Detroit pastor Lorenzo Sewell, who attended the National Prayer Service with President Donald Trumphe was very critical of the Venerable Mariann Edgar Budde because of her preaching which turned into political sentiments.
“It was theological malpractice on all sides,” said Sewell, the pastor 180 Church in Detroit, MichiganFox News Digital said on Wednesday.
“Nowhere in Scripture do we see a leader stand up without God’s permission and speak to someone in authority… What happens in the middle of our Christian tradition is that we think we can stand before kings and just act like we can say whatever we want , as we will in the name of God.”
The Rev. Budde of the Episcopal Diocese of Washington was among several religious leaders who spoke at Tuesday’s National Prayer Service. She was a previous critic of Trump and the US government after the death of George Floyd.
Left: President Donald Trump speaks as he signs executive orders in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, DC, Monday, Jan. 20, 2025; Right: Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde delivers a sermon during the National Prayer Service at Washington National Cathedral on January 21, 2025 in Washington, DC (Left: Jim Lo Scalzo/EPA/Bloomberg via Getty Images; Right: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
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Budde’s sermon first focused on “unity,” but then her remarks turned to immigrants and LGBTQ youth.
Budde addressed the president directly, saying, “Let me ask you one more time, Mr. President, millions have placed 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 beg you for mercy to people in our country who are afraid. There are gays, lesbians and transgender children in Democratic and Republican and independent families, some fearing for their lives.”
Trump and Vice President JD Vance appear to have been irritated by the bishop’s sermon.
Budde further explained that “the vast majority of immigrants are not criminals.”
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“They pay their taxes and are good neighbors,” Budde said. She further said, “They are faithful members of our churches and mosques, synagogues… and temples.”
180 Church Pastor Lorenzo Sewell delivers a blessing after President Donald Trump is sworn in during the 60th presidential inauguration in the Rotunda of the U.S. Capitol in Washington, Monday, Jan. 20, 2025. (Saul Loeb/Pool Photo via AP)
The reverend asked Trump to have “grace to those in our communities whose children fear their parents will be taken from them, and to help those fleeing war zones of persecution in their own countries to find compassion and welcome, our God teaches us that we must be merciful to the stranger”.
after, Trump joined the Truth Social to condemn Budde’s performance, suggesting that she and her church should apologize to the public.
Sewell was in the audience “sitting with the first family” as Budde preached. He described her speech as a “political agenda”.
“She not only did not preach the texts of the Holy Scriptures, not only did she not use her opportunity to preach to the death, to deal with the resurrection of Jesus Christ, but quite frankly, she took a political program, imposed it and acted as if she were speaking in for God’s sake,” Sewell said.
“She said, in the name of our God, as if God was speaking through her. In terms of immigration, as if God was speaking through her, as if it related to the LGBTQ+ community. She spoke as if God was speaking through her. her to the president of the United States of America .”
Sewell told Fox News Digital that “we have to make sure our faith communities are educated.”
“Now, if she had a solution, if she was talking about how church and state could work together to ensure that people could get a clear path to citizenship, that would make sense,” he said.
Sewell also shared with Fox News Digital what it was like to pray for the country after Trump was sworn in during the 60th presidential inauguration on the same day as Martin Luther King Jr. Day.
Sewell often emphasized the speech of Dr. King’s “I Have a Dream”.
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Pastor Lorenzo Sewell speaks on Day 4 of the Republican National Convention (RNC), at the Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, USA on July 18, 2024. (REUTERS/Brian Snyder)
“It was Dr. King’s birthday. What does it look like for black Americans to get out of the nightmare they’re in so we can live the dream? Remember, Dr. King, he made the law through his spiritual and political activism,” he told Fox News Digital.
“The Bible says that faith without works is dead. So my prayer was prophetic. But my prayer was also very practical as it relates to what we expect from our 47th president in this incredible administration.”
He told Fox News Digital that Trump personally asked him if he could to pray at the inauguration.
Sewell, a Republican, spoke at the last Republican National Convention in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, in July. He endorsed Trump in the 2024 presidential election and hosted the then-GOP presidential candidate at his Detroit church last summer.
