November 8th was, for so many of us, the death knell for any claim white evangelicals as a group had on caring for “the least of these.” It wasn’t a trickle, but a landslide of white evangelicals who helped to usher the real-life Biff Tannen to the seat of power.
My social feeds have been full of expressions of disillusionment, like those of Yolanda Pierce and Brandi Miller here on RD. And indeed, as we see from the roundup of responses below, evangelical voices from across the spectrum have expressed everything from shock to bitterness to a public renunciation of the faith tradition they had considered their own.
As our sensibilities are further pummeled in the run-up to inauguration day, will we see divisions deepen? One thing is certain: the sense of betrayal expressed here so powerfully demands a response.
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#ElectionNight taught me that white evangelicals will NOT be denied their privilege. They will trample the cross to hold onto it.
— M.DivA, 100% Intelligent Black Child (@sista_theology) November 9, 2016
I drafted my divorce papers with evangelicalism a long time ago.
Tonight I serve them.
— Brandi Miller (@BrandiNico) November 9, 2016
Katelyn Beaty, an editor at Christianity Today, wrote in the Washington Post:
When it comes to the Bible and Jesus and evangelism and service, the 81 percent and I share the same DNA. Although recently I have wished it were otherwise, evangelicals are my people. But this time, this election, I can’t defend my people. I barely recognize them.
Privilege was also more important than justice to the religious group who crucified Jesus. Congrats, white evangelicals. You're Pharisees. https://t.co/slG0pwrtxb
— Antoine A (@sofanias315) November 10, 2016
By the way, white evangelicals I see you. I see your racism and sexism. I see your repudiation of the very values you said matter.
— Leslie D. Callahan (@fifthpastor) November 9, 2016
Reporter Sam Thielman wrote at The Guardian:
White American evangelicals, who produced me, and among whom I must count myself, have thoroughly demonstrated how little we care about our representation of Christ to the world, how gleefully willing we are to put our own interests and grievances above the teachings of Jesus. And we have done that where we always do it: in the voting booth.
White evangelicals:you've decisively proven that you love your whiteness more than you love your black & brown brothers & sisters in Christ.
— Yolanda Pierce (@YNPierce) November 9, 2016
So I guess I'm not an evangelical.
Because I'm not whatever the hell this is.
— Preston Yancey (@prestonyancey) November 9, 2016
Pastor and author Skye Jethani expressed on his website:
Look at what you have become—little more than a political identity with a pinch of impotent cultural Christianity. You’ve become a category for pollsters rather than pastors, a word of exclusion rather than embrace…What was admirable about your name has been buried, crushed under the weight of 60 million votes. I am no less committed to Christ, his gospel, and his church, but I can no longer be called an evangelical.
And this is the last day I identify as evangelical. (Not that anyone cares, but I do).
— D.L. Mayfield (@d_l_mayfield) November 9, 2016
If this is evangelicalism–I am out. #election2016 #Evangelicals Tony–you win. https://t.co/orlIWNcgfU
— John Fea (@JohnFea1) November 9, 2016
