God Wants Trump

At least, that's what evangelist John Hagee told his followers last week. Hagee has been featured here on Augoeides before, when his "blood moon" apocalypse prophecy totally fizzled back in September. One wonders if he's at it again, hoping that electing Donald Trump president will finally bring on a real apocalypse as opposed to a totally made up one.

As I'm not a Trump supporter, here's hoping that Hagee's endorsement of Trump's campaign is about as effective as his endorsement of that "blood moon" business - that is, not at all - and the campaign likewise fizzles out on election day.

On yesterday's "Hagee Hotline," Pastor John Hagee urged Christians to get out and vote and made it abundantly clear that he'll be casting his vote for presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump in November.

After mangling Dietrich Bonhoeffer's famous "not to speak is to speak" quote and falsely attributing it to Martin Niemöller, Hagee informed his viewing audience that "God will not hold us harmless" and so they have an obligation to vote.

"I'm going to vote for the candidate that's going to make the U.S. military great again," he said. "I'm going to vote for the party that is going to solve the immigration problem, not the one that has created the immigration problem. I'm going to support the party that brings jobs back from China ... I'm not going to vote for the party that has betrayed Israel for the past seven years."

"If you can read a newspaper, you know who I'm talking about," Hagee said. "No candidate is perfect, but I want you to go vote and may God give us a leader who has the courage to put America first and stand up for we the people."

The interesting thing about Trump is that, while Christian, he's not much of a religious conservative. Ted Cruz was an actual Christian Reconstructionist, and Trump defeated him easily for the Republican nomination. Not only that, in the primary more than half of evangelicals backed Trump over the guy who theoretically was their ideal candidate.

So Hagee is not alone in his support. This sort of lobbying is pretty ridiculous, though. Hagee can't say "Donald Trump" without losing his organization's tax exempt status, but literally everybody knows exactly who he's talking about as he practically quotes Trump's campaign slogans. And the idea that God is in favor of of a "great military" and opposed to immigration seems kind of silly if you actually read the Bible, especially the teachings of Jesus.

The comments about Israel are kind of ironic too, given the actual political situation and the evangelical worldview. First off, the United States has continued to provide aid to Israel over the last seven years even during a massive recession, so how that constitutes "betrayal" eludes me. And second, the only reason evangelicals like Hagee have any interest in supporting Israel is so that it can be blown up during the apocalypse. That's some qualified support right there.

Based on my understanding of the Christian religion, it seems to me that if God were to pick a candidate it sure wouldn't be Donald Trump. But then, they do say that the Lord works in mysterious ways.