Weekly Roundup: Talarico and the Pope vs. MAGA Christianity

 Brad Onishi and Dan Miller discuss the Texas Senate race between Trump-backed Ken Paxton and Democrat James Talarico as a public theological contest between Christian authoritarianism and a Christianity centered on love of neighbor, noting Paxton’s scandals and the right’s misogynistic, transphobic attacks portraying Talarico as weak or deviant. They connect this politics of masculinity and domination to reports that Trump’s DOJ opened (or is attempting to open) a perjury investigation into E. Jean Carroll after Trump was found liable for sexual assault and defamation, framing it as retaliatory weaponization and hostility toward women who “won.” They also preview Axis Mundi’s expansion into live programming, then analyze Pope Leo’s first encyclical on human dignity amid AI, highlighting critiques of homogenization, efficiency-over-dignity, sanctified hatred, and Tolkien imagery, including a reframing of Nehemiah against MAGA wall theology.

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