✝️ Faith, PR, and the Project 2025 Pipeline
This one's long guys...
It Started with a Simple Comment:
“Hi Top! I support Trump and the last poll showed he has obtained a National approval rating of 88 percent… Among just the, ‘cult’ Republicans it’s 92 percent. CNN stats, not mine! If I’m in a cult it’s a damn good America First cult and I’m proud to be a member.” — Hermit Hank
Hank came in respectfully. No insults, no all‑caps rage—just his view.
But what he shared is a perfect snapshot of the crossroads we’re at in this country: data versus loyalty, faith versus accountability, and the pipelines quietly being built to cement it all in place.
📊 Polls, PR, and Manufactured Reality
Hank cited numbers—big ones.
Numbers that sound impressive, even overwhelming: 88% national approval. 92% among “cult Republicans.” On the surface, it sounds like a tidal wave.
But if you’ve followed politics for more than five minutes, you know numbers can lie—or, more accurately, they can be made to lie. Over the past year, Trump’s inner circle has quietly frozen out multiple reputable pollsters because they didn’t like the results.
Firms that produced anything less than glowing numbers found themselves cut off. What’s left are cherry‑picked or campaign‑funded “push polls,” engineered to look sky‑high for the evening news.
Even CNN—the outlet Hank invoked—has publicly warned viewers that a poll is only as trustworthy as its methodology, sample size, and transparency. Without that context, a poll becomes a propaganda tool, not a snapshot of reality.
And this isn’t new.
Authoritarians throughout history have used selective polling as a show of strength. Dictatorships parade 99% approval ratings as proof of righteousness. In a functioning democracy, we’re supposed to know better.
When a campaign controls who’s hired to collect data and who’s fired for being honest, you’re not seeing reality—you’re seeing public relations data bits.
And if we’re going to call ourselves proud Americans first, then we should demand real data—not numbers manufactured to keep a base fired up. Even a self‑described “cult,” if that’s the word you’re embracing, deserves the truth.
✝️ The Conversation Shifts: From Numbers to Divine Right
After I pointed out the numbers issues, Hank replied—not with more data, but with something deeper and far more revealing:
“I believe in the United States Constitution. And believe it was/is influenced by GOD and written by men that believed in Jesus Christ. I also believe that GOD has initiated, through His followers, a TRUTH that is overcoming Satan and his followers…”
That’s not just patriotism.
That’s claiming a spiritual mandate over our political system.
It’s one thing to say you like a candidate’s policies. It’s another to declare that your candidate is chosen by God, that the Constitution itself is a divinely dictated document (on par with the bible), and that opposing voices are actually agents of evil. At that point in the conversation, we’ve left the realm of civic debate and stepped into something far older—and far more dangerous.
⚠️ Manifest Destiny, Rebranded
This has already happened in this country. We called it Manifest Destiny…
Declaring that God’s will is woven into our Constitution?
That’s the same logic that fueled Manifest Destiny—the 19th‑century doctrine that America was divinely chosen to expand its borders, no matter the cost.
That belief justified:
Wars of aggression against Mexico,
The displacement and slaughter of Native peoples,
The theft of land and erasure of entire cultures,
Centuries of subjugation of people branded up as “God’s plan.”
It was wrong then.
It’s wrong now.
The framers of the Constitution were indeed religious men, but they deliberately separated church and state.
They wrote, debated, and revised—not scripture, but a legal framework built on compromise and accountability.
They designed a system meant to check power, not sanctify it.
When we start citing God as the reason our political team should win, we’re no longer debating policy—we’re wading into holy war territory. And once you’ve declared that your side is righteous by divine design, you’ve closed the door on accountability, on facts, and on the voices of anyone outside your circle.
✝️ My Lens as a Cradle Catholic
I can’t read Hank’s words—or watch Project 2025’s rise—without filtering it through my own experience.
As I’ve previously stated…I’m a cradle Catholic.
Baptized by a monsignor.
First reconciliation and first communion by second grade.
I walked the halls of Catholic schools from Pre‑K to my senior year of high school.
I can still hear the pipe organ booming during Mass, the cadence of the Nicene Creed recited in unison. I’ve raised my own kids in those same sacraments.
Because of that, I know how faith can guide a life. I know what it means to serve, to see Christ in the marginalized, to treat every life with dignity. But I’ve also watched how easily that same faith can be twisted into a political sword.
In the 1990s, Pope John Paul II’s anti‑abortion messaging dominated Catholic schools. Assemblies, Christian concerts, even optional field trips to D.C. were structured to push a single political outcome. My mom was pro‑choice, so I didn’t go—but I watched classmates turn the faith we shared into a weapon against others.
Later, as an adult and veteran, I watched homilies morph into political rallies. I watched priests trade reflections on mercy for rants about party platforms. I walked away, not from faith itself, but from institutions that forgot what faith was for.
So when I see Project 2025 and its Project Esther pipeline weaponizing Christianity to cement political control, I don’t just disagree—I feel sick.
Because I’ve seen it before.
And I know who gets hurt.
🚦 Project 2025: The Blueprint for Control
The Heritage Foundation’s Mandate for Leadership 2025 doesn’t hide its intentions:
“Conservatives must be ready to flood the zone with personnel who share our values.”
It’s not just about cutting taxes or tweaking regulations. It’s about rebuilding the administrative state in their own image by filling agencies with handpicked ideologues.
To make that happen, they’ve built the Presidential Personnel Project—a massive database of pre‑approved candidates ready to slide into thousands of federal jobs on Day One.
And that’s where Project Esther quietly comes in.
🌱 Project Esther: Recruiting Faith as a Weapon
Project Esther is the soft‑power recruitment pipeline for Project 2025.
It’s named for the biblical Queen who used her access to save her people—but in this context, it’s about embedding ideological foot soldiers in every federal agency.
At faith‑based conferences, speakers urge conservative Christian women to see public service as a divine mission:
“God has placed you here for such a time as this… to serve in government, to reclaim America.”
These are not neutral calls to service. These sessions filter for hardline stances:
Oppose abortion and reproductive autonomy,
Fight LGBTQ protections,
Support dismantling public education in favor of vouchers for religious schools.
Resumés are gathered, vetted for ideology, and funneled into Heritage’s network. On Inauguration Day, those names are ready for deployment—quietly, efficiently, and far from the public eye.
🧩 Pre‑Vetted: From Senators to Staffers
Look at Josh Hawley and JD Vance—two men who aren’t just aligned with Heritage, they’re products of it.
Hawley was tied to Heritage before his Senate career. He headlines their events, pushes their culture‑war agenda, and mouths their talking points verbatim.
Vance is a Heritage darling, a frequent speaker who openly embraces the nationalist, faith‑based blueprint that Project 2025 represents.
They’re proof of concept.
Project Esther is the same model, scaled down: recruiting school‑board crusaders, ministry leaders, and local activists who have already proven their loyalty. They’re not coming in to broaden democracy—they’re coming in to narrow it.
🏗️ Placement and Execution
Once they’re installed in agencies, the work begins:
Rewriting Title IX to erase LGBTQ protections,
Diverting federal funds away from public schools into religious voucher programs (Missouri JUST started doing this…)
Reshaping advisory boards until only one worldview remains.
It’s not loud like a campaign rally.
It’s not flashy like a viral poll.
It’s the quiet, methodical replacement of a pluralistic government with an ideologically rigid one.
Project Esther is the velvet glove on Project 2025’s iron fist.
🙏 Faith Is Personal.
Policy Must Be Public.
My Catholic upbringing taught me that faith is about mercy, service, and protecting the vulnerable.
Project Esther—and the mindset Hermit Hank voiced—is the opposite.
It’s faith turned into compliance.
It’s PR turned into truth.
It’s the Heritage Foundation’s version of Manifest Destiny, and honestly, it makes me sick.
Once you declare your side righteous by divine design, you’ve closed the door on accountability.
You’ve shut out millions of Americans—Christians, Jews, Muslims, atheists—who are every bit as entitled to a voice in this democracy.
Hank’s pride in a so‑called “cult” isn’t unique.
Project Esther’s recruits aren’t one-off’s.
They’re part of the same strategy: push ideology/ theology via politicians, fill government with loyalists, and call it God’s will.
That should make anyone of faith—and anyone who values democracy—sick to their stomach.
Love of Country Means Demanding Better— from Everyone
Demand transparency in polling and methodology.
Hold leaders accountable, no matter their party or their prayers.
Keep faith personal, not political.
The Constitution is ours, not a divine permission slip for any one movement.
Facts matter. Don’t settle for Garbage dressed up as Religion.
📚 Sources
Heritage Foundation – Mandate for Leadership 2025
Heritage Presidential Personnel Project briefings
Faith Wins / Family Research Council materials on Project Esther
CNN Polling Methodology and warnings
Historical context: Manifest Destiny and separation of church & state