On Tuesday (Jan. 21), President Donald Trump went to church for the second time in two days, but it was the first time he actually sat through a sermon in a long time. And he didn’t like it.
Near the end of the sermon during the Washington National Cathedral’s inauguration worship service, Episcopal Bishop Mariann Budde of the Diocese of Washington, D.C., urged Trump to “have mercy upon the people in our country who are scared now.” She specifically mentioned LGBTQ children and migrant workers.
“Our God teaches us that we are to be merciful to the stranger for we all once were strangers in this land,” she added. “May God grant us the strength and courage to honor the dignity of every human being, speak the truth to one another in love, and walk humbly with each other and our God for the good of all people in this nation and in the world.”
Trump sat stone-faced during the plea while Vice President J.D. Vance gave a side-eye and others nearby looked uncomfortable. Asked about the service afterward as he returned to the White House, Trump criticized it: “Not too exciting, was it? I didn’t think it was a good service, no. Thank you very much. They can do, they can do much better.” He later took to social media to blast Budde as a “so-called bishop” and “a Radical Left hard line Trump hater” who was “nasty in tone, and not compelling or smart.” He added, “She and her church owe the public an apology.”
A bunch of Trumpian pundits, preachers, and politicians also attacked Budde for standing up for LGBTQ children and undocumented immigrants. Her conservative critics apparently just learned that Episcopalians exist! But beyond just being upset that some Christians are liberal, many of the criticisms seemed to imply the church and Budde should have focused on supporting Trump and helping build national unity behind his agenda.
Trumpian activist Charlie Kirk, who has been working to get pastors involved with Republican politicking in churches, argued Budde “disgraced herself” with her “embarrassment” of a sermon. He apparently thought she should’ve had a different focus, insisting she had been “given a great honor today, a chance to unify America around a Christian message at the dawn of a new administration.” Todd Starnes, a culture war pundit who managed to get fired by Fox News and the Southern Baptist Convention’s Baptist Press, said the Washington National Cathedral “has become a Sanctuary of Satan” and urged Christians to “avoid attending any events at such a godless evil place.” And blogger and podcaster Matt Walsh attacked Budde’s spirituality and appearance: “Just take one look at this witch and you know everything you need to know about her, even before she starts talking.” All I got was Episcopalian given the robe, but he added later he was labeling Budde, a heterosexual married mother of two, as a lesbian.
“The National Cathedral is going to need an exorcism after this,” added William Wolfe, who served in the first Trump administration and now leads a group trying to make the Southern Baptist Convention more conservative and Trumpian.
Several MAGAchurch preachers joined in. Rob Pacienza, senior pastor of Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church in Florida which was founded by the late Religious Right leader D. James Kennedy, criticized Budde for deciding to “lecture the president” and “explicitly promote a secular worldview and woke agenda.” He then added that her sermon showed “the heresy that has taken over mainline Protestantism.” Robert Jeffress, pastor of First Baptist Church in Dallas and a strident Trump backer, similarly blasted Budde for having “insulted rather than encouraged our great president.” Franklin Graham, who the previous day offered partisan remarks for the invocation at Trump’s inauguration, decided Budde was the one who went too far. He claimed the cathedral is run “by people I would call gay activists” and urged Trump to “avoid that place at all costs because they don’t represent the churches of America.” And Trumpian musician Sean Feucht attacked Budde from inside the cathedral after the service for doing Satan’s work in leading a “woke” church. Insisting it “was not a church service” because of Budde’s remarks, he said he would gather some people together to “have a real church service” to “lift up the name of Jesus because we are one nation under God.”
President Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance (left) attend the national prayer service at the Washington National Cathedral in Washington, D.C., on Jan. 21, 2025. (Jack Jenkins/Religion News Service)
Rep. Mark Harris, a Southern Baptist pastor in North Carolina whose previous attempt to enter Congress was thrown out due to his campaign’s election fraud, offered what he thought was a good retort, judging the sermon based on how people vote in a secular election: “This kind of underhanded wokeness was rejected at the ballot box by Americans. Completely disgraceful.” Like many critics, Rep. Diana Harshbarger of Tennessee insisted Budde’s job was supposed to be to unify the nation behind Trump — and she joined others in doubting Budde’s religious credentials because she disagreed with Budde’s comments.
“Well, this morning’s prayer service was going great until the ‘reverend’ decided to go woke,” Harshbarger wrote. “This was supposed to be a prayer service about our country and the new leadership under President Trump, but it was radically politicized. This is not the way to unify a nation.”
Not to be outdone, Rep. Mike Collins of Georgia posted a clip of Budde preaching with the caption, “The person giving this sermon should be added to the deportation list.” So we have a U.S. congressman wanting to deport a U.S. citizen born in New Jersey for exercising her First Amendment rights to both free speech and free exercise of religion while in a church. So much for religious liberty!
What the Bishop & Her Critics Share
The online mob of criticism toward Budde clearly demonstrates the bravery she demonstrated in offering even a gentle but clear rebuke of some of Trump’s policies. The responses by a bunch of pundits, preachers, and politicians pushing Christian Nationalism also reveal a couple of things about that ideology.
First, Christian Nationalism has no place for a prophetic church. The purpose of Christianity in Christian Nationalism is to serve the state power. Budde violated the expectations of Christian Nationalism by attempting to offer a prophetic word instead of merely massaging the leader. That’s why Trump went to the service; he wanted a godly veneer added to his presidency to aid his political agenda.
Second, the responses to Budde show that Christian Nationalism is only ever about privileging a narrow slice of Christianity. It’s not that those pushing the ideology want Christianity in general to be established; they just want their brand of Christianity in power. Thus, a seminary-educated minister with over three decades of pastoral experience and in a prominent position of leadership in a significant denomination is cast out as not just unAmerican but even unChristian. Even her entire denomination is rejected as not American or Christian enough and thus targeted for discrimination like nonbelievers or those of other faiths. Which is ironic since it’s the Episcopal Church.
Budde’s denomination — and the Washington National Cathedral specifically — have long advanced Christian Nationalism. In fact, that’s the only reason Trump showed up at the cathedral on Tuesday. The cathedral created its inauguration prayer service as part of its efforts to mix church and state. That’s why Beau Underwood and I addressed these services and other aspects of the Washington National Cathedral in Baptizing America as we documented how mainline Protestants helped build Christian Nationalism.
Tuesday’s service was actually no different until the very end of Budde’s sermon. The service was chock-full of Christian Nationalism. The music included lots of patriotic tunes to conflate God and country, like “God Bless America,” “America the Beautiful,” “My Country ’Tis of Thee,” and “God of Our Fathers.” The latter was written by an Episcopal priest and released by the Episcopal Church to celebrate the centennial of the U.S. Constitution. Much of the music was performed by the United States Marine Chamber Orchestra, thus bringing together church and the military to celebrate the U.S. and a new presidency. The livestream controlled by the cathedral highlighted the U.S. flag flying in the sanctuary, such as during the singing of the National Anthem. Various clergy members offered prayers for Trump and others in his administration that they might do God’s will in office.
Screengrab from the Washington National Cathedral’s livestream of the National Anthem during its national prayer service in Washington, D.C., on Jan. 21, 2025.
None of that came as a surprise. That’s standard Christian Nationalistic flare for the Washington National Cathedral and its inauguration services. What was different was Budde’s sermon. Eight years ago, they didn’t include a sermon because Trump requested there not be one. Budde admitted afterward that a lot of people had criticized her and the cathedral since it seemed “as if the church had surrendered its responsibility to preach truth to power.” But, she added at the time, she thought the president should get such a say and the service was “not the occasion that we will use to address particular issues of policy or concerns we might have about the direction he’s taking the country.” She clearly changed her mind this time, and it was for the better. Now, we just need her and the cathedral to also deconstruct their own Christian Nationalism.
Budde’s important word might endanger the cathedral’s tradition of inaugural services, which would also be a good development to help them walk away from their role in pushing Christian Nationalism. Some people even suggested the cathedral not invite Trump but instead hold a protest service like they did for Richard Nixon’s second inauguration. But instead, there was Trump in the front row being blessed (other than the last couple of minutes of the sermon).
Eight years ago, Trump heard a pro-Trump sermon at St. John’s Episcopal Church and attended a sermonless service at the Washington National Cathedral, both full of Christian Nationalism and blessing his presidency. This year, St. John’s skipped the sermon because of criticism, thus again hosting power while biting its tongue. But Budde and the cathedral spoke up for those already being targeted by Trump in executive orders before he stepped into the sanctuary. With that, she proved we don’t need a “national” cathedral; we need prophetic preaching.
As a public witness,
Brian Kaylor
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