As RedState reported on Tuesday, President Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance were forced to sit through a scolding session delivered by a woke “bishop” named Mariann Budde.

Speaking at the National Prayer Service, the Episcopalian clergy member claimed that people “fear for their lives” because of Trump. In doing so, she cited “transgender children while describing illegal immigrants as those who “pick our crops” and “clean our office buildings.”

At the National Prayer Service at the Washington National Cathedral, woke Bishop @Mebudde gave a political speech against President Trump, asking his administration to support illegal migrants and transitioning children. She’s part of @iamepiscopalian. pic.twitter.com/JwlrGIXAwy

— Andy Ngo (@MrAndyNgo) January 21, 2025

BUDDE: Let me make one final plea, Mr. President. Millions have put their trust in you, and as you told the nation yesterday, you have felt the providential hand of a loving God. In the name of our God, I ask you to have mercy upon the people in our country who are scared now. There are gay, lesbian, and transgender children and Democratic, Independent, and Republican families, some who fear for their lives. 

I ask you to have mercy, Mr. President, on those in our communities whose children fear that their parents will taken away and that you help those who are fleeing warzones and persecution in their own lands to find compassion and welcome here. Our God teaches us that we are to be merciful to the stranger, for we were all once strangers in this land. May God grant us the strength and courage to honor the dignity of every human being, to speak the truth to one another in love, and walk humbly with each other and our God for the good of all people, the good of all people in this nation and the world.

As left-wing screeds go, it wasn’t necessarily surprising. That’s especially true if you’ve been paying attention to the Episcopalian Church over the last several decades. It’s not her calls to comfort the stranger or express compassion towards others that are at issue. Clearly, Christians should show kindness and empathy to those in need. That’s not a green light to break the law, though. Countries have borders, and the Bible never commands Christians to support the human trafficking immigrants so they can “pick our crops” and work in “meat-packing plants.” 

That is a perversion of the Gospel that seeks to boil the sacrifice of Jesus Christ down to universalist hedonism that affirms things like “transitioning” children, which is child abuse.

In short, it’s heresy. Figures like Budde have taken the Word of God and cast it aside for a worldly ideology that just so happens to line up directly with their selfish political wants. That’s not Christianity. It’s idolatry that preserves sin, leading people away from the transformative power of the Gospel.

And as if she was trying to confirm all my criticisms, Budde did exactly what you’d expect in the aftermath of her misappropriation of the pulpit: She ran to CNN to pat herself on the back. 

The way you know this “bishop” was sincere and isn’t just a political mouthpiece is that she immediately went on CNN to double down. pic.twitter.com/MqlNGLcobu

— Bonchie (@bonchieredstate) January 22, 2025

I’m not going to waste my time transcribing everything she said. If you want to hear it, you can watch the video, but it’s nothing more than a reiteration of all the same perversions she spoke during her “sermon.” Budde’s insincerity is marked by her decision to immediately go on CNN and play activist. She wasn’t reaching out to Donald Trump in love and understanding. She was wagging her finger at him in hate and disgust so she could get backslaps from far-left cable news anchors. 

Sure enough, it turns out Budde has done this before. 

same lady from 2020https://t.co/uTga1mW8hC

— Dr. Richard Harambe (@Richard_Harambe) January 22, 2025

Keep in mind that the people she’s defending in the above clip were cleared out of Liberty Square because they were rioting. It’s almost as if Budde’s religious positions are simply dictated by whatever the left-wing current thing is. Who could have guessed? 

I’m normally very deferential when it comes to criticizing pastors, priests, bishops, etc. because I always want to err on the side of caution in this context. God may be working through people in ways I don’t understand. With that said, it is obvious Budde and the broader Episcopalian Church do not fall into that category. Instead, they should take heed of the warnings delivered by the Book of James about Christian teachers using their positions to lead people astray. To put it simply, it doesn’t end well.