Several years ago, I heard a Catholic radio commentator say that the Islamic Middle East was so focused on the “Great Satan” (America) and the “Little Satan” (Israel) that they might miss the fact that another “Satan” was approaching from their rear—an increasingly Christianized east and north. Despite the best efforts of those trying to suppress the faith in China, the “Stans,” and the hinter regions of Iran, God was working to transform those cultures and draw his people to himself—a nightmare for the mullahs, ayatollahs, and functionaries of Xi Jinping.
From the get-go, with a flurry of executive actions, President Joe Biden made our southern border more porous and moving to bring upwards of 20 million illegal immigrants “out of the shadows”—essentially an effort to secure a massive new voting bloc for his party. Pair that Hispanic surge with the Democrats’ already huge advantage with blacks, and the party of Pelosi and Schumer is beginning to make out victories as far as the eye can see.
Maybe not. Maybe there’s a Trojan Horse crossing near El Paso. Maybe the black voting bloc is a sleeping giant, about to awaken and roll over on them. And the reason could be religion.
Republicans are already seeing percentage gains among these voters. Politico’s Zack Stanton picked up on this trend in a November 12, 2020 piece, “How 2020 Killed Off Democrats’ Demographic Hopes.” Still, in the 2020 election, Hispanics went two-to-one for Biden and blacks went nine-to-one for him. But can this hold? I think not, and let me work briefly from the Ten Commandments to suggest why.
The Ten Commandments and Voting
Consider this: Hispanics and blacks overwhelmingly identify with some form of Christianity, whether Catholic or Protestant, and their Bible contains the Decalogue, for which they profess respect. Of course, some of their churches field ministers serving up a socialistic “grievance gospel,” a nasty brew of perpetual resentment lacking biblical warrant, and many of “the faithful” are not discernibly faithful. But there’s still a big connection between church and ethnic populace.
Because of that, it’s hard to see how these two groups—Hispanics and blacks—can long abide marching alongside leftist politicos. When these ethnic hikers pause for the night, they increasingly and disturbingly find themselves bivouacked with strange bedfellows.
Let’s run through the list: Commandments one through four concern basic reverence for God. Over a third of Democrats call themselves “unaffiliated” (“nones,” if you will), compared to only a sixth of Republicans. Then there’s the fifth commandment, the one about honoring your parents. So where do we find the “children of the ’60s,” the ones who liberated themselves from, and continue to distance themselves from, the allegiances and scruples of their parents?
Commandment number six forbids murder, which brings us to the black-on-black carnage in Democrat-led cities and the Democrat-platformed abortion mills, which destroy tens of thousands of innocent black babies for every George Floyd.
Commandment seven addresses sexual immorality, for whose proliferation and enforced normalization Democrats are taking the lead. Eight forbids stealing and thus honors the status of private property. Socialists, who find their home on the left, are impatient with this institution. Nine forbids false testimony. The epithet “liar” is thrown around as carelessly and viciously as “racist,” but a critical mass was reached in the Swamp with Comey, Brennan, McCabe, Schiff, Steele, and Clinton. (We’re not talking obvious hyperbole, honest mistakes, or even confusion from negligence, but rather willful misleadings for the sake of harming others and/or protecting yourself.) And finally, commandment ten, which condemns covetousness, the driver of the Left’s politics-of-envy car.
Of course, Republicans have godless, philandering, insolent, thieving, covetous, duplicitous, and otherwise treacherous politicians and voters. But it’s a binary choice. And you’re always voting for the lesser of two evils.
I think of the two men who scared up a grizzly. One drops immediately to put on his running shoes, and then the other shouts, “You’ll never outrun that bear.” The first responds, “Ah, yes, but I only have to outrun you.” And Republican agendas are better equipped to outrun the carnivorous, postmodern, leftist beast.
A Law Written on the Heart?
Of course, spiritual awakening across the nation could accelerate this phenomenon as people not only recognize but also internalize the Ten Commandments. I have in mind, for instance, the Wesleyan evangelical revival that helped deliver England from the revolutionary madness that descended on France in the 18th century. (Not incidentally, evangelicals who cherish that Wesley revival make up about a third of the Republican voting base.)
I’ll never forget the week that we Indiana Southern Baptists, in order to promote simultaneous revival meetings in their churches, dragged a cross 300 miles from Gary to Jeffersonville. Though many who saw or passed us were indifferent or occasionally scornful, I was struck by the enthusiasm we found in black observers. One man in a three-piece suit asked if he might take a turn pulling it around Indy’s Monument Circle in the noontime crowd. That same day, south of the city, two black girls ran out from behind the counter at a burger place to wave and shout at “Jesus” coming up the way. And down toward Columbus, a black truck driver honked and raised his “One Way” forefinger as he met us on the highway. Their spiritual roots were obvious, as when gay-marriage enthusiasts were gobsmacked by black support for California’s Proposition 8, which banned same-sex so-called “marriage” (only to be overturned by the courts). They thought they had this demographic in their anti-referendum bag. Surprise!
No, I’m not saying that if you love God, you have to vote Republican. I am saying that God’s Ten Commandments should inform our votings for and our votings against. And too bad for “progressives” if they continue to forget and scorn the Lord’s bedrock guidance. As the old saying goes, the Word of God is an anvil that’s worn out many hammers.
Be Careful What You Wish For
David French, who occupies a perch as house “conservative” at the New York Times, has announced that he’ll be supporting the Harris/Walz ticket for the sake of conservatism. Never mind that these Democrat candidates have aggressively supported a host of stupidities and abominations, from untrammeled abortion, to transsexual mutilation, to George Floyd rioting, to open borders. French’s position is that Donald Trump is so terrible a person and leader that drastic measures are called for. Babylon Bee has followed his logic to post a couple of satirical pieces, one having him transition to female in order to save masculinity, the other with his founding “Evangelicals for Satan.” They remind me of the 1968 Associated Press report by Peter Arnett that an Army major remarked, after the horrendous bombing of Ben Tre, “It became necessary to destroy the town to save it.” So French, in his incendiary contempt for Trump and in his zeal to end the former president’s influence in the Republican Party, has sided with the North Vietnamese Army in bombing the Village of MAGA.
It’s obvious that the Democrats’ open-borders policy is meant to boost their voter rolls by flooding the zone with illegal (“undocumented”) and grateful newcomers, in debt to the party for a batch of goodies. On this model, Minnesota Governor Walz has signed off on providing them drivers licenses, health care, and a path to free college tuition. He’s also pushed for “sanctuary status,” which would deny state cooperation with ICE personnel.
One might think that we’d hear a chorus of acclaim from the nation’s Hispanics as brethren from the South join them in electoral allegiance to the Democrats. But their “Blue State” orientation is fading on a number accounts. A multitude is finding Trump’s business environment more congenial than that of the big-government, regulation-enamored Democrats; many remember the leftist economics of the failed states from which they fled. Of course, they don’t look kindly on the chaos and violence indulged by big-city, Democrat mayors; it reminds them of the mean streets and dangerous tumult they meant to leave behind when coming to America. And then there are the Hispanics with religious scruples, including ten million Evangelicals/Protestants. They’re not amused with Walz’s provision of “free menstrual products” in Minnesota’s school rest rooms set aside for boys.
All this to say, David French and his Democrat compadres had better be careful about what they wish for. Notwithstanding the host of illegals with no cultural Christian background, three quarters still hail from Mexico, Central America, and South America, predominantly Catholic countries, albeit with growing Evangelical presence. If a combination of general and special revelation spurred by the Spirit stirred these latecomers to convictional awakening, David French’s friends on the left could, by their border lawlessness, facilitate his worst nightmare, MAGA success at the polls.
[Editor’s Note: This article originally appeared at the American Spectator and was recently updated and expanded under the final heading. It is used with gracious permission.]
