a spiritual message. President Ronald Reagan signed a Bible that was sent secretly to Iranian officials in 1986. President Franklin Roosevelt signed the family Bible his attorney general used to take the oath of office in 1939.”⁴
The Rev. Donnie Anderson makes an important distinction between these two historical examples, their discretion, and what she sees as political opportunism and pandering to evangelicals.
“It would have been different, Anderson said, if Trump had signed a Bible out of the limelight for someone with whom he had a close connection.”³— Rev. Anderson, executive minister of the Rhode Island State Council of Churches
“The only Bible endorsed by President Trump!” retails for $59.99 and each is bound with copies of the U.S. Constitution, the Bill of Rights, the Declaration of Independence, the Pledge of Allegiance, and the 1984 lyrics to country singer Lee Greenwood’s God Bless America.
Trump’s website is also hawking “Never Surrender” Trump hightops with gold trim, other footwear, cologne, and perfume.
Entrepreneurship is eminently American. But profiteering is fundamentally un-Christian. And if not inadvertently misleading, conflating American political documents with the holiest text in Christianity is antithetical to both Church and state.
The “Trump Bible” is a 60-buck souvenir of American Christian nationalism and political idolatry in one leatherbound edition, signed by a man seemingly filled with hate, and completely devoid of compassion for the least of these.
What kind of Christian leader can lead without love? What kind of Christians are we if we follow a false idol?
“The Second Council of Nicea (787) settled the iconoclastic controversy by establishing a distinction between worship (latria — due to God alone) and veneration (dulia — offered to saints and images).”⁵
My fellow American Christians, are we worshipping God or Trump? No mortal man is our Lord or our savior.
In 2013 Richard Rohr wrote, “I can no longer wait for, or give false comfort to, the many Christians who are forever ‘deepening their personal relationship’ with a tiny American Jesus — who looks an awful lot like them.” — Immortal Diamond: The Search for Our True Self (2013)
Deep-thinking religious leaders are speaking from the heart and speaking publicly.
“When you worship power, compassion will look like a sin.” — Rev. Benjamin Cramer
Our most compassionate theologians are trying to steer us back to God on a path lined not by wild accusations but by simple truths that speak to the core of the Christian ethos and obligation.
Rev. Dr. Jacqui Lewis asks, “Palm Sunday presents two parades: Will we follow Jesus or follow Rome?”
For American Christians who either don’t see the empirical parallel between the modern U.S. and ancient Rome or are proud to see the American empire equated with the historical magnitude of the Roman empire, have you abandoned your God’s call to love and serve the Lord and one another?
Rev. Dr. Lewis continues, “Christian nationalists reject the humility of riding on a donkey. On warhorses with the legion, they have made their choice.”
In a secular culture, it is easy to feel like Christian values are being threatened when we are often ridiculed. But the answer is never to hate in retaliation.
Rev. Benjamin Cramer puts it succinctly, “A Christianity that believes it needs political and religious dictators to protect and ensure its existence is a Christianity that no longer believes Jesus is its savior.”
Trump is not the chosen one. And he is not a victim any more than we are.
Yes, people are falsely accused in America of crimes they didn’t commit. But 91 criminal charges? Two impeachments, grand juries, multiple convictions, dozens of indictments, and 91 criminal charges would be incomprehensibly difficult to legally fabricate, coordinate, and implement.
My friends, might the sum of his parts be greater than the whole this time? Is it possible that dozens of attorneys and multiple judges are telling the truth?
Trump the man is wholly invested in myth-making around his own greatness, his infallibility. But if you consider each of his tax evasions, bankruptcies, breaches of contract, affairs, divorces, impeachments, indictments, trials, and convictions, each one gets harder to one-off. This is an unethical man with one unwavering priority — himself — not America or Americans.
“I can’t imagine Jesus waving an American flag any more than I can imagine him wearing a ‘God Bless Rome’ shirt. Patriotism is too small. Our Bible doesn’t say ‘For God so loved America’ … it says ‘For God so loved the world.’ America first is a theological heresy.” — Shane Claiborne
The answer is not to worship a geopolitical entity, its flag, or a man who panders to Christians without practicing Christianity. We are Americans for but a moment in time. We are children of God for eternity.
Instead of buying snake oil, instead of following a false prophet, a modern Caesar, please, let us love and serve one another.
Donald Trump’s current criminal and civil trials are detailed below. He has been on trial seven times since he left office¹ for:
Criminal Trials
34 felony counts of violating corporate record-keeping laws for falsifying business records in the first degree. “The case centers on payoffs to two women, porn star Stormy Daniels and Playboy model Karen McDougal, who said they had extramarital sexual encounters with Trump years earlier,” Trump’s personal lawyer Michael Cohen paid Daniels $130,000 and McDougal $150,000 and was later reimbursed for his “legal services” and received additional payments and bonuses (March 30, 2023, New York)²
A grand jury approved an indictment against Trump, charging him with an extraordinary conspiracy that threatened to disenfranchise millions of Americans — two felony counts of obstructing an official proceeding, specifically one felony count of conspiracy to defraud the United States and one felony count of conspiracy against rights, (Aug. 1, 2023, District of Columbia)¹
A regular grand jury approved a 98-page indictment with a long list of charges: one count of violating the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act; one count of conspiracy to commit impersonating a public officer; two counts of conspiracy to commit forgery in the first degree; two counts of false statements and writings; two counts of conspiracy to commit false statements and writings; one count of filing false documents; one count of conspiracy to commit filing false documents; (Aug. 14, 2023, Georgia)¹
32 felony counts of willful retention of national defense information in violation of the Espionage Act — six felony counts of obstruction-related crimes and two felony counts of false statements; (June 9, 2023, Florida)¹
Civil Suits:
New York State Attorney General files civil fraud charges against Trump, three of his adult children, and the Trump Organization. Seven causes of action allege more than 200 instances of false asset valuation. “The financial statements in question were issued annually; each contained a significant number of fraudulent, false, and misleading representations about a great many of the Trump Organization’s assets; and most played a role in particular transactions with financial institutions,”³ (September 2021)
E. Jean Carroll v. Donald J. Trump: In 2019 Carroll wrote an unflinching account of Trump raping her in 1995. After his public denials escalated into libel she sued him for defamation. The media referred to this suit as Carroll I.
Carroll II: When Carroll won the defamation lawsuit Trump again denied the allegations by relentless public ad hominem attacks on Carroll. She sued him again in 2022 for defamation and added sexual battery charges. She won again.
https://www.politico.com/interactives/2023/trump-criminal-investigations-cases-tracker-list/?source=post_page-----38c8c9c5c856--------------------------------
2. https://apnews.com/projects/trump-investigations-civil-criminal-tracker/
4. https://apnews.com/united-states-government-general-news-babacf0241774561badc76b3201c2f2c
5. https://folgerpedia.folger.edu/Idolatry:_Icons_and_Iconoclasm