There is no better day of the year to consider the primary tenets of What Would Jesus Do (WWJD) than Easter Sunday. Those of us who believe that the Lord is our salvation are obligated to model behavior he only once strayed from during his time among us. Anything else is heretical to the faith that is supposed to guide our lives as Christians. Simple, straightforward, commonsensical… a no brainer.
So what are the basics for conducting oneself in line with WWJD? Again, nothing complicated here. Love your neighbor. Welcome the stranger. Offer love instead of loathing, understanding instead of fear, giving instead of taking, helping the poor at the expense of the rich, peace instead of conflict, unity instead of division. The list is fairly effortless to conjure up.
Yet and still, millions in America who swear they are devoted to God’s only son have created a political identity that betrays near every virtue he stood for. Indeed, their champion, who far too many actually compare to Jesus himself, is an idolatrous maniac who spends most of his time trying to convince anyone who will listen/read that he is far more in league with the beast than our savior.
Make no mistake, this bloc is the activist component of a criminal Republican Party, an organization that is enabling a sinisterly immoral, spiritually destitute villain to destroy godly virtues, not just in the U.S., but throughout the world. Donald Trump despises humanity, and possesses no inclination to do anything but obsessively renounce WWJD as a paradigm for “Radical Left Scum.”
How at odds Trump is with our Lord’s chosen path requires little research; it is constantly on display. In fact, on Easter Sunday, he provided all a rational person would require to confirm his malevolence. Addressing the leadership of Iran, who on national television a couple of nights before he had quipped should be bombed “into the Stone Age,” the President of the United States railed that:
“Tuesday will be Power Plant Day, and Bridge Day, all wrapped up in one, in Iran. There will be nothing like it!!! Open the Fuckin’ Strait, you crazy bastards, or you’ll be living in Hell — JUST WATCH! Praise be to Allah.”
It’s hard to imagine anything more profane, violent and hateful, and on Easter Sunday no less! What Would Jesus Do? Denounce all of it… condemn its author. Evangelist Franklin Graham’s reaction? Not so much…
“Today the Iranians, the wicked regime of this government, wants to kill every Jew and destroy them with an atomic fire. But you have raised up President Trump. You’ve raised him up for such a time as this. And Father, we pray that you’ll give him victory,”
Graham cited the book of Esther as the basis for his vitriol, assuming Iran’s current leadership harbors the same agenda as Persia’s King Haman back in 400 BC. Like Trump, Graham constantly lies that, when it comes to Muslims anywhere, the Bible issues a blank check regarding ends justifying means.
Graham can be confident that his flock embraces his Islamophobia and whatever Trumpist war crimes it legitimates. More than 60 percent of U.S. Evangelicals are loyal Fox News viewers. Clearly, when push comes to shove, Jesus doesn’t stand a chance against Jesse Waters or Greg Gutfeld.
Conversely, Pope Leo XIV can’t be certain just how many Catholics he speaks for when he condemns “the violence of war.” After all, a majority supported Trump as recently as December of 2025. Like Evangelicals, rank and file Catholics possess far more tolerance for bombing a girls school in Iran than for a woman’s right to choose, gays or the dreaded transexual community. Turns out more than 50 percent of white Catholics are regular Fox News viewers.
Like every other part of our national demise, the life of Jesus and its impact on American Christianity has been overwhelmed and disfigured by the 24/7 propaganda of Fox/AM. Rather than a blueprint for humanity, the teachings of Christ are now just more grist for the MAGA white grievance and resentment mill, fuel for division, a basis for exclusion rather than welcoming.
What Would Jesus Do? What would he say? Perhaps the same thing he said on this very day more than 2000 years ago… “Forgive them father; for they know not what they do.” (Luke 23:34) BC