Pushing back against the Dark Ages

The results of yesterday's midterm elections show a division in America between urban/suburban residents and those who live in rural areas. Rural voters are solid in their support for Donald Trump.

It is often mentioned that it is confusing to the outsider that deeply religious voters who have long considered themselves to be for decency and "family values" can support a man who is so blatantly and unapologetically sinful. A man who is obviously not well-versed in any religion. A bullying blowhard from NEW YORK CITY, of all places. One would think he might as well be from Sodom.

The answer given by Trump's devotees is that, just as He chose bad boy King David to rule over Israel, God chose Donald Trump to deliver the United States from evil. (One unanswered question is why only presidents the religious right approves of are chosen by God. God apparently has His own version of "executive time," during which he lets things slide.)

We in the West have often marveled that the various kinds of Muslim seem to be fighting over events that happened (if they did happen) many centuries ago. Well, it seems that most of our rural Americans are living in pre-scientific darkness. They are still under the impression that natural events are signs from the Almighty praising or condemning things that humans are, or are not, doing. (I applaud the work that the evangelical Christian climate scientist Katharine Hayhoe is doing to try to shift that view, and I wish her success.)

But really, I again blame the habits of thought that religion reinforces in our already too irrational minds. I have said that theology is the attempt to find excuses for one's belief in things that are glaringly not true. And I have also said that if you want someone to commit some unspeakable act, the best way is often to convince that person, or those people, that God wants them to do it.

The truth is that our most religious citizens have talked themselves into believing that one of the most vile men in American public life is favored by God. Without God's guidance, they would never be able to justify supporting this man.

God does not work in mysterious ways, but the human mind certainly does.