On Thursday, February 6th, 2025, President Donald J. Trump issued an executive order titled "Eradicating Anti-Christian Bias," which establishes a task force to investigate and prosecute what he calls "anti-Christian violence" in the United States of America. Throughout the order the Trump administration appeals to the romantic notion of "religious liberty," but the task force is directed against the supposed enemies of only one religion, which just so happens to be the dominant religion in the United States and throughout the Western world. 

 

Trump cites two examples of this supposed ‘anti-Christian bigotry.’ The first is the prosecution of anti-abortion activists who physically blockaded an abortion clinic, quite literally interfering with access to medical care for vulnerable people. (Trump later pardoned these people.)

 

Trump's second example is the very existence of transgender people. He cites the Biden administration recognizing March 31, 2024, which happened to fall on Easter Sunday, as Transgender Day of Visibility, as an example of “anti-Christian government.” (For reference, TDoV has been observed on March 31st since 2009, and the date of Easter changes every year.) There are no examples of transgender people doing anything to Christians other than fighting to have their pronouns and identities respected, and this is what the Trump administration and its supporters consider "violence" against Christians. 

 

We the undersigned, as Christians of various traditions representing both clergy and laity, reject the Trump administration's dangerous and Christian-supremacist executive order. 

 

We wish to state unequivocally that anyone using the name of Christianity to block their fellow citizens from accessing lifesaving medical care does not represent Christianity, so prosecuting them for breaking the law cannot be an attack on Christianity.

 

We affirm that the existence of transgender people and their fight for the right to live freely as their true selves cannot be construed in any way as an assault on Christianity. To claim otherwise is a vicious and bigoted attack not only on transgender people, but on all of Christendom, as it casts us all as inherently antagonistic towards trans people. Millions of Christians around the world already love and respect our transgender siblings. There are many Christians who are themselves transgender. You do not speak for us.

 

It is a critical time for America, socially, economically, politically, and religiously. The American electorate voted in an administration that seems hell-bent on attacking anyone who does not fit their narrow idea of American citizenship, which is centered on white, cisgender, heterosexual, conservative Christian men.

A 2021 Guardian article used religious affiliation data and interviews with several political scientists to conclude that the decline in American Christianity, especially among younger people, is tied directly to hateful, far-right, homophobic and transphobic policies pushed by the Republican Party and its close association with Christianity. This is exactly what they want–Trump and his ilk want their hateful version of Christianity to be the only version of Christianity. They want to push those of us who take parables like The Sheep and the Goats–the idea that to feed the hungry, welcome the stranger, heal the sick, and love the prisoner, is to do all those things to Christ Himself–out of Christianity so that they, and they alone, can claim to speak for Christ.

 

We refuse to let them. 

 

In our vision of Christianity, LGBTQ+ people are made in God’s image just as much as anyone else.

 

In our vision of Christianity, immigrants are welcome everywhere, whether they have documents or not. 

 

In our vision of Christianity, “pro-life” means abolishing the death penalty and providing lifesaving medical care to all of our neighbors, no matter the cost. 

 

In our vision of Christianity, when Jesus told us to love our neighbors as ourselves, He meant it.

 

American Christians face a choice between these two visions of Christianity. On the one hand, justice and love and equality; on the other, bigotry and bullying and pretend-victimhood.

 

We, the undersigned, proudly choose the vision of justice. 

 

If the Trump administration is truly interested in protecting Christianity, we suggest that they pursue policies related to feeding the hungry, healing the sick, welcoming the stranger, and fostering unity and love between all the people living in this land.

 

As Christians, we must continue to love our neighbors as Christ taught us to.  We therefore publicly reject and denounce Donald Trump's executive order in the strongest terms.

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​Signed,

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~Red Star Ministry Central Committee

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~John-Marc Ormechea, Aspirant for Unitarian Universalist Ministy

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~Gabriel Requadt, United Church of Christ

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~Rev. Morgan Guyton, LPC

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~David W. Congdon, PhD, University Press of Kansas, member of the Episcopal Church

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~Rev. Charley Earp, Chicago area chaplain

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~Rev. Dr. Clint McCann, Eden Seminary, StL, MO

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~Kathryn Olson

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~The Rev. Mark Andrew Jones, BSG

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~Carol Waymack, MD, longtime member of Woodland Park United Methodist Church, Seattle, WA

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