Orange Jesus: The second coming of Donald Trump?

2015 photo of Donald Trump in New Hampshire, running for US President the first time around. (Photo by Michael Vadon via Wikimedia Commons 2.0)

There’s a new Jesus in town and he is a bit orange. #OrangeJesus is now trending on twitter – but in politics, not religion, so it is safe to presume he is more a man with skin issues than God’s son. In a book by US politician Liz Cheney, Oath and Honor, she is said to have quoted Republican Congressman Mark Green from Tennessee calling Donald Trump… an orange Jesus. His exact words are supposed to be, ‘Things we do for Orange Jesus.’

This is not, in case you are wondering, a case of stigmata. Christ’s wounds on the cross are yet to appear anywhere on Trump’s body that we know of. This is just what everyone presumes is Trump’s opinion of Trump – that he is the Almighty. Is he walking on water? Is he turning water to wine? Not yet.

Every century someone somewhere in the world claims to be Jesus, Wikipedia has a whole page on them. From Rhys Evans who was arrested around 1650 for impersonating Christ to Jeff Ayan recently who offered help in locating twin flames, the phenomenon of divine personas is aplenty and cuts through eras. Of course, some of the lord-like figures usually start a cult and sometimes get arrested when major robberies or even murders are traced back to them. Though it is important at this point to note that Trump is said to only think he is God but has not yet changed his surname officially to anything else. Orange Jesus – or OJ – is more a social media nickname as of now.

Meanwhile, this is something he has actually said at some point in his life: ‘You know, when I was running, 2016, Christmas was like you couldn’t say the word. I said the word. And I said we are going to bring back Christmas, and we are going to be saying Christmas.’ Plus, he has referred to himself in the third person before. Some would even say it is a short jump from president to deity.

And since Jesus’s complexion has already gone into many complicated controversies – he could not have been white, claim some historians – orange seems as good a colour as any for heir-claimants without anyone getting into racism debates. Orange, which has been a hair hue both natural and dyed and referred to commonly as ‘ginger’, has rarely appeared as a skin colour except when a fake tan is overdone.

And though there are a lot of important people in America saying many things both dirty and devotional about Trump, who has as many fans as those who are phobic of him, there is a growing suspicion that the only person on bended knee praying feverishly to the Orange Jesus may be the Orange Jesus himself.