How to speak Christian truth to political power

Really, what the majority of Moore’s statements have in common (apart from being, well, correct — at least according to traditional, values-first Christian teaching) is that they might offend those being criticized, the president-elect included. That, in turn, might result in — gasp — a loss of political power.

And that’s what his Christian critics seem to be responding to. “He’s going to have no access, basically, to President Trump,” was the observation of one of the pastors considering yanking Moore’s funding. Because — and how did we miss this? — access is now the end goal of Christians in Washington.

The thing is, even when religious groups have bowed and kowtowed enough to think they have the ear of a president, it rarely works out as expected: Christian leaders who think that having access means that they’ll be taken seriously when it comes to policymaking have been disappointed, including during the tenures of self-declared Christian presidents like the evangelical George W. Bush or Barack Obama. David Kuo, the now-deceased deputy director of the Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives under Bush, recalled in 2006 how quickly his office dropped down the president’s list of priorities. Evangelical ethicist David Gushee, who was in frequent contact with Obama’s team, called the president’s advisers “useful idiots.” Under President-elect Trump, it’s hard to imagine that the results would be any better.