I thought about it and decided there are 3 standing principles that determine the religious affiliation of any given person to any religion.
#1 Does the person BELIEVE and Acknowledge the basic concepts and understandings upheld by the religion. Not ALL of the beliefs, only the founding, primary ones. For Christians this would be acknowledging a belief in God and in particular Jesus Christ as God enfleshed having lived,died, and been Resurrected.
#2 Does the person PRACTICE the religion if the religion has main, common practices with a fair amount of consistency. For Christians this usually entails going to church fairly regularly and reading some, most, or all of the Bible.
#3 (This being the most significant) Does the person uphold the primary VALUES of that religion. For Christians this includes Charity, Forgiveness, Mercy, Sacrifice, Compassion, and Peace. Also NOT casting Judgments upon anyone -as Christ said.
So how does Donald Trump measure up? Well I can't speak for him, but part of me does believe he might acknowledge #1. He certainly claims to.
As for #2, not so much. He doesn't attend church and actually said "2 Corinthians" instead of Second Corinthians -which tells me he probably hasn't spent much time with the Bible.
As for #3, NOT AT ALL. Period.
So basically he's 1/3rd Christian.
Personally since I haven't attended church in a while and don't read the Bible regularly, though I did in the past, I consider myself about 2 and a half/3rds Christian. I'm also a Spiritualist and believe in some Truths founded in Catholicism and Buddhism.
The Ku Klux Klan and Neo Natzis generally rank about a 1/3rd to 2/3rd. Certainly not fulfilling the VALUES of Christianity by any stretch of the imagination.
Which leads me to another, separate point. If Christians continue to remain silent as a vast majority to the bigotry and convoluted representation found by a deeply misunderstanding minority more and more people will proceed to "leave the flock". It's gotten that way for me at this point.
When I'm invited to a church, when I see a Christian billboard, when I consider working for christian ministries I have to stop and ask myself, "Is this the REAL Christianity or the backwards Westboro kind? I hesitate to engage. And I'm COOL with Christianity. Imagine what people outside of the faith or seeking the faith must feel.
Every time Christianity is misrepresented more Atheists come out saying, "This is the reason we don't believe in God or anything those Christians say." They hear the falsehoods preached by false shepherds and flee -as do many people within the religion.
It's kind of like before the Catholic church came out in full acknowledgement of the abuses against children. Would YOU feel safe having you kids go to confessional or be a part of that church knowing these abuses are going on and they're actually covering them up and supporting the priests/abusers?
Which leads me to another separate point. It is my belief that a spiritually intuitive soul of light finds themselves in a religion like Satanism they will NOT enact any of the dark values preached, but instead rise above them and seek to add light to the religion and their practices. And if a dark, lost soul is introduced to a religion like Christianity that person might seek to add darkness to it and enact darkness in the name of Christianity.
Ultimately SOULS are going to do what souls are going to do regardless of what religion they are in. It is easier for more souls -dark or light -to do good, positive things if the religion they affiliate with ENCOURAGES and PROMOTES good, positive, compassionate, peaceful, supportive, embracing, forgiving things.
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