This week, Donald Trump posted an AI image of himself dressed in white robes, placing a glowing hand over an ill or deceased man in a hospital bed, as if to heal or resurrect him. The image, posted on Truth Social, was widely taken as him presenting himself as a Messianic Jesus figure.

Sometime the next morning, he deleted the post. “I thought it was me as a doctor,” he explained to reporters, according to Time magazine. Jesus? “Only the fake news could come up with that one.”

But the post was widely interpreted as blasphemous – including by conservative Catholic group CatholicVote.org.

“I don’t know if the President thought he was being funny or if he is under the influence of some substance or what possible explanation he could have for this OUTRAGEOUS blasphemy,” declared Megan Basham, a prominent conservative Protestant Christian writer, on X. “But he needs to take this down immediately and ask for forgiveness from the American people and then from God.”

“I was very grateful to see how many conservative Christians immediately denounced the blasphemous Jesus/Trump image,” said pastor Doug Wilson, who recently led a prayer service at the Pentagon and founded the network of churches War Secretary Pete Hegseth belongs to.

Within the Christian tradition, blasphemy has historically been an unstable, shifting idea. But, simply put, it means speech, thought or action that shows contempt for – or mockery of – God and........

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