It is unclear to most what President Donald Trump was trying to say when he turned tear gas on protesters outside of the White House, and then, with the assistance of the Secret Service walked across a park to St. John’s Church to hold a Bible in the air.
The gesture was another dramatic attempt to distract from the failures of his presidency and his feckless leadership. Twitter users immediately responded.
READ MORE: Trump declares he’s president of law, order amid protests
One poster compared it to The Triumph of the Will, a 1935 Nazi propaganda film. The theme of the film was to show Germany as a great power. It was also supposed to show the nation, Adolf Hitler, as their leader, would bring glory to the nation.
What in the Triumph of Will is this. https://t.co/wDSFwzhes1
— Hayes Brown (@HayesBrown) June 2, 2020
Spoiler alert: He didn’t.
Other comparisons to Hitler were shared including a split-screen of Trump holding the Bible in the air, juxtaposed to the Nazi leader doing the same, however, the image of Hitler holding a bible is actually photoshopped.
Was trump waving a #Bible today ? pic.twitter.com/4gkjz889QE
— AltBlueOhio (@StickerDeep) June 2, 2020
Social media users seemed to be in consensus that the sacred text should not have been used as a prop. They also were confused by officials firing rubber bullets and tear gas on peaceful protesters for the president’s impromptu photo-op.
Religion should not be used as a political tool. The bible should not be used as a prop.#Trump pic.twitter.com/ciS8E9qOiS
— It’s ‘Anderona’ (@_Its_AColeWorld) June 2, 2020
St. John’s Church had recently suffered a fire in the basement where a Sunday School daycare was previously housed. Yet he did not address meeting the needs of that sacred space. In fact, no one associated with the church knew that he was coming or understood why the visit was made.
Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde, the Episcopal Bishop of Washington, seemed perplexed when interviewed on MSNBC, “If he had come to offer words of solace, healing, and resolve … that would have been an appropriate use of the sacred symbol of walking across the park to the church. But, he did none of those things.”
Bishop Budde on President Trump’s visit: “If he had come to offer words of solace and healing and resolve, to bind the wounds of our nation, that would have been an appropriate use of the sacred symbol of walking across the park to the church. But he did none of those things” pic.twitter.com/Szh9VCxaj1
— MSNBC (@MSNBC) June 2, 2020
On CNN’s New Day with Alisyn Camerota and John Berman, when asked if “the president is a frequent visitor to St. John?” Bishop Budde answered swiftly.
“No. He is not a man of prayer on Sunday morning,” she revealed. “And he has not gone to worship at St. John or regularly at any of the churches in our diocese.”
“Let me be clear. He did not come to pray,” the bishop noted.
Bishop Budde serves as the spiritual leader for 88 Episcopal congregations and ten Episcopal schools in the District of Columbia and four Maryland counties and the first woman elected to this position. She also serves as the chair and president of the Protestant Episcopal Cathedral Foundation, overseeing the ministries of the Washington National Cathedral and Cathedral schools.
Earlier on Monday, Trump said, “I will fight to protect you. I am your President of law and order and an ally of peaceful protesters.”
Bishop Budde disputes that.
She says, “He did nothing to say to them [the protesters] that your future is before you and I will protect you and do all that we can to make this country worthy of you.”
“[He did not do] all the things that we need and deserve from anyone who is leadership, spiritual or political at this time.”
READ MORE: Trump slams governors as ‘weak,’ urges crackdown on protests
ABC News reporter Terry Moran took to Twitter to match the presidential Bible-thumping, with some actual scripture, quoting the Gospel of Matthew, Chapter 6.
Posing with a Bible.
Matthew 6:5-6
“And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by others…When you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen.” pic.twitter.com/NGp1ff06kU
— Terry Moran (@TerryMoran) June 1, 2020
Standing in front of St. John’s Church, Trump held the sacred text aloft in a moment that was so inflammatory that CNN called it “gaslighting.”
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