Nearly 200 evangelical leaders condemned Christianity Today’s editorial calling for the removal of President Trump, which “offensively questioned the spiritual integrity and Christian witness of tens-of-millions of believers who take seriously their civic and moral obligations,” they wrote to the magazine’s president.
Christianity Today, one of the nation’s top Christian magazine publications called for the removal of Trump on Thursday, one day after the House of Representatives passed two articles of impeachment against him.
The letter to Timothy Dalrymple, the president of the magazine, also condemned the editorial for dismissing evangelicals who oppose its views as “far-right,” the Christian Post reported.
“We are, in fact, not ‘far-right’ evangelicals as characterized by the author,” the letter said. “Rather, we are Bible-believing Christians and patriotic Americans who are simply grateful that our president has sought our advice as his administration has advanced policies that protect the unborn, promote religious freedom, reform our criminal justice system, contribute to strong working families through paid family leave, protect the freedom of conscience, prioritize parental rights, and ensure that our foreign policy aligns with our values while making our world safer, including through our support of the State of Israel.”
The letter continued: “We are not theocrats and we recognize that our imperfect political system is a reflection of the fallen world within which we live, reliant upon the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, which is freely given to sinner and saint, alike. We are proud to be numbered among those in history who, like Jesus, have been pretentiously accused of having too much grace for tax collectors and sinners, and we take deeply our personal responsibility to render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s — our public service.”
The editorial has faced severe rebuke from many Trump supporters.
Jenna Ellis, a senior legal adviser for the Trump 2020 campaign, slammed the magazine in an op-ed for the Washington Examiner as being run by “pious ‘Never Trumpers’ who feel morally justified…in a self-serving desire to be proven right…”
The editorial was widely celebrated by the left and crashed its website.
“We want CT to be a place that welcomes Christians from across the political spectrum, and reminds everyone that politics is not the end and purpose of our being,” Christianity Today editor-in-chief Mark Galli wrote in the editorial titled “Trump Should Be Removed From Office.” “That said, we do feel it necessary from time to time to make our own opinions on political matters clear—always, as Graham encouraged us, doing so with both conviction and love. We love and pray for our president, as we love and pray for leaders (as well as ordinary citizens) on both sides of the political aisle.”
Galli defended the scathing editorial on Sunday.
He said in an interview with CBS’ “Face The Nation” that Trump’s support of causes important to the evangelical community can no longer excuse his actions in other areas and said the president is “morally unfit” to occupy the Oval Office.
“I am making a moral judgment that he is morally unfit or, even more precisely, it’s his public morality that makes him unfit,” Galli said.