During a YouTube livestream last Friday, right-wing pastor Curt Landry told his viewers that they should listen to President Donald Trump and not medical experts when it comes to the COVID-19 coronavirus outbreak because Trump was chosen by God and therefore has greater spiritual authority.
"We are in a small window of time where we need to be decreeing, praying, believing, and speaking it out of our mouths—critical at this time—speaking out of our mouths and agreeing with what Donald Trump is saying and not some of his advisers," Landry said.
Landry, who last week declared that any eventual coronavirus vaccine would be "from the pit of Hell" and should not be taken, said that while he respects the nation's top infectious disease expert Dr. Anthony Fauci, Trump outranks him spiritually and so Christians should be listening to the president rather than doctors and other health experts.
"I'm talking to you spiritually," Landry said. "I am not a scientist, I am not a doctor, and I do respect [Fauci's] knowledge, I respect where he comes from, and I respect him in his position that God has put him in. But in the order of spiritual alignment, Donald J. Trump is the Cyrus above him ... As believers, we need to agree—I believe that God puts kings and leaders in their place, I believe God has put Donald Trump in his place as a Cyrus—and we need to agree with what he's saying."
