The former president’s supporters have said his survival is a sign of divine intervention — and his White House destiny.
“Surviving an assassination attempt just confirms for these folks everything they say and believe…that he is God’s chosen to bring salvation to the United States and to the world,” said Matthew Sutton, a Washington State University historian of American religion who focuses on apocalyptic Christianity and politics.
Sutton said the evangelicals’ focus on political power began building after the Second World War, as religion was injected more directly into campaigns and platforms. It continued as White evangelical leaders such as Jerry Falwell in the late 1970s and early 1980s pushed for the U.S. government to adopt their socially conservative values on topics from abortion to race and protection from competing non-Christian religions. That decades-long effort didn’t stem the rise of secularism and moves toward same-sex marriage and women’s rights, adding up to a feeling among some present-day evangelicals that Trump is their last chance.
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