The Battle for Bonhoeffer

by Stephen R. Haynes

I think Amy Sullivan said it best when she wrote that Trump is “pretty much the human embodiment of the question ‘What would Jesus not do?’ ”3 Indeed, Trump’s personal mottoes—“always get even” and “hit back harder than you were hit”—represent the antitheses of Jesus’s own, which were “blessed are the merciful” and “love your neighbor as yourself.” Furthermore, neither his stable of evangelical advisers nor his White House handlers have had any success in controlling the flow of evidence that Trump’s character is animated by the least Christian of qualities—self-aggrandizement, enrichment at the expense of others, getting away with whatever one can, seeking to humiliate others, and spreading hate and suspicion.