The great paradox of evangelical Christianity in the U.S. has been for years that although it calls itself Christian (i.e., with its source in the New Testament teachings of Christ), its most cherished tenets usually spring from Old Testament “I am a jealous God” teachings. And while that’s probably a gross over-simplification, the fact remains that to secular liberals like me, that’s exactly how we see it. So every time an evangelical claims to love Christ then praises the extraordinarily un-Christlike Trump, the secular left sees hypocrisy and writes off the whole group. Even more so when we remember the disdain with which the Christian right treats Jimmy Carter, who was certainly the most devout New Testament Christian to hold power in at least the last century.

What we see, then, is politics masked as religion, and treated with religious fervor. And when they claim that they don’t love Trump per se but see him as a Cyrus-like figure, anointed to do God’s work without being godly himself, it feels like a shallow and cynical excuse to achieve political ends while still waving the cross. So if they claim to be misunderstood by the secular left, it’s because they’ve done an appalling job of living up to the example they claim to be setting. A bit of actual ministry, addressing the perceptions of both sides, would be very welcome indeed, but I’m seeing precious little of that.