His spiritual side

Trump, it turns out, is a medium.

A few weeks ago, while posthumously honoring a World War II hero, Trump gave the man’s family a report on their departed loved one. He was “looking down from Heaven, proud of this incredible honor, but even prouder of the legacy that lives on in each of you. So true.”

A few weeks before that, at what was billed as a celebration of patriotism at the White House, Trump reported to the crowd that fallen soldiers are pleased with his economic policies and increases in the stock market. “Many of them are looking down right now at our country, and they are proud,” he said.

Sometimes, Trump pinpoints the location of the deceased, using some psychic GPS. At an outdoor Medal of Honor ceremony in May for soldiers lost at a battle in Afghanistan, Trump pointed at a location in the sky and said, “They are looking down right now.” A week before that, outside the Capitol, Trump pointed to a point in the sky over his head and told the family of a slain police detective: “So she’s right now, right there. And she’s looking down.”

Well, it’s scientific. They’re in a spot in the sky where they can hear Trump. Naturally they’re not in the sky above Indonesia or something – that would be silly.

Occasionally, something must get lost in the cloud and Trump receives a heavenly miscommunication. Speaking to a steelworker at the White House in March, Trump informed the man: “Your father, Herman, he’s looking down, and he’s very proud of you right now.”

“Oh, he’s still alive,” the steelworker said.

“Then he’s even more proud of you,” Trump said.

Wait what? He’s less proud when he’s dead? Is that orthodox theology? It seems kind of sad.

After a column of mine mentioned one of Trump’s conversations with the dead, I was contacted by Karen Park, a professor of theology and religious studies at St. Norbert College in De Pere, Wis. “My sense is that this is what passes for spirituality for Trump — a world where imaginary dead white people take an elevator to a heavenly penthouse where they look down on him with approval,” she told me.

With approval and just a bit of envy, because his penthouse is nicer than theirs, heavenly or no heavenly.

Trump does allow that some people may not land in that gauzy heaven. In 2016 in Iowa, he threw a group of farmers a theological curveball after telling them they would be looking down happily after death. “We hope you’re looking down, anyway,” he amended.

Do we? Do we? Do we not rather hope they have better things to do than look down at Trump?

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