You can now buy the only Bible officially endorsed by Umpa Lumpa. It’s only $59.99 and comes in the most widely accepted English translation, which is also the only translation in the public domain (i.e., no copyright fees). If you’re a serious Christian Nationalist you can grab your copy here.
So, if you haven’t read anything else on this site and simply scrolled here, you might not realize I believe this exploitive pandering to his base is pathetic. Watch the Bible Project video to learn about the Bible and see if it aligns to what Trump is selling in the latest of his numerous grifts.
Source of the following
Few politicians have commanded the loyalty of the religious right like former President Trump, whose decision to begin selling $60 Bibles for Holy Week has outraged his critics — but drawn little reaction from evangelical leaders.
Why it matters: Trump has developed a sense of impunity when it comes to religious messaging, forged through a grand compromise with Christian conservatives who see him as a flawed — but effective — champion of their movement.
- Hawking Bibles is just the latest example.
Flashback: Trump was neither a regular churchgoer nor prone to displays of faith before running for president. His 2016 campaign produced a series of memorable gaffes as he courted the GOP’s evangelical base.
- At the Family Leadership Summit in Iowa in 2015, Trump said he had never asked God for forgiveness and called Communion his “little wine” and “little cracker.”
- In an interview with Bloomberg the following month, Trump repeatedly refused to name his favorite Bible verse — calling it “very personal.”
- In a speech at Liberty University in January 2016, Trump cited a verse from what he called “Two Corinthians” instead of “Second Corinthians,” drawing laughter from the crowd and mockery from his GOP rivals.
Zoom in: In office, Trump pursued policies that thrilled his white evangelical supporters, including the appointment of three conservative Supreme Court justices who voted to overturn Roe v. Wade.
- Conservative allies, including an influential think tank led by Trump’s former budget director Russ Vought, have developed plans to infuse “Christian nationalism” into his second-term agenda, according to Politico.
- Trump repeatedly has claimed that the “radical left” is persecuting Christians, and vowed at a December rally to “create a new federal task force on fighting anti-Christian bias.”
Between the lines: Since 2016, Trump increasingly has treated Christian imagery as a powerful rhetorical tool, including by comparing various investigations and indictments to the persecution of Jesus.
- Weeks into the COVID pandemic in March 2020, Trump declared his goal was to lift social distancing restrictions by Easter Sunday, telling Fox News: “Wouldn’t it be great to have all the churches full?”
- In June 2020, Trump walked from the White House to the historic St. John’s Episcopal Church moments after police forcefully cleared George Floyd protesters from Lafayette Square. Trump held up a Bible and posed for photos in front of the church, which had been damaged during protests the previous night.
What we’re watching: On the 2024 campaign trail, the religious undertones employed by Trump and his allies have grown more apocalyptic — even messianic — as his legal troubles have mounted.
- In one video shared on Truth Social and played at Trump’s rallies, a narrator’s voice booms: “On June 14, 1946, God looked down on his planned paradise and said, ‘I need a caretaker.’ So God gave us Trump.”
- On the first day of his New York civil fraud trial in October, Trump shared an AI-generated courtroom sketch depicting himself sitting next to Jesus.
- This week, Trump posted a message he said he received from a follower: “It’s ironic that Christ walked through His greatest persecution the very week they are trying to steal your property from you.”
The bottom line: 64% of Republicans view Trump as “a man of faith,” according to a November poll by Deseret News — more than his former vice president and vocal evangelical Mike Pence.
Here is what Dr Esau McCaulley had to say in the NY Times 🙂
The presumptive Republican nominee for president of the United States, who weeks ago started selling shoes, is now peddling Bibles. During Holy Week.
What’s special about this Bible? So many things. For example, according to a promotional website, it’s the only Bible endorsed by Donald Trump. It’s also the only one endorsed by the country singer Lee Greenwood. Admittedly, the translation isn’t distinctive — it’s your standard King James Version — but the features are unique. This Bible includes the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, the Declaration of Independence, the Pledge of Allegiance and part of the lyrics of Mr. Greenwood’s song “God Bless the USA.” Perhaps most striking, the cover of the Bible does not include a cross or any symbol of the Christian tradition; instead, it is emblazoned with the American flag.
While part of me wants to laugh at the absurdity of it — and marvel at the sheer audacity — I find the messaging unsettling and deeply wrong. This God Bless the USA Bible, as it’s officially named, focuses on God’s blessing of one particular people. That is both its danger and, no doubt for some, its appeal.
Whether this Bible is an example of Christian nationalism I will leave to others. It is at least an example of Christian syncretism, a linking of certain myths about American exceptionalism and the Christian faith. This is the American church’s consistent folly: thinking that we are the protagonists in a story that began long before us and whose main character is in fact the Almighty.
Holy Week is the most sacred portion of the Christian calendar, a time when the church recounts the central events of our faith’s narrative, climaxing in the death and resurrection of Jesus. That story, unlike the parochial God Bless the USA Bible, does not belong to any culture.
Holy Week is the most sacred portion of the Christian calendar, a time when the church recounts the central events of our faith’s narrative, climaxing in the death and resurrection of Jesus. That story, unlike the parochial God Bless the USA Bible, does not belong to any culture.
Holy Week is celebrated on every continent and in too many languages to number. Some of the immigrants Mr. Trump declared were “poisoning the blood” of America will probably shout “Christ is risen!” this Easter. Many of them come from the largely Christian regions of Latin America and the Caribbean. They may have entered the country with Bibles in their native tongues nestled securely among their other belongings.
One of the beauties of the Christian faith is that it leaps over the lines dividing countries, leading the faithful to call fellow believers from very different cultures brothers and sisters. Most of the members of this international community consist of the poor living in Africa, Asia and Latin America. There are more Spanish-speaking Christians than English-speaking ones.
If there are central messages that emerge from the variety of services that take place during Holy Week, for many Christians they are the setting aside of power to serve, the supremacy of love, the offer of divine forgiveness and the vulnerability of a crucified God.
This is not the stuff of moneymaking schemes or American presidential campaigns.
It was Pontius Pilate, standing in as the representative of the Roman Empire, who sentenced Jesus to death. The Easter story reminds believers that empires are more than willing to sacrifice the innocent if it allows rulers to stay in power. The church sees Christ’s resurrection as liberating the believer from the power of sin. The story challenges imperial modes of thinking, supplanting the endless pursuit of power with the primacy of love and service.
Holy Week is the most sacred portion of the Christian calendar, a time when the church recounts the central events of our faith’s narrative, climaxing in the death and resurrection of Jesus. That story, unlike the parochial God Bless the USA Bible, does not belong to any culture.
Holy Week is celebrated on every continent and in too many languages to number. Some of the immigrants Mr. Trump declared were “poisoning the blood” of America will probably shout “Christ is risen!” this Easter. Many of them come from the largely Christian regions of Latin America and the Caribbean. They may have entered the country with Bibles in their native tongues nestled securely among their other belongings.
One of the beauties of the Christian faith is that it leaps over the lines dividing countries, leading the faithful to call fellow believers from very different cultures brothers and sisters. Most of the members of this international community consist of the poor living in Africa, Asia and Latin America. There are more Spanish-speaking Christians than English-speaking ones.
If there are central messages that emerge from the variety of services that take place during Holy Week, for many Christians they are the setting aside of power to serve, the supremacy of love, the offer of divine forgiveness and the vulnerability of a crucified God.
This is not the stuff of moneymaking schemes or American presidential campaigns.
It was Pontius Pilate, standing in as the representative of the Roman Empire, who sentenced Jesus to death. The Easter story reminds believers that empires are more than willing to sacrifice the innocent if it allows rulers to stay in power. The church sees Christ’s resurrection as liberating the believer from the power of sin. The story challenges imperial modes of thinking, supplanting the endless pursuit of power with the primacy of love and service.
Easter, using the language of St. Augustine, represents the victory of the City of God over the City of Man. It declares the limits of the moral reasoning of nation-states and has fortified Christians who’ve resisted evil regimes such as fascists in South America, Nazis in Germany, apartheid in South Africa and segregation in the United States.
For any politician to suppose that a nation’s founding documents and a country music song can stand side by side with biblical texts fails at a theological and a moral level. I can’t imagine people in other countries going for anything like it. It is hard to picture a modern “God Bless England” Bible with elements of British common law appended to Christianity’s most sacred texts.
I am glad for the freedoms that we share as Americans. But the idea of a Bible explicitly made for one nation displays a misunderstanding of the story the Bible attempts to tell. The Christian narrative culminates in the creation of the Kingdom (and family) of God, a transnational community united by faith and mutual love.
Roman Catholics, Anglicans and Orthodox Christians, who together claim around 1.5 billion members, describe the Bible as a final authority in matters of faith. Evangelicals, who have overwhelmingly supported Mr. Trump over the course of three election cycles, are known for their focus on Scripture, too. None of these traditions cite or refer to any American political documents in their doctrinal statements — and for good reason.
This Bible may be unique in its form, but the agenda it pursues has recurred throughout history. Christianity is often either co-opted or suppressed; it is rarely given the space to be itself. African American Christians have long struggled to disentangle biblical texts from their misuse in the United States. There is a reason that the abolitionist Frederick Douglass said that between the Christianity of this land (America) and the Christianity of Christ, he recognized the “widest possible difference.”
And while Christianity was used to give theological cover to North American race-based chattel slavery, it was violently attacked in places like El Salvador and Uganda, when leaders including the archbishops Oscar Romero and Janani Luwum spoke out against political corruption.
The work of the church is to remain constantly vigilant to maintain its independence and the credibility of its witness. In the case of this particular Bible, discerning what is happening is not difficult. Christians are being played. Rather than being an appropriate time to debut a patriotic Bible, Easter season is an opportune moment for the church to recover the testimony of the supremacy of the cross over any flag, especially one on the cover of a Bible.