Donald Trump claims to be a Presbyterian, but his words and actions are totally repugnant to all thoughtful and conscientious leaders and members of the Presbyterian Church USA.
The Presbyterian Church USA, a mainline Protestant denomination, has 1,482,767 active members, including your solitary reporter, and 19,721 ordained ministers in 9,451 congregations, as of one year ago. The Presbyterian Church USA is the largest single Presbyterian denomination in the United States. Its unique and carefully thought-out polity (form of church government) features shared leadership between laity and clergy (as opposed to episcopal polity, a more hierarchical form of church government in which bishops and subordinate clergy provide leadership).
The Co-Moderators of the Presbyterian Church USA are Rev. Denise Anderson, who is African American, and Rev. Jan Edmiston, who is white. The Stated Clerk of the Presbyterian Church USA serves a four-year term and is responsible to the denomination's General Assembly, which conducts the ecclesiastical work of the church. The Stated Clerk is Rev. J. Herbert Nelson, the first African American to serve in that office. Rev. Nelson, a powerful preacher, is a third-generation Presbyterian pastor.
In 2014, the PCUSA’s General Assembly voted for a resolution calling for divestment from stock in Caterpillar, Hewlett-Packard, and Motorola Solutions, in protest of Israeli policies on the West Bank.
Donald Trump is now vacationing at Mar-a-Lago, his exclusive private club in Palm Beach, Florida. There, he is gloating over his only significant legislative accomplishment, which changed our tax code to favor the wealthy and screw the poor. At Mar-a-Lago, as he moves his massive butt around his Trump International Golf Club in West Palm Beach, he is plotting his next moves to disenfranchise people of color, to increase tensions in Israel and Palestine, and marginalize refugees.
This morning, associate solitary reporter Johanna Jones was with Trump at the golf course. Jones had to receive a special dispensation to be there because the initiation fee for membership is $150,000, with an annual fee of $25,000. Trump golf courses are not open to Democrats unless they are very wealthy.
Immediately after making a triple bogey on the 18th hole, Trump was completely unprepared as Revs. Anderson, Edmonton, and Nelson suddenly appeared at the 19th hole. In unison, they preached to him from Mark 10:45, “For the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life [as] a ransom for many.”
Infuriated, Trump threw his gold-plated driver at Rev. Nelson, using a racial epithet; and Rev. Anderson and Rev. Edmiston marched off the course wearing their pussy hats.
Elsewhere, the Denver Broncos’ General Manager, John Elway, a Republican, denied rumors that he is considering hiring Sen. Ted Cruz (TP-Texas) as his next starting quarterback after the Broncos’ 5-10 season. Associate solitary reporter Nick Johnson had suggested to Elway that Cruz would be a logical choice because of his conspicuously pugnacious stance against any position taken by Democrats.