Tim Wyatt looks back at all the key events of the past seven days, and offers some analysis of where faith has taken centre stage
As Donald Trump, the 47th President of the United States of America, delivered his inaugural address, he cast his mind back a few months. At another podium in front of another adoring crowd, he narrowly escaped being shot to death by a few millimetres. “Just a few months ago, in a beautiful Pennsylvania field, an assassin’s bullet ripped through my ear,” Trump reminded the audience. “But I felt then and believe even more so now that my life was saved for a reason. I was saved by God to make America great again.”
From that moment – and indeed long before on the campaign trail and since Trump’s resounding election win in November – his second presidential term has been marked by Christianity.
As in 2016, he won strong majorities of believers – claiming 59 per cent of the Catholic vote, 63 per cent of the Protestant and a massive 81 per cent of white evangelical vote, according to polls.
The inauguration
A number of high-profile Christian leaders were present at his inauguration, including Franklin Graham (son of evangelist Billy), who offered a prayer: “Father, when Donald Trump’s enemies thought he was down and out, you and you alone saved his life and raised him up with strength and power by your mighty hand.”
There was also a smorgasbord of lesser-known Christian leaders, including a black pastor called Lorenzo Sewell who delivered a dramatic prayer inspired by Martin Luther King’s ‘I have a dream’ speech. Shortly afterwards, he took to the internet to use his new-found fame to launch his own cryptocurrency. A retired Catholic priest who gave the final blessing seemingly won his invite on the back of weeding Trump’s parents’ grave in New York City.
During the sermon, Trump and Vance both seemed to turn away or even roll their eyes
Some Christians spotted that Trump did not take the oath of office holding a Bible, as is tradition, but Graham later told Premier Christianity this was not intentional nor intended as a snub. Instead, the Chief Justice simply began the oath-taking too quickly for an aide to get a Bible into the new president’s hands, forcing his wife Melania to stand to one side holding it instead.
Graham also said he was confident that Trump and his government would listen to and defend Christians in ways the previous Biden administration had not. Despite the President’s sometimes-shaky grasp on faith, there are Christians in every corner of his team. His vice-president, JD Vance, is a Catholic convert. Many of those named to his cabinet have a strong faith, including defence secretary Pete Hegseth (whose tattoos include a cross with a sword inside, a reference to Matthew 10:34), housing secretary Scott Turner (who also serves as an assistant pastor at a Texas Baptist church), and homeland security chief Kristi Noem, a vocal evangelical.
Executive actions
Many of Trump’s early executive actions have been to implement policies strongly supported by his right-wing Christian base, including declaring that the federal government only recognises two genders, male and female, and pardoning those involved in the 6 January insurrection at the Capitol four years ago. Focus on the Family, a large conservative Christian ministry, praised the former by quoting Genesis 1 and hailing Trump for ushering in a “revolution of common sense”.
The new president has also launched a crackdown on immigration, declaring a national emergency along the US border with Mexico, cancelling refugee programmes and ramping up deportations of unauthorised migrants. For years, some churches have offered sanctuary to those on the run from the immigration authorities, but federal agents are now free to enter churches to search for people to deport. Pastors whose congregations are full of long-term US residents with uncertain immigration status have warned this is keeping some of their faithful from services.
America’s Catholic bishops’ conference said that the move endangered trust between pastors and those they serve and “will not make our communities safer.”
“All people have a right to fulfil their duty to God without fear,” the statement added, saying that churches must remain places of “care, healing and solace.” However, megachurch Baptist minister Robert Jeffress backed the change, arguing “there’s no such thing as a sanctuary that’s immune from the laws of our land”. Vice-president Vance agreed, saying it was right to pursue illegal immigrants wherever they were.
Prayer service
Perhaps the most remarkable Christian entanglement with the second Trump term so far came on its second day. At the traditional prayer service at Washington National Memorial, the Episcopalian Bishop of Washington, Mariann Budde, ended her sermon with a direct plea to Trump – sitting in the front pew just a few metres away – to rein in his plans on migration and LGBT people.
Despite his own sometimes-shaky grasp on faith, there are Christians in every corner of his team
“In the name of our God, I ask you to have mercy upon the people in our country who are scared now,” Budde said. “There are gay, lesbian and transgender children - some who fear for their lives.” The migrants were mostly not criminals, but decent people, often members of churches, trying to get on with their lives, she added. “May God grant us the strength and courage to honour the dignity of every human being, to speak the truth to one another in love, and walk humbly with each other and our God,” she concluded.
During the sermon, Trump and Vance both seemed to turn away or even roll their eyes and, afterwards, Trump told reporters he had not been impressed by the service. Later, Trump posted an attack on Budde on his social media site: “The so-called Bishop who spoke at the National Prayer Service on Tuesday morning was a Radical Left hard line Trump hater. She was nasty in tone, and not compelling or smart…She and her church owe the public an apology!”
Budde also drew condemnation from some conservative Christians, including Graham, who told a podcast it sounded like the cathedral had been taken over by “gay activists”. Worship leader Sean Feucht described it as a “service of demonic perversion” by a “woke LGBT mafia bishop woman” who tried to “destroy a beautiful inauguration of hope”. Budde has said in subsequent interviews that she was not seeking to grandstand or humiliate Trump, but felt she must challenge the president to show God’s mercy after his slew of executive orders on inauguration day.
Abortion
As ever, abortion remains close to the top of many American Christians’ political agendas, and the new Trump era kicked off with a round of pardons designed to appeal to this constituency. Twenty-three people who had been convicted of blocking access to abortion clinics - in sometimes violent confrontations - were released from prison. The news was praised by pro-life activists at the March for Life in Washington last week, although some called for Trump to cut federal funding or support a ban on abortions.
While it was Supreme Court judges appointed by Trump in his first term who were pivotal in overturning Roe vs Wade in 2022, the president has since stepped back from full-throated pro-life advocacy. Nonetheless, Vance made his first official address as VP during March for Life, declaring ”this administration stands by you”, while a pre-recorded message from Trump was also played.
In it, the president pledged to end the “weaponisation of law enforcement against Americans of faith” and said his pardoning of the pro-life prisoners showed “never again will religious persecution be allowed to happen again in America”.
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