Sorry for the pile-on, ScoMo and Trump, but by Jesus, you send women a warped view of religion (2024)

It was the gilt that struck me first. Shiny gold doors inlaid with an ornate pattern, glinting in the background of a photo of a beaming Donald Trump with a grinning Scott Morrison. Gold, money, success. Or, the appearance of money, the appearance of success.

An image of an ostentatious, moneyed Manhattan, far, far from Sydney’s Sutherland Shire, that our former prime minister appeared thrilled to be briefly part of. Proudly posting the photo on X, he said he was “pleased” to meet Trump at his “private residence”, the penthouse in Trump Tower: “It was nice to catch up again, especially given the pile-on he is currently dealing with in the US.”

Now, let’s just briefly put aside using the term “pile-on” for four indictments amounting to 88 felony charges, and a criminal trial that aired allegations of hush money paid to a p*rn star, one who claims she spanked Trump’s bottom with a rolled-up magazine – to talk about these optics.

Two men, in suits. Two men of scant self-doubt who believe God chose them to lead their countries. Two men courting American evangelicals.

Our former PM is in the US on tour for his new book, titled Plans For Your Good: A Prime Minister’s Testimony of God’s Faithfulness, one that appears to be aimed at inserting himself into the American evangelical scene. Former vice president Mike Pence, who wrote the foreword, said: “Christians around the world will be inspired by his story and his example of trusting God no matter the circ*mstances.”

Morrison’s decision to publicise a meeting with Trump in this way serves as a reminder of how many white evangelicals support a man known for his mendacity, grandiosity and insistence that the last US election was stolen, a man a jury found to have raped a woman, a man who boasted about grabbing “puss*es” whenever he felt like it, and who has sledged veterans, people with disabilities, Mexicans, Muslims and a Fox News host who had “blood coming out of her wherever”. How do we explain this to our daughters?

The photo of Trump and Morrison was a neat depiction of the brotherhood of Christian nationalism, and a reminder of why so many people outside the church associate Christianity with conservatism and a pursuit of power, even now with men like Trump whose alleged lovers tell courts they don’t like wearing condoms when they cheat on their wives, but proudly, strategically take credit for the Supreme Court’s dismantling of women’s reproductive rights. Who hurl slurs at opponents, condemn foreigners and turn backs on migrants. Who don’t appear to have, say, read the Bible, the whole “do unto others as they would do unto you” and look-after-the poor-and-the-vulnerable stuff.

I was especially struck by that image this week when the grandson of lifelong Baptist Jimmy Carter informed us that the 99-year-old former president was “coming to the end”. Carter has long been touted as an average president who fumbled the 1979 hostage crisis but as an excellent ex-president; whatever his flaws, or the merits of his politics, he was a man who united, a humanitarian who supported the civil rights movements and connected faith to compassion, decency and goodness.

Carter’s moderate beliefs seem almost archaic today, as swaths of American evangelicals have become more fundamentalist. After he left office, he stood up to his conservative fellow Christians with significant courage. In a 2009 essay, “Losing my religion for equality”, the former peanut farmer publicly condemned the Southern Baptist Convention, of which he had been a member for 65 years, and a key part of the white evangelical voting bloc. Carter told the SBC: “Women and girls have been discriminated against for too long in a twisted interpretation of the word of God.”

He said he had made the “painful and difficult” decision to sever ties with the SBC after its leaders, “quoting a few carefully selected Bible verses and claiming that Eve was created second to Adam and was responsible for original sin, ordained that women must be ‘subservient’ to their husbands and prohibited from serving as deacons, pastors or chaplains in the military service”. He continued: “The truth is that male religious leaders have had – and still have – an option to interpret holy teachings either to exalt or subjugate women. They have, for their own selfish ends, overwhelmingly chosen the latter. Their continuing choice provides the foundation or justification for much of the pervasive persecution and abuse of women throughout the world.”

The 2009 essay went viral again in 2015. The SBC is still fighting about women, keeping them out of leadership.

In the 1970s, Christian voters supported Carter – at least at first; now they support Trump. More than three-quarters of white evangelicals backed Trump in 2016, and again in 2020, and about half believe he is a leader appointed by God. A leader not known for deep respect for women.

A host of thinkers have tried to figure out why evangelicals cling so firmly to Trump, especially during this recent criminal trial. Supporters paint him as a martyr being crucified by public opinion and a beleaguered Christian crusader. At the same time, others are puzzling over why there has been such a steady stream of people leaving the church, with a steep decline in church membership – including in the SBC – and why women have so little trust in religious institutions run by men.

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Research just published by Macquarie University found one in three women voters in Australia have “no trust at all” in religious leaders, and that this proportion jumped to one in two among women aged 18 to 29. And, interestingly: among religious women, the study found about 10 per cent have “no trust at all” in organised religion and religious leaders – and about 50 per cent had “not very much trust”. This is the fault of the leaders.

There are so many good, decent people in churches, caring for others, trying to make a decent fist out of life, trying not to fall apart, trying to find meaning. By all accounts, Jimmy Carter was one of them. If he had been able to convince his peers to treat women as equals, we might see more glimpses of a world in which insulting and controlling them is not seen as somehow compatible with a religion intended to be about love.

Julia Baird is a journalist, author and regular columnist. Her latest book is Bright Shining: how grace changes everything.