Samuel Rodriguez, a Religious Right activist who likes to portray himself as above partisan politics, was among the religious leaders invited to speak during President Trump’s inauguration on Friday. That evening, in black tie at the Freedom Ball, he spoke with Fox News’ Tucker Carlson and described his concerns about “moral relativism, cultural decadence, the pushback on mores and absolutes.” Was this an example of speaking truth to power, of challenging Trump’s materialism, cynicism and penchant for lying? Nah. It was standard Religious Right culture-war rhetoric.
Rodriguez, who heads the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference, spent a good chunk of the interview talking about his belief that Trump, through his Supreme Court picks, will save religious liberty from people who are trying to force Christians “to sacrifice truth on the altar of political or cultural expediency.”
Our Christian, our Judeo-Christian value system, without a doubt, has been under assault, unprecedented historical assault. Religious liberty will emerge as the quintessential civil rights issue of the 21st century in America. It behooves us to stand up and defend our right to exercise our religious beliefs…
I believe the conduit of Supreme Court nominations, subsequently approved by the Senate, I do believe that religious liberty will be protected, at least for my generation, and God, please, for my children and my children’s children’s sake. I am concerned. Again, moral relativism, cultural decadence, the pushback on mores and absolutes, like never before. Dorothy, we’re not in Kansas anymore…
We’re not advocating for a theocracy, of course not…We want to protect religious liberty for all. But the idea of pushing back against a Christian ethos, or a Judeo-Christian value system for that matter, and it’s not hyperbole, by the way. It’s not rhetoric, it’s not conspiracy theory. We’ve seen it in the past few years. So now, through this president, through the Supreme Court appointments, we believe religious liberty will be protected, at least for my generation.
