Minnesota Evangelicals Remain for Trump

Goya's Against the Common Good, (plate 71 of The Disasters
of War). (Photo credit: Yale University Art Gallery).
Today the bible, tweeting and trolling in search of gratification
from white Evangelical Christians floating in hope that somehow,
someway, the liberals, immigrants, Jews and others against
god can suffer the wrath of the righteous.

Lunatics holds sway in Republican politics—They hate and they vote; White Evangelicals are Trump's most solid constituency

Madison, Wisconsin — The coalition electing President* Donald Trump is a rogues gallery of white supremacists, Evangelicals, rightwing billionaires and know-nothings looking for something, anything, to see and hate.

One group, white evangelical Protestants, flew its nihilistic colors high in 2015-16 supporting this imbecile in the White House.

Evangelicals are pro-war, any war, and desire political power above all else.

Sexual assaults, lies, character assassinations, hatred, bigotry, demonetization, infidelity, child molestation, rape? No problem, say the Evangelicals.

Just give them activist, rightwing federal judges and do what you can to stop women from controlling their bodies and those gays from marrying against our rights.

Judy Keen in the Minneapolis Star Tribune has a piece out this morning on these fundies.

The headline in Keen's piece suggests a tension, a struggle, people "torn" between supporting a hateful troll like Trump and any American who is pro-choice and pro-equality.

Little sign of tension in the piece.

These religious nuts do not want to live a classical liberal democracy. They want to be ruled in a society in which only the chosen achieve rights and wealth.

Keen interviewed many people for her piece.

Not one of her sources expressed objection and challenge to Donald Trump's repulsive display of hate and deceit. Not one.

Some of the everyday, Evangelical, Bible-believing, Trump-loving ignoramuses are listed below.

Check out Keen's sources and one thing you will not hear is, 'I've been praying on this and god told me Donald Trump is a racist, lying, fascist, misogynistic, Islamophobic, hateful piece of shit.'

Some Minnesota Evangelicals

Jeff Waldron of the Cities Church in St. Paul

Joe Rigney, pastor at Cities Church

Rev. Fred Hinz, of the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod in Minnesota

John Helmberger, CEO of the Minnesota Family Council

Rob Carlson of the Westminster Presbyterian Church

David Walters of Northfield’s First United Church of Christ

Judy Bond, United Church of Christ prayer group participant

Mary Carlson, United Church of Christ prayer group participant

Marian McKone, United Church of Christ prayer group participant

The Super Bowl and god

Update: Super Bowl Winner Chosen by god (FDL, Dennis Trainor Jr ).

Millions of Americans willfully suffer under the illusion that religious faith brings health, wealth and- I kid you not- Super Bowl victories. A recent study by the Public Religion Research Institute found that one-third of the United States believes that God plays a role in determining which team wins the Super Bowl.

Also, a majority – more than one in two- believe that God rewards individual athletes who are faithful to God with success.

It's Super Bowl weekend, perhaps the most American of spectacles, outside of invading countries and killing people.

I'm taking Baltimore, with a lot of points scored by both teams. [Note: score was 34-31- Batlitmore]

Ray Lewis agrees, but for a different reason.

Lewis thinks God or Jesus or whatever supreme metaphysical forces concern themselves with the game are betting on Baltimore as well.

A great football player, Lewis is nuts and his metaphysics are about as sensible as Immanuel Kant's (1724–1804): Not very.

In honor of Sunday's game, below is a previously posted piece on author, Tom Krattenmaker, and his Onward Christian Athletes: Turning Ballparks into Pulpits and Players into Preachers.

Religion in sports, especially football is a problem.
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Tom Krattenmaker's
Onward Christian Athletes:
Turning Ballparks into
Pulpits and Players into Preachers

Growing up in Wisconsin during the Bart Starr-coached years (1975-1983), I used to grimace as Bart announced that a new draft pick is a "good Christian."

'Chriiiiist Bart, who cares? Just get some players.'

But like everyone else I felt Bart is Bart, a winner from the glory years.

Over the last 15 years roughly as right wing Christians have taken aim at America's military, an authoritarian and evangelical strain of Christianity has taken aim at professional sports, in its own exclusionary and often wacky dogmatic way.

Muslim? They're spiritually dead. Jewish? Dead. Free-thinking agnostics? Dead. Oakland Raiders who played during the 1970s-80s? Beyond dead and not even Christ can save those guys.

Today, sportsfans notice say Notre Dame's receiver Golden Tate [looks like a future NFL Hall of Famer] often pointing to the sky and acclaiming that Christ is number one (though ND opponents Southern Cal and Pittsburgh don't respect this metaphysical ranking apparently) but the question arises why are players in sports evangelizing so much?

Tom Krattenmaker's new Onward Christian Athletes: Turning Ballparks into Pulpits and Players into Preachers (Rowman and Littlefield, October 2009) is a brilliant and much-needed investigative analysis for those viewing post-game, on-field prayer meetings as foolish displays of exclusionary, only-through-Christ silliness.

There's much more behind these displays and it's not divine intervention. The religious right is behind it and Christian athletes are eating it up [about 20 percent of them] as Krattenmaker demonstrates in his exhaustive exposé that should be sitting atop the Times nonfiction best seller list.

Writes Krattenmaker about the religious-political "Justice Sunday":

Seated around [former NFL player Herbert] Lusk at the altar of his packed Church, having already spoken or waiting to take their turn at the microphone, were some of the biggest names in Christan conservative politics—Rick Santorum, the junior U.S. Senator from Pennsylvania; Jerry Falwell, the founder of the Moral majority; James Dobson, the founder and leader of Focus on the Family; and Tony Perkins, head of the Family Research Council. The latter was the chief organizer of this, the third rendition of Justice Sunday, an event billed as a stand of resistance by people of faith agings the supposed tyranny of a liberal judiciary bent on leading America from its Christian heritage. ... On that given Sunday in north Philadelphia in 2006, pro sports, Evangelical religion, and conservative politics came together in a particularly stark framing of a powerful current in American public life.

The religious right is organized and often with professional teams' administrative support are pounding away to create a Christian America only for the saved, and the Republican Party.

Krattenmaker is sympathetic to the religious right in a sense and is not mean-spirited in his tone. But there is no doubt after reading his analysis that Krattenmaker prefers a pluralistic and tolerant America where people are free to choose their way to happiness and fulfillment.

This is a book that many Americans, and many sportsfans, have been waiting for and Krattenmaker has performed a public service in his rigorous and often funny investigation of something everyone sees in sports and then lets go by like a Miller Lite commercial.

It's about holiday season, so grab a few copies of Onward Christian Athletes: Turning Ballparks into Pulpits and Players into Preachers. You will not be disappointed. Thank you Tom Krattenmaker!