About Trump at the National Prayer Breakfast

I hear our President, Still-Your-President Donald Trump, ruffled some feathers at the National Prayer Breakfast yesterday.

The details may be found elsewhere.  I would not have said everything he said in that setting.  But you know what?  I have not had the coup against me that Trump has endured for over three long years. (Well, actually it was a coup against my vote.)  And, especially with coup participant Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who has long not respected the President nor his election, sitting there, I can understand Trump getting a bit hot.

It also should be remembered that Trump is President of the United States; he is no bishop and no priest.  And I am thankful, both for his office and that he does not hold churchly offices.  There’s one advantage of not having an established church right there.

But you know what else? If some pundit has been silent about the coup against Trump or worse has supported the coup yet now bashes Trump for being a bit hot upon his impeachment trial acquittal, he can shut up.  Yes, I said it.  That goes double for perverters of the faith like Jesuit LibPapist James Martin.

The President's speech at the #NationalPrayerBreakfast was disgusting. Self-serving, mean-spirited and targeting his "enemies," it was the opposite of prayer. At the heart of the believer's relationship with God is a profound humility before the Lord. And at the heart of the... pic.twitter.com/HCGQ8O6sU1

— James Martin, SJ (@JamesMartinSJ) February 6, 2020

Such need to shut up and repent far, far more than President Trump.  And the rest of us would do well to use the following rule of thumb. If a pundit on American politics has not opposed or at least questioned the coup against Trump, he probably is not worth listening to whether he or she is a person of the Left or the Right or something in between. 

If you think that would mean listening only to Trump supporters, not so.  Remember Democrats Alan Dershowitz and Jonathan Turley have opposed impeachment.  Both very much merit listening.  Even Van Jones, a slightly Left-wing opponent of Trump, who nonetheless has come to earn my respect and my ear, has questioned the wisdom of impeachment.

Don’t get me wrong. I am very much for free speech as longtime readers know.  And dialogue is vital in a democracy.  But there are still lines that should not be crossed. And the coup against Trump and against the 2016 election of him long ago crossed the line between legitimate policy disputes and illegitimate attacks on our Constitutional democracy.

It’s important that we get that and punish the perpetrators rather than give any credence to them or to their sycophants.