There have always been tricksters, who doesn’t know one?
Being a “bible seller” means that someone has the ability to place anything on others. But few have achieved the peak of Donald Trump, capable of mobilizing his supporters with the falsehood that he was cheated in the 2020 elections, when not even he believes it, or precisely starting to sell the sacred book, at the price of 59.99 dollars, for electoral campaign purposes, and income, in a clear suggestion that the church must direct the government.
And he markets this “article” despite his sins, the kind that would take anyone straight to hell. According to critical theologians, it contravenes several commandments. Like “thou shalt not lie” (he does it daily); “thou shalt not steal” (he wanted to usurp the will of the ballot boxes); or “you shall not commit impure acts”, with two divorces (marriages broken by his adulteries), his claim that he could fuck “all the pussies” by hand or the upcoming trial in Manhattan motivated by his alleged relationship with a porn star, while His wife Melania was recovering from childbirth.
With this background, the former president of the United States takes advantage of Holy Week for his divine business. Accustomed to selling highly toxic political smoke, pictures with him dressed as a superhero, perfume, scraps of the suit from his inauguration of the White House or sports shoes – sneakers that look cooler – at 400 a pair, this time he has found the gold. of messianism, what they call their complex of being the Almighty.
It is not an unfounded qualification. In addition to the fact that those in the QAnon cult think that he is “the sent one,” his team promotes videos at rallies proclaiming that “God gave us Trump.” He has sometimes referred to himself as “the chosen one” and even shared a post in which he was described as “the second greatest,” behind Jesus Christ. This same week he liked a message of Jesus on the cross comparing it to the crucifixion he suffers in court.
Urged to find financing to face the high costs of his legal cases – such as guaranteeing more than 90 million for the conviction for defamation arising from the sexual assault of the columnist and writer E. Jean Carroll –, the Republican candidate seeks a miracle with the sale of bibles. Not just any one, but “the only one that has the support of President Trump.” The other versions lack value for supplications before the Almighty. That is one reason for its expensive price.
“Let’s make the United States pray again,” he proclaims on his social network when reporting his new commercial offer, an unparalleled trend in electoral history. She promotes herself covered with the country’s flag and the slogan God bless the USA (God bless the United States) in reference to the Lee Greenwood song that plays at all of her events. It also incorporates the lyrics of that song, the declaration of independence, the verses of the Pledge of Alliance and other historical documents.
The use of the Bible as a propaganda weapon, contravening the second commandment (“thou shalt not take the name of God in vain”), already caused controversy in 2020. As president, and after gassing some anti-racism protesters, he went to church of St. John and posed with a copy, which earned him the reproach of the bishop of the diocese of Washington.
Evangelicals, and the Christian nationalism movement, with far-right ideology, are enthusiastic about this commercial initiative. Trump’s more than dubious morality, seen according to his religious radicalism, matters little to them since in the 2016 campaign they heard him say “Christianity is under siege.” He, too, was not ashamed that in an interview he did not know how to cite a single biblical passage or discern between the old and the new testament. It doesn’t matter, they voted for him en masse in 2016 and 2020. And he continues to court them, avoiding his proposal on abortion, lest they turn against him.
“A substantial number of evangelicals share Trump’s nationalism, Islamophobia, racism and nativism. They tolerate their unpleasantness and agree that attacking protesters is giving them what they deserve,” writes Kristin Kobes du Mez in Jesus and John Wayne.
To a large part of the church, however, this commercialization provokes indignation. “Sacrilege”, “heresy” are some of the adjectives on the networks. “It is a bankrupt Christianity that sees a demagogue co-opting our faith and even our sacred scriptures for the sake of his own quest for power and praise,” the Reverend Benjamin Cremer maintains in X.
In the spirit of these dates, this is how they see it in the Daily Beast: “Is there a better way to celebrate the glory of the resurrection than by helping a criminal suspect, accused of dozens of charges, pay his legal fees?”
