The right wing, Atlanticist, pro-Republican, Christian Conservative Cabinet minister and ally of Rupert Murdoch, Michael Gove, who interviewed Donald Trump last January, is an unlikely candidate as a critic of the current US President.
Yet even last February, fresh from his encounter with Trump, he told Christian Today: 'I think that he's probably one of the American presidents least influenced by religion for a long time. Barack Obama was influenced by his own personal faith. George W Bush ditto. Bill Clinton, even though there were all sorts of character and ethics issues, was clearly influenced by his faith; Ronald Reagan ditto; George H W Bush a particular type of episcopalian; Jimmy Carter clearly. I think you'd probably have to go back to Richard Nixon to find an American President who was less influenced by their faith than Donald Trump.'
Since then, Trump has won over the leaders of white evangelicals who overwhelmingly voted for him in November 2016, leaving some of us wondering whether evangelicals will, bizarrely, be the last supporters of Trump standing.
Now, that prospect looks even more possible with the forthcoming publication of a new book, Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House by Michael Wolff, who exposes utter chaos and rampant infighting at the heart of the President's team.
With virtually every single person associated with the administration badmouthed by Trump, according to the book, including his own son in law Jared Kushner – not to mention the former 'strategist' Steve Bannon who Trump last night said had 'lost his mind' – it seems there are no friends or alliances left in the current regime at the White House.
Then there is Trump's lifestyle, which it is fair to say appears to back Gove's view that he is the President 'least influenced by religion for a long time'. Evening prayer, say? Nope, he's in bed by 18:30 eating McDonald's cheeseburgers and watching three televisions at once. Grace towards underlings? Nah, he barks at cleaners who pick up his shirts left draped over the floor.
Perhaps Trump possesses some inner calm amid the chaos, a hitherto hidden centredness and spirituality, one that will in time bear the fruit of grace towards others. But there is no mention of Trump reading scripture, praying or attending church. In fact, the only – buried – religious reference that has emerged from the Wolff book so far has been that Kushner reportedly offered to marry the TV hosts Mika Brzezinski and Joe Scarborough because, he said, he was 'an internet Unitarian minister'.
No, the reality is that Trump's presidency is made of clay, built on sand and not on rock and, as we predicted here at Christian Today on New Year's Eve (before details from the book emerged), it will surely spin out of control sooner rather than later. We said of 2018: 'In the end, only evangelicals are left supporting Trump, as the Russia collusion scandal and allegations of sexual harassment in the White House engulf his presidency. To the horror of evangelical leaders, Trump calls what many think is a routine press conference and sensationally quits, claiming a "vast leftwing conspiracy" involving the FBI and CIA and returning to his playboy lifestyle in New York.'
Think that's crazy? Well, let's finish as we began, with that most unlikely Trump critic Michael Gove: '[Does] he have the character to see it through? On the one hand he is someone who is clearly narcissistic or egotistical enough to want to be seen as a success, and therefore he'll want to show his critics that he can meet this challenge. On the other hand though there is just a sheer unpredictability about the way in which he sometimes responds to events, that it would be impossible I think to predict with accuracy.'
