This post follows up on the two immediately preceding posts, titled Authoritarianism, Patriarchy, and Misogyny in the White Evangelical Church and Onward, Christianist Soldiers: Peter Wehner on Vice as Virtue.
I have five observations.
Context: The Declining White Evangelical Church
The material in these two posts should be read and considered in context: the White evangelical church is leaking like a sieve. The crew that reveled in Trump’s vileness the other day at the National Prayer Breakfast represent a declining population. There are still a lot of them, but not as many as there were a decade ago, when Trump deescalated down the golden escalator.
Southern Baptist Convention membership peaked in 2006, at 16.3 million members. By the time Russell Moore was booted out, in mid-2021, membership had declined to 13.7 million. Subsequent to Moore’s defenestration, the SBC has lost another million members.
These data are consistent with data on overall participation in White evangelical Protestant Churches. In 2006, they were 23 percent of the U.S. adult population; now, it’s 13 percent, or about one quarter of the White population in the United States.
Why are So Many Evangelicals Abandoning Ship?
A variety of reasons, but clearly some of it is because folks who actually reads the words printed in red in the New Testament and who want to follow Jesus are disgusted by what they have seen in their church.
Who is the Progressive’s Biggest Ally in Combating National Prayer Breakfast-Style Christianism?
Jesus of Nazareth.
How Will White Evangelicals Reconcile the Tension Between Their Culture War Victories Under Trump and Their Economic Losses Due to Tariffs, Inflation, Loss of Job Opportunities, Etc.?
I don’t know, of course, but it’s going to be a non-trivial threat to Trump’s remaining 70%+ approval among the White evangelical crowd.
With Trump’s Deteriorating Mental and Physical Health, Will Significant Numbers of White Evangelicals Decide They Still Want an Authoritarian Messiah, Just Not Trump as Their Authoritarian Messiah?
Anything is possible.
Facing MAGA 