President Donald Trump delivered a State of the Union address peppered with religious references and ideas on Tuesday evening (Feb. 4), laying out a sweeping vision for the United States that evoked old (and contested) religious ideas and catered directly to conservative Christians who make up his base of support.
The president made several appeals to faith throughout his annual speech to the nation and the U.S. Congress, some of which appear to be targeted at specific demographics. Here are a few.
Roughly halfway through his speech, Trump outlined his opposition to abortion through a mixture of story and theology. He pointed out the presence of Ellie Schneider and her mother, Robin, in the crowd, explaining that the 2-year-old Ellie was born premature at just 21 weeks in 2017 — but was saved “through the skill of her doctors and the prayers of her parents.”
Her story was framed in two ways: as an argument for granting additional government funding for neonatal research, and against abortion.
“Ellie reminds us that every child is a miracle of life,” Trump said, adding that he is asking Congress to pass legislation “finally banning the late-term abortion of babies.”
He then invoked the Almighty as a potentially unifying force for lawmakers: “Whether we are Republican, Democrat or independent, surely we must all agree that every human life is a sacred gift from God.”
The lines echo his rhetoric in other recent speeches when he referenced abortion, particularly when addressing conservative Christians. In January, he spoke at an evangelical church in Miami to kick off his “Evangelicals for Trump” campaign initiative, repeating his opposition to abortion and declaring to the group of Christian conservatives that he believes “we have God on our side.”
President Donald Trump speaks at the March for Life rally Jan. 24, 2020, on the National Mall in Washington. (AP Photo/Patrick Semansky)
A few weeks later, Trump delivered a speech at the March for Life, an annual anti-abortion gathering in Washington, where he told the crowd of thousands, “When we see the image of a baby in the womb, we glimpse the majesty of God’s creation.”
The president also lifted up what he described as his administration’s dedication to religious freedom, including the right to pray in schools.
“My administration is also defending religious liberty, and that includes the constitutional right to pray in public schools,” he said. “In America, we don’t punish prayer. We don’t tear down crosses. We don’t ban symbols of faith. We don’t muzzle preachers and pastors. In America, we celebrate faith, we cherish religion, we lift our voices in prayer, and we raise our sights to the glory of God.”
Advocating for prayer in public schools has long been a hallmark of the religious right, which has spent decades insisting that teachers and administrators should be allowed to lead students in prayer. Despite a series of Supreme Court decisions generally outlawing the practice — including a 2000 decision that banned school districts from sponsoring student-led prayers at football games — a 2019 Pew Research survey found that while orisons in public schools are rare, they still occur: 8% of teenage public school students said they have ever had a teacher lead their class in prayer, a number that rises to 12% in the South.
The issue of religious liberty has become a rallying cry among Christian conservatives in recent years as well, particularly surrounding issues of same-sex marriage, abortion and contraception, which many religious conservatives oppose. The concept has also been invoked by conservative activists who argue that barring faith leaders and groups from formally endorsing candidates — a move that would violate their tax-exempt status — impinges on their religious freedom (or as Trump put it, “muzzles” them). Hence Trump’s 2017 executive order “promoting free speech and religious liberty” that curtailed the enforcement of such laws.
Source: Religion News Service
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