So, Trump and Clinton had their first head-to-head last night. The pundits and pollsters called it for Clinton, though that means nothing in this most topsy-turvy of elections: it's hard to know what Trump has to do to persuade people not to vote for him.
There's a great deal about the US presidential election that is frightening and depressing. The thought of a Trump victory, of course, ticks both those boxes; Clinton's generally hawkish record on military intervention, as well as her extreme liberalism on abortion, is not really encouraging either.
Far worse than this, however, is the way the religious right has been so eager to ditch every principle it ever possessed in a desperate quest for power. Trump, they believe, can give it them, so they will overlook every lie and every insult, and every demonstration of ignorance or incompetence. And the religious right's leaders and opinion-formers have resorted to conscripting entirely legitimate conservative concerns, about abortion and same-sex marriage, into their campaign to elect Trump as president.
The latest example of this unholy alliance is an advertising campaign by Andrew Wommack ministries. It's raised $500,000 for a media campaign that includes a full-page ad in the New York Times, and it's aiming for a million signatures on a 'Declaration of Dependence'. Starting with a quote from the Declaration of Independence ("We hold these truths to be self-evident", etc) it says that no government has the right to take away the right to "exercise our beliefs as put forth in God's Holy Bible".
Among these are that life begins at conception and that abortion is wrong, and that marriage is between heterosexuals only. The Declaration says: "We therefore respectfully reserve the right to refuse any mandate by the government that forces us to fund or support abortion." It goes on, "We also oppose same-sex marriage, polygamy, bestiality and all other forms of sexual perversion prohibited by scripture."
The Declaration doesn't mention Trump. To that extent, it's non-political and is probably on the right side of the Johnson Amendment. But every sentence is calculated to appeal to voters who want the next US president to be the one who entrenches conservative judges on the bench of the Supreme Court. These judges, they believe, will roll back gay marriage, allow extensive religious exemptions from equality legislation, and clamp down on abortion. And this president will, incidentally, repeal the pesky Johnson Amendment that stops churches endorsing political candidates.
So who are the signatories? As I write, there are 71,486 – so there's some way to go. But the list of original backers is instructive. One of them is historian David Barton, who said Christians who didn't vote for Trump would have to answer to God. James Dobson, founder of Focus on the Family signed it, as did televangelist Kenneth Copeland – both are members of Trump's evangelical advisory board. Retired army general Jerry Boykin signed a letter supporting Trump. Lance Wallnau is a member of the National Diversity Coalition for Trump.
The Declaration is another example of the sort of overheated rhetoric that has characterised the engagement of conservatives – with some honourable exceptions – in this election. It sets up the contest as a binary competition between the forces of light and the powers of darkness. It commits its signatories to resisting their government, when in truth there is nothing to resist. It implicitly attributes positions to Clinton she doesn't hold. It's also, incidentally, monumentally insulting to gay people by bracketing together same-sex marriage and bestiality.
The Declaration of Dependence is a new low. But November 8 is still a long way away. Watch out for even worse to come.
Follow Mark Woods on Twitter: @RevMarkWoods
