The Church should reevaluate its expectation that political leaders, particularly the President, share our faith. Such a reevaluation should also prompt us to rethink our politics. The collapse of Christendom (the time when the Church ruled over the West) makes possible for the Church a choice between two different politics: a democratic politics, and a politics shaped by the cross. In the ruins of Christendom we can now live lives in the knowledge that Christ rules the world, and we do not.

He’s not a Christian…

Donald Trump is not a Christian. Marcail Schuurmann, who argued last week that Trump fails to represent Christian values, will, I’m sure, be glad to know this. This might come as a surprise to some readers, who have seen our president-elect interact with high-profile Christians, heard him state that God saved his life during an assassination attempt in Butler, PA, and stand with a raised Bible in hand outside of St. John’s Church in Washington DC during the unrest of the summer of 2020. Like most politicians in the U.S., Trump has done his due diligence in expressing his faith. Although they are not exactly churchgoing, the American electorate is still suspicious of a politician who isn’t even willing to put in an attempt.

And so, though Donald Trump has done what is required to present himself as one, I do not think he is a Christian. In the ruins of Christendom, the Church can no longer assume that what it looks like to be an American is what it looks like to be a Christian. This means that we will become distinctive, or we will disappear. These distinctions might look like the practices of table fellowship, confession of sin, submission to the discipline of a church body, and the hearing of the Word preached consistently. While I do not know him, I do not think Donald Trump engages in these practices.

…and that’s OK.

In saying that it is OK that Donald Trump is not a Christian I am no longer addressing the argument in Mar’s essay last week. Mar claimed that Donald Trump does not represent Christian values but made no claim as to the value of this fact. However, these kinds of claims are often embedded in some Christian’s rhetoric about democratic politics. They say, ‘This politician supports this/acts like this. Jesus would not support that/act like that. Thus I cannot support this politician, nor condone them acting like that.’ I think we should stop talking like this. Furthermore, I think Jesus died so that we could stop talking like this.

When I say it’s OK that Donald Trump isn’t a Christian, I use ‘OK’ to mean neither good nor bad. I do not feel strongly either way about Donald Trump not being a Christian, and you (as a member of the Church) should not either. It is of course not very good that Donald Trump is not a Christian — the State of the Union would be a wonderful time for one of us to preach. But it is also not very bad. There are many people in America who are not Christians — people who are easier to get to and who need Jesus a little more than a billionaire might. But beyond good or bad, I mostly believe that the president-elect not being a Christian is OK because it is a reality that the Church will have to get used to.

I do not think it will be long until we have a President who is not even willing to do their due diligence, who refuses to placate the evangelical bloc with photo-ops using the Bible as a prop. What will we do then? Should we remake the Moral Majority and try to throw our weight around Washington? Do we want to become another interest group that clamors to be included in high-powered meetings? That is a well-worn path, one that the Church should decisively turn away from.

Withdrawal?

To some the claim that the Church will have to get used to a president who does not belong to the Church may sound like a call to withdraw from democratic politics. Those people might say, ‘We cannot withdraw, we must engage. Christians have a stake in the character and values of the President. We should vote for one who represents our values and vote against one who does not. As Christians, we must participate in democratic politics by agitating against and exhorting those politicians who do not share our values.’ I do not think this is how a Christian should speak, act or think politically. Stated strongly, withdrawing from a politics so described is a prerequisite to the participation in a truer politics, a politics only available to the Church: a politics shaped by the cross.

The politics of the cross.

Politics is a morally formative enterprise. The systems of building and keeping power that we engage in shape our hearts, whether or not we know of and assent to that shaping. In recognizing that politics is a morally formative enterprise, we can begin to see how watching cable news all day or doom scrolling through political social media feeds stands in opposition to the communion fellowship of the Church. Our consumption of political media shapes us towards a life lived in the ecstasy and fear of democratic politics. American theologian Stanley Hauerwas, in a sermon to Duke Divinity School on election day in 2016, reminds us that “there is a democratic moment in the Gospels. They chose Barabbas.”

The politics of the Church are incomprehensible to democratic politics. They are not practiced through the expression of our power, but in the remembrance of one who gave up His power, humbling himself “even unto death on a cross.” Our consumption of Christ’s body and blood witnesses to, and shapes us towards, a life lived in the freedom of a cross that raised for us a new and eternal King.