Christianity is splintering along racial and ethnic lines in the U.S. It's fair to say that President Trump and his policies are particularly unique in history, and so it's hard to be neutral or nonchalant about him and his administration. So it is particularly interesting to see Christian positions on Trump because it reveals us--Christians--to ourselves, particularly when we accept or disapprove of the Ethics of the Trump administration.

Ethics reflect values, and values reflect belief systems or religion. When there is a divergence in how we assess ethics among Christian demographics, it means that our values are different, and divergent values imply religious differences. This is another way of saying that though we all may call ourselves Christians, we can't all be Christians and feel so differently about Trump's ethics. Either one side is wrong and the other right, or maybe "Christian" is a meaningless term and Trump has exposed that.

The Pew Research Center has some numbers on Trump's approval among Christians.
Trump's approval among adults: 59% Disapprove and 40 approve
72% of White Evangelicals approve of Pres. Trump compared to 10% of Black Protestants.
51% of White Catholics approve of Pres. Trump compared to 26% of Hispanic Catholics.

Now, approval can very much be about politics, economy, and culture, and so not necessarily an issue in itself. But here's the troubling data.

They asked about the ethical standards of top Trump administration officials. Let's refer to it as "Trump."
34% of White Evangelicals rate "Trump's" ethics as excellent and another 35% rate the ethics as good. That's 69%.
4% of Black Protestants rate "Trump's" ethics as excellent and 5% as good. 63% see it as poor.
For White Catholics, 23% see "Trump's" ethics as excellent and 26% as good. (49%)
For Hispanic Catholics, 10% see "Trump's" ethics as excellent and 15% as good.

There is a clear divergence based on race and ethnicity (these categories work differently in other countries). The assessment of ethics is key. If there is a divergence on how we all view the ethics of the Trump administration, it has to go far beyond simple politics, culture, or economic issues. Differing assessments of Trump's ethics imply different values and religions. There are no longer transcendent values that fundamentally hold the Christian community together. What's disturbing is that because of the influence of the US, these forms of Christianity are being exported around the globe at an alarming rate.

Denominational differences have defined the landscape of Christianity in the past few centuries. But, in the past few decades, there are new differences that have emerged that seem to cut just as deep. All this does raise the question of Christian unity. The issue of Christian unity is a pressing issue for only one reason: Jesus prayed that his disciples be one. But what does that mean? Or maybe the question is who really are his disciples (those who are to be one)? Does discipleship identification rest primarily on self- identification, or is it that those who are true disciples and are the ones who are unified in perhaps some unidentifiable way known only to God? The stats above, coupled with denominational differences, show that Christian unity or the prospect for unity is virtually impossible.

President Trump has driven the kind of wedge in Christianity that may be impossible to overcome. Or maybe he is exposing a wedge that was there all along. Maybe we all just have to admit that our differing ethics reflect differing values, which in turn reveal that we "Christians" aren't all of the same religion. Maybe "Christianity" is simply some sociological umbrella term that masks the canyons between vastly different religious streams that make some claim to the Christ figure. Maybe we who claim to follow Christ should realize that the true disciples who should be those (whoever they are) are bound together in spirit and transcend these differences (but we are not all the true disciples). If so, then all that's left to us is to strive for righteousness and pray that we are among the true disciples.  (P.S. "true disciple" as I speak of it, is not the equivalent of not going to Hell)

One moment in history that haunts me is the death of the great scientist (proto-scientist), Archimedes (287-212 BC). Archimedes was one of the most brilliant humans ever to live. He famously solved a volume displacement problem in the baths an ran through the streets shouting "Eureka!" He also uncovered physical laws about and speculated about things like levers, screws, mirrors, and a whole lot more. He said to have said, "Give me a place to stand and I'll move the earth," referring to his law of levering. 

I'd always heard that Archimedes was killed by a drunken Roman soldier. Maybe the soldier wasn't drunk. Either way, he was killed by a soldier. The armed man was either angered by Archimede's refusal to follow him to the king because the thinker was working on a problem in the dust. "Do not disturb my circles," he said. Or the soldier thought Archimedes's instruments were valuable plunder and killed for them. Either way, one of history's most brilliant men died at the hands of a man with limited education, who by a sword and by the state, weilded power, and who did not appreciate the genius before him.

("Death of Archimedes" 1766, by François-Philippe Charpentier, after Ciro Ferri, in the National Gallery of Art)

Well, the world has gone on and Archimedes has slipped into historical legend along with many greats in our intellectual history. However, one wonders what brilliant thing might he have envisioned if he lived longer. Does it matter? Does the life of any one man matter? Maybe it does, maybe it doesn't. But what if history and human flourishing is contingent on nodes of development and insight that spur new ways of thinking? A special insight at just the right moment in history could change the course of peoples, nations, public health, public education, science, international policy, ethics, etc. We would never know. But to have such hope die because of common rage feels like throwing pearls to swine.

(Btw, who knows how many Archimedes, Einsteins, Da Vincis, are dying or suffering or being turned away at the border; or wasting away in impoverishment. To be clear, each and every life wasted and underdeveloped is a crucial opportunity cost for the world.)

The elite class (intellectual and cultural elites, not the societally and financially wealthy class), I see as a version of Archimedes. They are arrogant and perhaps too self assured. But human history is driven by these people because ideas have consequences. For instance, it is not an exaggeration to say that Alexander the Great changed the course of world history . . . with his sword. Yet, the lesser know fact is that he was the pupil of one of the greatest philosophers, Aristotle. Christianity flourishes because educated elites (Paul, Luke, Matthew) wrote things down. Karl Marx, some say, "lived" in libraries studying and writing, and the world has been shaped to dangerous effect (but some good) by his ideas.

The populist purging of intellectual elites (scientists, academics, artists, writers, etc) makes for a good talking point. Idea factories and concept generators produce nothing tangible. But eliminating the intellectual and cultural elite destroys a certain kind of hope. We all live in the present, struggling to meet our daily needs. These elites live in a different world, anticipating the forms that structure reality and that determine the future. To be sure, elites are dangerous (see Marx), because they are unaware of the power of their ideas, nor do they seem able to see the world but in the way it appears to them. And they quickly lose touch with what it means to not live in an ordinary world because their heads are in the clouds. They should circumscribed with means that prevent them from directly pouring their ideas and notions into general society (easier said than done). Nonetheless, it is vital that the intellectual and cultural elite flourish in the institutions designed for them. In our day, these are universities and other academic or intellectual outlets.

It does no good to human and societal flourishing for enraged drunken soldiers to yet again, disturb elite circles written in dust and again, kill Archimedes for his insolence. Without Archimedes' fulcrum, we don't move the earth.