This weeks Christian Today Article.
A letter to Evangelicals for Trump
Dear brothers and sisters at Evangelicals for Trump,
As we approach the day of the Presidential election, I thought I would follow up my earlier letter to your brothers and sisters on the other side of the political divide.
In terms of an organisation, Evangelicals for Trump doesn’t appear to be much of a ‘grassroots’ one. Indeed the only one I could find was this one paid for by the Trump campaign.
To be honest there was not much on there, but this statement reveals why you think Christians should re-elect the President: “Evangelicals for Trump will engage the Christian community to help re-elect President Donald J. Trump in 2020. Through re-affirming support for President Trump, evangelicals across the country will work to deliver a second term – ensuring that pro-life initiatives, religious freedom, and the appointment of conservative judges are kept as a top priority for four more years.”
What is an Evangelical?
Evangelicals for Trump reflects rather a widespread view that the vast majority of white evangelicals (and a significant number of African-American and Hispanic ones) have voted and will vote for Donald Trump. This is deeply puzzling to many outwith the US who do not understand how you can vote for such a flawed human being. I must admit that I shared (and to some extent still do) their scepticism – but as usual with all simplistic narratives – the reality and the truth is much more complex. For a start the definition of evangelical is one that is deeply puzzling. One recent report suggested that 30% of American evangelicals did not accept that Jesus is God. In what sense then can they possibly be called evangelical, if they deny the very centre of the evangelical faith?! Labels are not necessarily helpful.
However, in this letter I am addressing those who are Bible-believing Christians, who have the Cross at the centre, believe in the necessity of the new birth, in heaven and hell, and that faith should be worked out in actions both in church and community. Why would real Christians vote for a man who appears to be somewhat lacking in the fruit of the Spirit?
The Lord’s Anointed?
It’s always best when we are trying to understand a position, to grasp what the best defenders of that position say. If on the other hand you are seeking to mock or demonise then pick the worst. Which is why I am not going to argue against those who say that President Trump is ‘The Lord’s Anointed’, or who prophesy that God has told them ‘his servant will win big’, or indeed the lady who wrote to tell me that John Piper was “nothing more than an opinionated, mean spirited, self-righteous, judgemental Baptist” because of his criticism of the President.
Dump Trump or Bide with Biden?
The former Liberal Party leader in the UK, Tim Farron, expresses the puzzlement of many when in a recent Spectator article, he urged Christians to dump Trump. You may be annoyed at the article, as I was, because it completely ignored the elephant in the room. In asking you to dump Trump, Farron was in effect encouraging you to ‘bide with Biden’ . There are many reasons why I accept that evangelicals will never vote for Biden.
The Five ‘Single Issues
I have long ceased to be party political and have little faith in any politician. But in a democracy, as long as we have it, I believe that as a Christian citizen I have a responsibility to vote. Sometimes that means I have to go for the least bad option. Evangelicals for Biden, knowing that his support for the Democrat policy of state-funded abortion on demand up to birth is a real stumbling block, suggest that we should not be ‘one policy’ voters. I agree – there are at least five ‘one’ policies which are crucial to me.
I could not vote for someone who supports partial birth abortion or abortion on demand up to nine months; nor could I vote for someone who believes that one race is superior to another; nor for someone who supports transgender ideology which is so dangerous especially to women and children; nor could I vote for someone who does not see it as a duty of the State to protect and provide for the poor; and finally I could not vote for someone who does not uphold law and order and in particular equality for all before the law. There are other policies I would prefer – but these are absolutes.
For that reason, I agree with you that I could not vote for Biden. In all conscience I could never vote for a man who supports abortion on demand and who recently spoke in favour of an eight-year-old changing gender. Much as I like some of his policies, these are a big no. Perhaps then we should abstain, or make a protest vote for a third candidate?
What is the case for voting for President Trump?
The best I have heard is from Al Mohler, in this article in which he says: “I didn’t vote for Donald Trump in 2016. Repulsed by his character and unable to see him as a conservative, I voted for neither major party candidate. I made a symbolic vote.”
He now says that he is going to vote for the President, despite all the reservations about his character. Speaking of which I found this statement powerful: “I cannot accept the argument that a calm man who affirms the dismembering of babies in the womb has a superior character to a man who rants like Genghis Khan but acts to preserve that life.”
There is another factor that has surprised me. Although I was delighted in 2016 that Hilary Clinton did not get in, and even more delighted that the media and pundits were all proved spectacularly wrong, I thought that President Trump would be a failure. That has not turned out to be the case. In foreign policy, he has been the most successful US president for many decades – as Greg Sheridan, senior foreign correspondent of The Australian, summarises: “By recognising Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, Trump brought a new realism to Middle East diplomacy. By imposing tariffs on China, he changed gears and lubricated the rusted cogs of trade negotiations. By pressuring NATO allies, he won new commitments. And by exiting Paris, he showed the way to a pragmatic, technology-based approach on emissions reduction.”
The agreements with Bahrain, the UAE, Sudan and Israel are stunning diplomatic successes which would have brought, for any other President, a Nobel Peace Prize. President Obama got one after eight months in office, when he was waging war in Afghanistan and Iraq!
On the domestic front, his economic policy is usually deemed to have been successful, his social policies less so, but the biggest success has been in the appointment of three Supreme Court judges and over 300 other judges. Unusually for a politician, President Trump has delivered much of what he promised.
The Christian Champion?
But that still leaves me with a problem. These reasons explain why you would vote for President Trump but please do not go to the extreme of having him as some kind of Christian champion. One woman wrote me: “Trump is a warrior and a patriot! He humbles himself daily as people near and far lift him up before Almighty God! He is not ashamed of the Gospel of Jesus Christ!”
This is the kind of nonsense that gives Christianity a bad name. There is nothing about Donald Trump that indicates he knows anything about either humility or the Christian Gospel.
“I am the only one who can make America great again.”
“No one reads the Bible more than I do.”
Stephen Mansfield’s Choosing Donald Trump is a revealing insight into the religious thought of Trump and of some who support him. Trump’s version of ‘Christianity’ is more Norman Vincent Peale’s The Power of Positive Thinking than it is Jesus Christ’s. Peale’s mantra – “believe in yourself! Have faith in your abilities” – is Trump’s. When Trump becomes a Christian, it will be because he no longer has faith in himself, but instead in Jesus Christ. Until that day please do not pronounce him as a believer, never mind a Christian leader we should follow.
Emotional Investment in the Wrong Place
This letter is long enough but I also have one other concern. It seems to me that far too many Christians have allowed politics to take the place of their faith (on either side). That is seen in the emotional investment – sometimes to great harm. I suspect that if it were not for Covid, President Trump would have been a dead cert for re-election. As it is, almost all the pundits and polls have him as a loser. They could be wrong. But whatever the result, please do not exult if your man is elected, or get depressed if he isn’t. It’s not the inauguration of the Millennium, nor is it the end of the world.
Remember the words of the Psalmist: “Do not put your trust in princes, in human beings, who cannot save”. (Psalm 146:3). Instead continue to hope in, live for, and love Christ.
Yours in Him,
David Robertson
Although we in the UK are not involved in the actual voting for either candidate, doubtless whoever wins will have some sort of effect on the UK in the long run. As far as I am aware Trump, like him or hate him, has done great things for the Christian world, even although I have no doubt it’s from advice from Christians such as Pence, in the background. However, all things pertaining to Israel for example, would certainly never have happened under the Democratic party. Too many reasons to mention here, but as far as I am concerned, it’s Trump for me. P.S. He who is without sin, let him cast the first stone!! I don’t think Trump would, for one moment, state that he is without sin!!
Actually Trump did say he was without sin – or at least he said he had nothing to be forgiven for!
I wasn’t aware of this statement. May we know in which context it was made?
A couple of times – here is one of them…https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rNiyjb7tHF0
“nor could I vote for someone who believes that one race is superior to another”
What was that about? How did that slur find its way into your shopping list?
And in what sense “superior”? It is undeniable that people with black African genes excel at tough, physical sports, and that people with genes inherited from ancestors in the Indian subcontinent have run profitable corner shops in Yorkshire that the indigenous Anglo-Saxons who sold up to them a generation ago could no longer make a go of. Even though everybody is an individual, it surely cannot have escaped your notice certain races seem to be superior to others on average, at certain activities, of which I have given only two obvious examples.
Trump seems to lack the natural talent of being able to talk to ethnic minority voters via a TV camera, admitting that he was as shocked as everybody else to see how George Floyd met his death and that he hoped the courts would deliver what little justice they could in the aftermath, going on to explain why, nevertheless, he is able to promise them that they would be better off voting for him, not Biden. He evades stupid questions, like, “Will you condemn so-and-so?”, or this-or-that abstraction, as he should, but he does this proper evasion clumsily. But do you really believe that such failings make him a “racist”?
If, in the interview, Trump had admitted “asking God for forgiveness”, can you imagine what follow-up questions that might have elicited? Trump is a better politician than you, even if he is an inferior theologian.
What slur? I was not referring to any particular candidate. Don’t be so sensitive? Trump admitted he did not ask for forgiveness – unless you think his crass remark about communion was him admitting he needed forgiveness.
If you were not referring to (or even thinking of?) any (either?) particular candidate, then why did you mention belief in the superiority of one race in your list?
Why didn’t you also link to a video of an awkward interview in which Biden too was asked whether he asked God to forgive him for his sins? Couldn’t you find it? Didn’t you wonder why?
I thought I had correctly discerned that the “forgiveness” question was mischievous for exactly the same reason that Cathy Newman’s infamous question about “sin” put to Tim Farron had been mischievous. What do you have to say about that comparison?
Because I would not vote for any candidate who believed in the superiority of one race over another.
I didn’t link to an interview about Biden because it was an article about Trump (the BIden one was last week)..
You had correctly discerned nothing. Trump is not a Christian and does not know what a Christian is…
Keep up!
Please be patient with me, even though you carry simultaneously the burdens of popularity and intemperate criticism by enemies you love enough to publish their criticisms alongside the praise of friends, and to respond to them.
As a friend, I asked you, “If you were not referring to (or even thinking of?) any (either?) particular candidate, then why did you mention belief in the superiority of one race in your list?”
You replied, “Because I would not vote for any candidate who believed in the superiority of one race over another.”
I see. You mentioned that you would not vote for any candidate who believed in the superiority of one race over another merely because you would not vote for any candidate who believed in the superiority of one race over another. You had realised that this rule of yours, which you took such trouble to mention, was irrelevant to what you were writing about (Trump and Biden), but for some reason (what reason again?) you just blurted it out anyway. I was mistaken to suspect that you mentioned this rule of yours because you thought that either Trump or Biden believed in the superiority of one race over another. I see.
I wonder, then, why you didn’t also mention that you wouldn’t vote for a candidate who believed that incest should be decriminalised, something else which neither Trump or Biden believes as far as I know. Or duelling. Or a candidate who believed that the moon was made of green cheese or that the Queen Mum had been a reptilian. That is, unless you’d be happy to vote for candidates with those equally irrelevant beliefs (when comparing Trump and Biden), but not for candidates with that one forbidden belief you singled out, the belief in the superiority of one race over another. Yes, that must be the explanation.
We will have to agree to differ as to whether I correctly discerned that the questioning of Trump about divine forgiveness was similar to the questioning of Farron about the doctrine of sin. I do not wish to judge whether either Trump or Farron is in the faith, on the basis of their handling of theological questions, in interviews of them as politicians who were seeking re-election.
I don’t feel that the conclusion one might tend towards, upon witnessing Trump, Farron, or any other politician struggling with theological questions thrown at him when he was expecting political questions, as to whether the politician concerned, who is seeking re-election, has a sincere Christian faith (or is good at answering theological questions), ought to be weighted too heavily in one’s deliberations as to for whom to vote.
In 1992, being something of a leftie, and sickened by memories of the miner’s strike, I mistakenly wanted the self-described “Atheist” Neil Kinnock to become Prime Minister rather than the not-particularly-religious, self-described “Christian” John Major.
Having now watched that clip, I have to say that I did not hear Mr Trump say that he “had nothing to be forgiven for”! I heard him say that he didn’t give much thought to that; that he felt that if he had done something wrong, he should seek to correct it (something that is not always mentioned, in my experience, when people do seek forgiveness!); that he thought that, when he partook of the Lord’s Supper, he was receiving forgiveness.
With respect – and you know that I have a great deal of respect for you – I cannot accept, on the basis of that interview, that what you claim here about Donald Trump is accurate!
Blessings, and shalom.
The interview is clear – and it is something he has repeated several times – for example in the clip on American Gospel – I realise that there is a tendency when people don’t want something to be true – not to see it – but there is no doubt that Trump on the basis of his public pronouncements has not repented and sought forgiveness for his sins. Why do you feel there is a need to say otherwise? https://www.businessinsider.com.au/trump-on-god-i-dont-like-to-have-to-ask-for-forgiveness-2016-1?op=1&r=US&IR=T
If you hadn’t finished with a question, I would have made no further response! However … !!!
Your original statement was that “… he said he had nothing to be forgiven for!” Such a statement is, effectively, a claim to “sinless perfection”! You now say that he “… has not repented and sought forgiveness for his sins.” That, I would suggest, is not the same thing.
As (I hope) you would expect, I freely confess that I am a sinner. I know that I need to repent and claim the forgiveness that the Lord Jesus gained for me at Calvary. However, if I fail to repent, and claim that forgiveness, that is not because I am claiming not to need forgiveness. Perhaps I need some further teaching but that, is it not, is something completely different!
re Israel Trump has abandoned the convention of US presidents seeking a two state solution. Whether you think that is pro Israel or not is a matter of perspective!!
As a member of a church in the US I cant see that Trump has done anything for Christianity though people keep claiming he has. What exactly?
His son claimed he had saved Christianity! Really? Since when was Christianity even under any threat in the US?! The Trumps are completely ignorant when it comes to faith.
Your reference to Norman Vincent Peale, and “The Power of Positive Thinking”, reminded me of the words of the late Rev. Willie Still, of Gilcomston South Parish Church, Aberdeen (at whose feet, on one occasion, I quite literally sat!). Regarding the aforementioned author, he reportedly stated: “Paul I find appealing; Peale I find appalling!”
I have no idea what he would have said about Pres. Trump!
Thank you, David, for such good food for thought. I am in full agreement! Love to you and Annabel from Charleston.
In spite of all his obvious faults, Trump and his administration have done more than most recent presidencies to highlight the plight of persecuted religious minorities around the world, which should at least count for something.
Whilst reducing the number of refugees resettled in the United states to near zero!
I feel similar to Al Mohler in your post. I do not like Trump’s character, or at least the persona that is portrayed, yet the Dems have lost their collective consciences. And I agree that an informed Christian could not vote for that party to ever be in power. I never took political science, but I feel that if you researched the collapse of the Democratic party in 1968, with the Chicago riots, LBJ not running for reelection, leaving the party almost bankrupt, and then research what agreements they had to do to stay solvent, you could see the root cause in the political party from something nearly indistinguishable from the Republicans (the more liberal of the two at the time or near that time) moving the Dems to the far left. The shift starting during the Cold War. To me, who was an Army officer in Germany during the Cold War, it seems the shift toward an ideology we were “fighting” was bizarre, almost in the realm of treason, but Communist leaders at the time were predicting it, and even manipulating it when they could.
Hi Mark, always consider the agenda of your source. The Democrats really are not moving to the far left. Wanting to build a more equitable and fair society really is not communism. But, even if it were, it would be an ideology that deserves to be voted on. Perhaps. I cannot see how all that Biden has proposed is anywhere near as abusive, cruel, and corrupt as unchecked capitalism. It is a strange thing that we Christians seem to have a problem with all things except capitalism that we defend as though it were God’s own command. And yet, it is responsible for an incredible amount of abuse and suffering.
The demonising of the Democratic party is embarrassing.
Trump is not really a Republican in the modern political sense of the word :
https://thefederalist.com/2020/10/28/theres-no-going-back-to-normal-after-trump-the-republican-party-is-changed-forever/
David
I would like to challenge you on your four points leading you to see Trump as the lesser of two evils
1. Abortion. Whereas Trump makes much hay of being the “pro life” candidate, he has done little, if anything on policy on this issue. He certainly did not make it a priority when his party controlled both houses of congress. He also lives the kind of lifestyle that promotes unwanted pregnancies. His party opposes improving sex ed or improving access to healthcare and contraception.
True, Biden is for keeping abortion legal, but he also has clear policies to reduce unwanted pregnancies – a combination of education and better access to healthcare. There is pretty good evidence that these actually do reduce abortion rates.
2. Trump has made a lot of racially charged statements and has run a campaign echoing the openly racist campaigns of the 1960s and 1970s arguing that only he can protect (white) suburbia. I’ve no doubt Biden is not perfect in this area, but he is at least recognizing the threat of racism and white supremacy which Trump consistently denies
3/4 I’ll take the issue of the trans child and equality under the law together. I haven’t seen Bidens townhall, but my understanding was he expressed support for the 8 year old girl to have the same rights and treatment as any other 8 year old girl.
I understand that many religious conservatives dont believe that the answer to being trans or experiencing gender dysphoria is to embrace the experienced gender, but I dont see how the answer can be to deny basic rights to these people, especially children. Trump is not for equality under the law. He is for preferring those who suck up to him. In both campaigns he has called for political rivals to be imprisoned without trial.
The past few days he has been praising supporters for trying to run Bidens campaign bus off the road.
I dont understand how he can ever be considered the lesser evil by any moral system, let alone a Christian moral system.
I think Biden is flawed and too neutral on some important issues such as healthcare, but I don’t see him as intentionally causing harm. It’s hard to see Trumps behavior toward covid or his inciting violence as anything but intentionally causing harm
Biden is doing much more than saying he will keep abortion legal…he is proposing to state fund it…and make it on demand up to birth in every state…..Its unwise to make comments on situations without having seen them – Biden explicitly supported the idea that an 8 year old could know they were born in the wrong body and should seek change. No one is denying ‘basic rights’ to trans children…. Biden is as crooked and flawed as Trump…his polices are worse…
So David, you didn’t actually agree with Greg Sheridan:
“Conscientious Christians could vote for Trump OR BIDEN or not vote at all. NEITHER candidate is SO BAD as to make them UNCONSCIONABLE, as it would be for a Christian to vote, say, for a communist or a Nazi.” (my emphasis)
Odd that statistics – if you put much faith in such things – show that abortion rates decline under Democratic Administrations.
Look it up.
Surprised me.
Maybe Pete’s point about healthcare and contraception has some merit?
Hi Pete. May I just pick up on your first point, that Trump has ‘done little, if anything on policy’ on the pro life issue?
President Trump was inaugurated as President on 20th January, 2017.
On 23rd January, by Presidential Memorandum, he reinstated and expanded the Mexico City Policy, renaming it ‘Protecting Life In Global Health Assistance’.
Briefly, this policy requires foreign non governmental organisations to certify that they will not perform or actively promote abortion as a method of family planning using funds with any source as a condition for receiving US Government family planning assistance.
Does this strike you as doing little, if anything on the pro life issue?
If President Trump has done little if anything on the pro life issue, one might wonder why Planned Parenthood’s acting president, Alexis McGill Johnson stated on June 15th that this year’s election will be a ‘matter of life and death’, adding ‘We felt that we can’t endure another four years of Trump, we have to do everything we can to get him out of office’.
They donated $45m to Democrats to help get Trump out of office.
Does this repudiate your fact free assertion?
John Barfoot
Add “ Supports Israel” to list of reasons to support a candidate. Vote policy, not personality. Not to mention the revelations about Biden, documented in a book out in February 2020. Is it not telling that he has not filed a lawsuit, nor denied the allegations, limiting his response to “it’s a smear campaign to distract people from issues”.
Regardless of who wins there is an assurance, that for many , conditions will improve :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zY68zn6nNDA
One of the Left’s manifest dislikes of C & W music is simply because it is the folk music of ordinary White people.
The US is very unique, in as much as we have a view on the personal lives of elected nominals, at least a voter can elect a person.
No other country offers this in the same way, whereby faith has Liberty to be allowed to play a part.
Look across the rest of the world, what can Christians choose and influence?
The UK, the elected have no chance of openly supporting or declaring a Christian faith at the moment.
Are the personal lives of our elected any better? We may not get the scandal exposed, but plenty will defend abortion, undermine marriage and the family and marginalise Christians, behind a veil of political respectability! I.e. falsehood.
France? Secular to the core, along with much of Europe.
Russia? A fair vote for opposition?
China?
North Korea?
The US has its faults, as does Trump, but so do other Nations and their elected representatives.
Can God use these flawed people and systems?
The bible says yes. He is in control, not them. We are never going to get a Jesus to vote for, because we know what the world thinks of him.
Do we vote for a person who presents as someone with personal flaws, but upholds and defends what is true and in accord with what we value?
Or someone who presents as upright, but undermines our values?
If you compared personal lives, David Cameron and Donald Trump?
But compare values and truths defended?
Cameron may not have tried building a wall, and not have personal scandal, but what policies did he introduce and defend contrary to the biblical worldview?
It may be an interesting issue to explore David, in politics in general, does the Christian focus on the person, or practical policies.
Do we look for those who say, ‘Lord Lord, didn’t we do this? But didn’t. Or those who actually did what he said?’
An interesting dilemma
My take away from this Trump / Biden debate is that in a country of 328 million people it comes down to a choice between these two, apparently the best the USA has to offer!
This is a good summary of Trump and Biden by Stan Grant:
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-11-05/us-election-trump-biden-stan-grant-analysis/12847454
Here’s another good piece by Stan Grant from a month ago, looking at the plight of the poor in America and why they vote for Trump:
https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.abc.net.au/article/12725288
Thank you for another discerning and thought provoking article. While one can understand why some USA Christians may have decided not to vote for either candidate, I take your important point: ‘I believe that as a Christian citizen I have a responsibility to vote’.
Then, at least there is hope conveyed or as a ‘Dave’ expresses it, above, on 3rd Nov., with a question: ‘Can God use these flawed people and systems? The Bible says YES. He is in control, not them.’ And so, we should continue to pray that our sovereign Lord would ‘move in the heart of many an ungodly leader to accomplish His purposes’.
Thankfully, God has so far spared us in Australia from the showmanship of the USA system of government. But, sadly, how blatant some State Premiers here have become over recent times, in further loosening abortion laws and in a push for so called ‘rights’ to choose ‘assisted death’.
Ecclesiastes 3:17 – ‘I said to myself, “God will bring into judgment both the righteous and the wicked, for there will be a time for every activity, a time to judge every deed.”
Why is it so evil to be open to abortion? …
We would do well to engage our brains a little – Biden is not promoting abortion! He is not going to kill unborn children! His position simply recognises the human condition and that we are broken and fragile. I am not ‘pro’ abortion – few are. But I acknowledge there are times when a devastatingly sad situation arises where people are left with an awful decision. I would never claim to understand the intricacies of each case – and so I would argue the law needs to provide space for doctors and those involved to do just that.
I do not want to share in great depth, but I am aware of a case where an unborn child would live for just minutes. In which time, if they survived the labour, they would essentially suffocate. There was no possibility that the mother could be saved the grief and agony of loss – but due to further complications, her life, which was linked to the child’s, was also at a heightened risk due to the pregnancy. There was a significant chance that both mother and child would die. What would you say to the two older children left without a mother? It is God’s will? Trump is God’s anointed leader? God’s grace does not apply to you. It’s all part of God’s big plan – you’ll understand it one day. ?? I share this only because abortion is never simple. It is never easy.
Interestingly, God has a particularly bad record when it comes to children. Between the flood, genocides, and the plague of the firstborn. How do we square that?
To my question. Why is it so evil to be open to a discussion about abortion, and yet a hint of gun control is an infringement of human rights? Surely, if Trump, the republicans, or anyone else is pro-life, the only position to take is tighter gun laws, inclusion of the LGBTQ community, expanded healthcare, and investment in the environment. Anything less is partial: we are pro-life for unborn babies and rich people. We are pro-life for people who will allow me to continue mine in the way I deem fit. I am Pro-life for people who think like me. In effect.. I am pro-my life.
Pro-life means that we have to accommodate people who have different opinions and stances. We cannot demonise people who see things differently or feel differently. And that is the great flaw of Trumpism; it demonises anyone who has a different opinion, who was unfortunate enough to be born outside of privilege, or who finds themselves in an hour of desperate need. It is devoid of understanding or compassion. That should be where we draw the line. Our leaders should be people who break down walls; not build them. Our leaders should be people who inspire us to be the best and most loving versions of ourselves. Not embody the worst of our tendencies or appeal to our insecurities.
I would like to remain anonymous due to some things shared.
Thanks anon….You are of course right we should engage our brains.
1) The example you give is so extreme that it is irrelevant to the debate. There are times when life could be taken – but they are so rare. The case you argue is a bit like saying that killing someone because they are about to shoot twenty people, is a justification for killing people whenever we want.
2) You are right – Abortion is never simple. Simply saying its the woman choice is wrong. As is saying ‘its my body’ – there are at least two other bodies involved.
3) Biden is pro-abortion. He stood on a platform to allow abortions at all times, for any reason, funded by the state. Not just in the 0.0001% of cases you describe. INcluding partial birth abortion.
4) You comment about God is facetious and silly. All human beings die. If you are going to argue that he must keep all children alive then logically you should say that he must keep all adults alive forever. Ironically that is what he offers to us – eternal life. But we have to chose it. It is blasphemous to suggest that human beings should have God’s perogative over life and death. And dangerous.
5. If we are going to use our brains in a discussion – don’t bring in red herrings and don’t argue against what has been said. Defending abortion on the basis that some people don’t want gun control is not using your brain! As is arguing that being against abortion means you have to be pro LGBTQ!
6. Sticking with using our brains – pro life does not mean we have to accommodate people with different opinions and stances. It means we are prolife – unless you chose to mangle the English language. If being pro-life means we have to accommodate people who have different stances then it means we have to accommodate those who believe that its ok to own a slave, kill disabled people and rape!
7. Your comments about what you call Trumpism are equally irrational and self-defeating. I have no idea what Trumpism is and I have no time for Donald Trump. I suspect you don’t know what it means either – you are just doing the very thing you are supposed to be condemning – judging others for having a different point of view. Your definition of Trumpism is also empirically false. If Trumpism is about supporting those born in privilege why did the majority of working class people vote for him, and the majority of privileged people vote against him? Are you saying they were stupid.
I agree with your statement that we should use our brains. I’m not sure how that fits with arguing that its ok to kill the weakest human beings of all (the children in the womb) in order to show compassion! Perhaps you need to rethink?