Shortly after the passage of President Trump’s domestic policy bill, Speaker Mike Johnson posted a Bible verse on his social media from Paul’s second letter to the church in Corinth. It read, “All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation.” Mr. Johnson appeared to be referring to the House’s passage of the reconciliation bill. Adding his own commentary on the text, he wrote, “soli Deo Gloria,” which is Latin for “glory to God alone.”
You almost have to appreciate the nerve it took to apply Paul’s words to a law that is likely to lead to millions of Americans’ losing their health care. Consider that the apostle was referring to sharing the good news about Jesus Christ and the chance to be reconciled to God.
In a rare moment of Christian ecumenism, white evangelicals, mainline protestants, Roman Catholics and Black church leaders agree that there’s no glory to be found in this legislation. They have levied distinctively religious critiques of Mr. Trump’s signature piece of legislation. Their issues with the legislation vary, but they seemingly all note that the ravenous greed at the core of this law threatens to devour the poor.
I am glad to see this pushback, but none of these policies can be called a surprise. What many feared has become a reality: treating diversity as a threat, dehumanization of migrants and policies that favor the wealthy at the expense of the poor.
For too long this administration has presented itself as the only defender of Christianity while it engages in merely symbolic gestures like posting Bible verses or publicizing worship services in the White House. Frederick Douglass described this type of performance: “Religion simply as a form of worship, an empty ceremony, and not a vital principle, requiring active benevolence, justice, love and good will towards man.” I fail to see how you can shout glory to God one minute and laugh about the harsh conditions of Alligator Alcatraz the next.
Mr. Johnson’s use of the Bible is similar to a recent U.S. Customs and Border Protection recruitment video that was posted on the Department of Homeland Security’s social media. It quotes the biblical passage about God asking the prophet, “Whom shall I send,” and the prophet volunteers to go in the name of the Lord to do his work. This prophet goes on to call people to repentance for mistreating the oppressed and abandoning God. Co-opting a passage depicting a prophet shaken by a vision of the glory of God to recruit for U.S. Customs and Border Protection is an audacious affront to Christianity that defies adequate description.
The National Baptist Convention, a historically Black denomination representing millions of members, has often criticized this administration. Instead of manipulating the words of the Bible to support its argument against the bill, it cited Psalm 82:3, which reads, “Defend the weak and the fatherless; uphold the cause of the poor and needy.”
Mr. Johnson’s and U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s use of scripture and that of the National Baptist Convention go beyond simply hurling verses at one another. They offer contrasting visions of how the Bible forms the moral imagination of the faithful. The leaders of the National Baptist Convention looked for guidance among the mountain of scriptures that highlight God’s concern for the weakest among us.
Psalm 82 was in fact a message to human rulers telling them that they would be judged for how they treated the poor. Mr. Johnson, by contrast, seems to be simply using biblical language to justify something that he had already done. This is religion as ornament, not the tree.
The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops has at times supported or opposed decisions by Mr. Trump and the Supreme Court that he helped shape. For example, it affirmed the court’s decision around parental rights but opposed the big domestic policy bill that just passed. It said, “the final version of the bill includes unconscionable cuts to health care and food assistance, tax cuts that increase inequality, immigration provisions that harm families and children, and cuts to programs that protect God’s creation.”
The Catholic conference opposes the damage this legislation does to the poorest Americans because Catholic teaching compels the faithful to uphold human dignity. It is hard to conceive of the law as promoting the sanctity of every life when it cuts key programs for the needy and expands tax cuts to the wealthy.
The Council for Christian Colleges & Universities critiqued the legislation’s tying of federal funding to degree programs based on salaries of graduates. It said, “The emphasis on earnings as a measure of value risks penalizing students who pursue lower-paying public service roles — many of whom do so out of a deep sense of faith and calling.”
The council argues that the bill assumes the primary reason one chooses a degree program is because it maximizes income. For the Christian, there are higher goods than money, including service and care for those in need. Paul makes this point in the very letter that Mr. Johnson quoted. The apostle said, “For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor. ”
Following this example, the argument goes, Christians have rejected higher-paying jobs to serve in impoverished areas. Christians also often go into social work and the nonprofit sector. The idea that Christian colleges might be punished for encouraging their students to follow in the example of Christ while rewarding colleges that do not is deeply troubling.
The Black church opposition to Mr. Trump might not be much of a surprise given that he secured only 13 percent of the Black vote, albeit a substantial increase from 2016. But he received 59 percent of the Catholic vote and 82 percent of the white evangelical vote. If there is widespread religious disapproval of Mr. Trump’s signature legislation because of the impacts that it has on the poor and working classes, then this might signal long-term danger for two pillars of Mr. Trump’s coalition.
But more than that, these statements highlight the irreconcilable difference between Trumpian politics and Christianity. Mr. Trump uses money and power to keep people in line. If politicians, countries, businesses or even institutions of higher education go against his wishes, they will pay a financial penalty. Mr. Trump believes in making deals rooted in self-interest.
Christians have the resources to resist this tactic because we are taught to model our behavior on Christ, who looked to the interests of others, not himself. It is precisely that interest in others, namely, the millions of working-class Americans negatively affected by this legislation, that led so many Christian leaders to say no to it. For some, this is a part of a long history of resistance; for others, they are finally finding their voice. Whether new or old, I am happy to see it.
It is up to the rest of the faithful to follow suit.
Esau McCaulley is a contributing Opinion writer and the author of the forthcoming children’s book “God’s Colorful Kingdom Storybook Bible.” He is an associate professor of New Testament and public theology at Wheaton College and host of the Esau McCaulley Podcast.
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