WASHINGTON (BP) – In a day punctuated with references to God and Judeo-Christian principles, Donald Trump was inaugurated Jan. 20 as the 47th president of the United States.
“Those who wished to stop our cause have tried to take my freedom and, indeed, to take my life,” Trump said in his inaugural address. “Just a few months ago in a beautiful Pennsylvania field, an assassin’s bullet ripped through my ear. But I felt then and believe even more so now that my life was saved for a reason: I was saved by God to make America great again.”
Inauguration Day began with a private worship service at St. John’s Episcopal Church near the White House, where Southern Baptist pastor Jack Graham read from Proverbs 3 and offered brief comments to Trump, Vice President J.D. Vance and their guests. Graham, pastor of Prestonwood Baptist Church in Plano, Texas, described the service as “tender,” “thoughtful” and “very traditional.”
“It was very private,” he said. “News media was not allowed in. It was not videoed or recorded. It was really just to focus on God and the president on this historic day.” Trump “was very thoughtful, very prayerful. He clearly appreciated the service.”
Every president since James Madison has attended worship at St. John’s. The tradition of Inauguration Day services there began with Franklin D. Roosevelt.
Hours later, mentions of God were plentiful in the inauguration ceremony.
Trump continued the tradition, followed by every American president to date, of invoking God in his inaugural address. The inauguration ceremony, held in the U.S. Capitol Rotunda due to extreme cold outdoors, also featured prayers by Roman Catholic Cardinal Timothy Dolan; evangelist Franklin Graham; Rabbi Ari Berman, president of Yeshiva University, a Jewish school in New York; Lorenzo Sewell, pastor of 180 Church in Detroit; and Frank Mann, a retired Catholic priest from the Diocese of Brooklyn.
Franklin Graham said to Trump with former President Joe Biden standing feet away, “Mr. President, the last four years, there are times I’m sure you thought it was pretty dark, but look what God has done.” Graham then offered a prayer asking God’s protection and guidance for Trump, Vance and their families.
Sewell’s impassioned benediction, delivered at an inauguration that fell on Martin Luther King Day, invoked King’s “I Have a Dream” speech. “Let freedom ring from every hill and every molehill,” he prayed, adding a hope that all classes of people would be able to say together, “Free at last, free at last. Thank you, God Almighty, we are free at last.”
Trump took the oath of office with First Lady Melania Trump holding two Bibles nearby: Trump’s personal Bible, given to him in 1955 by his mother, and the Lincoln Bible, which was used by Abraham Lincoln during his 1861 inauguration. His hand, however, was not on the Bibles, which were not in place before Chief Justice John Roberts began administering the oath of office. Placing one hand on a Bible is a presidential inauguration tradition but not a constitutional requirement.
Eight years ago, Trump used the same to Bibles at his first inauguration. He joined Grover Cleveland as the only presidents to be elected to two nonconsecutive terms.
Vance took the vice-presidential oath with his hand on a family Bible presented to him by his maternal grandmother in 2003, when he left home to join the Marine Corps.
In Trump’s inaugural address, he proclaimed that “the golden age of America begins right now.” He noted a list of his administration’s priorities, including addressing the definition of gender as part of what he termed “the complete restoration of America and the revolution of common sense.”
“As of today, it will henceforth be the official policy of the United States government that there are only two genders, male and female,” Trump said. He also promised to “end the government policy of trying to socially engineer race and gender into every aspect of public and private life. We will forge a society that is colorblind and merit-based.”
Among other agenda items listed by Trump were reinstating with backpay military members expelled for refusing the COVID-19 vaccine, securing the release of hostages in the Middle East, returning the Panama Canal to U.S. control, decreasing inflation and increasing American oil production.
“In everything we do, my administration will be inspired by the strong pursuit of excellence and unrelenting success,” Trump said. “We will not forget our country, we will not forget our Constitution, and we will not forget our God.”
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