WashU Expert: Trump’s Papal Attack Plays on Longstanding Fears of White Protestants
At The Source, Gerry Everding writes that according Marie Griffith, director of the John C. Danforth Center on Religion and Politics, Donald Trump’s recent verbal attack on Pope Francis appeals to deep-seated fears held by some religious groups. “His comments are calculated to build his following among several subsets of religiously inspired voters,” Griffith said, “including those conservative Catholics who spurn the Pope’s message about economic justice, evangelicals who think no one should presume to know another person’s heart or question their faith, and anti-Catholic fundamentalists who still associate the Pope with the Antichrist.”