The Right Rev. Mariann Edgar Budde, the bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Washington, delivered a powerful sermon during a prayer service on Tuesday marking President Donald Trump’s inauguration. And Trump, who was in attendance, was less than pleased.
During the service at Washington National Cathedral, Budde made a powerful direct plea for “mercy” to Trump, who was seated in the front with his family members and Vice President JD Vance. She asked the newly inaugurated president to have “mercy upon the people in our country who are scared now.”
Budde then appeared to reference some of Trump’s campaign promises and the flurry of executive orders he’d issued on the first day of the second term of his administration, such as his attempt to end birthright citizenship for the children of undocumented immigrants and his executive order rolling back protections for transgender people.
“There are gay, lesbian and transgender children in Democratic, Republican and independent families, some who fear for their lives,” Budde said in her sermon.
She then talked about the people who work hard at various jobs across the country who “may not be citizens or have the proper documentation,” but the “vast majority of immigrants are not criminals.”
“They pay taxes and are good neighbors. They are faithful members of our churches and mosques, synagogues, gurdwaras and temples,” she said. “I ask you to have mercy, Mr. President, on those in our communities whose children fear that their parents will be taken away.”
“Our God teaches us that we are to be merciful to the stranger, for we were all once strangers in this land,” she said. (Watch her entire sermon here.)
Trump has since lashed out at Budde over her remarks, writing on his Truth Social platform that Budde is a “so-called Bishop” and “Radical Left hard line Trump hater.” He charged that she “brought her church in the World of politics in a very ungracious way.”
“She was nasty in tone, and not compelling or smart,” he wrote.
The president also demanded an apology, but Budde has declined.
“I am not going to apologize for asking for mercy for others,” she told Time magazine on Wednesday.
Budde, who has used her platform to call attention to civil rights issues and to challenge Trump before, receivedwide praise online for addressing Trump directly in her sermon. Supporters of Trump criticized the bishop, accusing her of politicizing the prayer service.
But faith leaders have historically found inspiration for their social justice activism in their religion. And Budde “certainly has the Christian faith on her side” when it comes to the messages in her sermon, said William Willimon, a bishop in the United Methodist Church, an author and a professor of the practice of Christian ministry at Duke Divinity School.
Willimon said that Budde’s plea for mercy was “particularly moving.”
“There’s no instance in the life, work, teachings of Jesus where mercy ever takes a backseat to anything else,” he told HuffPost, adding, “Not only is Jesus merciful, he commands his followers to be merciful.”
“Even to those who are our enemies and those who wrong us, he ordered mercy,” he added.
Read on to hear more of what Christian leaders have to say about Budde’s sermon, their thoughts on faith leaders speaking out about social injustice and the criticism Budde has faced:
The messaging behind Budde’s sermon was rooted in her faith.
Willimon said that he was moved and felt “proud” of Budde’s sermon. He emphasized that she presented the sermon as an “issue of mercy.”
“Mercy is a Christian virtue,” he said, later adding that “government officials are often not known for being merciful.”
Trump is “a president that’s shown great mercy for convicted criminals who attacked the government in his name,” he said, seemingly referencing Trump’s pardons for those convicted in the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol, “and yet is so stunningly unmerciful with these vulnerable immigrants and others.”
Rev. Paul Brandeis Raushenbush, president and CEO of Interfaith Alliance and an ordained Baptist minister, said that as he watched Budde deliver her sermon, he saw how “deeply she was drawing on her spiritual calling to say what she knew the Gospel was inspiring her to say.” (Raushenbush was formerly executive editor for HuffPost’s Religion section.)
“I was grateful for her courage to speak gently, but truthfully, to the most powerful man in the world,” he told HuffPost.
It was important that Budde, a Christian leader, addressed Trump in her sermon.
Raushenbush said that Budde was “acting as a pastor” to Trump in that moment. She was “giving spiritual direction to someone in her congregation who happened to be the president of the United States.”
“You could see that Trump was unused to anyone, much less a Christian leader, speaking to him in any way that wasn’t simply delivering praise,” he said, later adding, “In the kindest way, she was offering him a moment to reflect and even repent. The fact that his heart was too hardened to hear it is on him — not her.”
Willimon said that the Christian faith, particularly in the context of the presidential inaugural events that have taken place this week, has been “misrepresented.” He pointed to faith leaders who participated in the inauguration, such as the Rev. Franklin Graham, who he believed delivered “divisive” and “political” comments.
“So I thought it was wonderful for [Budde] at this particular time to stand up and say, in effect, ‘By the way, world, Christians see these matters differently,’” he said.
Faith leaders should speak up on issues that affect communities.
“Religious leaders have a twofold obligation, which is to help congregants cultivate a relationship to the sacred, the Divine or spirituality, as well as to help individuals understand their moral obligations to each other,” Raushenbush said. “If you are only doing one or the other, you are not fully fulfilling your role as a faith leader.”
“So, of course, we have to talk about how transgender people are being targeted, because they are our neighbors — and in my Christian tradition, we have an obligation to love our neighbor as much as we have an obligation to love God,” he said. “Same with immigrants and others. We cannot sit these questions out and still say that we follow the mandates of Jesus.”
Willimon said that although some pastors may choose to not speak up on social justice issues on certain occasions or address certain issues in places beyond the pulpit — perhaps in counseling or at small gatherings — it’s still, overall, important to “speak up.”
“We should speak up,” he said, particularly if you know a lot about a particular subject and “feel Jesus put you up to it.”
Those criticizing Budde for the themes of her sermon are missing the mark.
“It makes me wonder just how much they know about the Christian faith or the church,” Willimon said of Budde’s critics.
He added, “What they’re really saying is not that Christians shouldn’t engage in politics, it’s just Christians shouldn’t engage in politics that I don’t approve of.”
He said that he’d ask Budde’s detractors to ask themselves whether they thought she accurately spoke up for the Christian faith and whether her message was derived from Scripture.
“And the answer to that is resoundingly yes,” he said.
Willimon said that Budde’s sermon should be viewed as a model for preachers and that there are other Christian leaders across the country spreading similar messages in their communities.
Raushenbush said that people criticizing Budde as being “political” have “clearly not read the Bible.”
“There is a lot in the Bible about welcoming the stranger and the immigrant and the outcast,” he said.
Raushenbush said he found it “striking” that Budde’s sermon was deemed controversial or “radical,” since her words were “squarely within the mainstream Christian tradition.”
He also called out those who spew Christian nationalist rhetoric, spreading hate and violence.
For those people, their “real objection” to Budde is that she’s a “Christian who put forward another way — one of mercy, kindness and unity,” he said.
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