Twin Populist Reform Warriors 500 Years Apart

Book excerpt: Similarities between “Playboy” Donald Trump and “Holy Man” Martin Luther? Scandalized by such a thought? Through the rediscovery of the Gospel, the great Reformer realized he was the object of God’s love, not His anger and wrath. Both Luther and Trump understood that God’s ways are not always our ways, and that God can choose and work through sinners. Neither twin understood themselves to be saints but were free to be themselves. They are gifted yet flawed human beings driven by optimistic visions of what the Church and State should be. Drawing insights from history, Scripture, and theology, Swartz illustrates numerous similarities in his Twins’ separated by five centuries. The times, events, and circumstances they encountered exhibit uncanny parallelisms: elite establishments, social media, swamps, walls, and plagues. Even more striking is how their “political stance” and personal traits mirror each other: coarse and filthy speech, pugnacious reactions, and use of derisive nicknames. There’s also a resemblance in their spouses as they became the “Maligned Housewives of the Black Cloister and the White House!”