In his role as journalist and podcaster, Robin de Wever writes about religion in all its forms. This included working as an editor on the three-part EO TV programme: ‘God, Jesus, Trump’, in which Tijs van der Brink explores why Trump has so many religious supporters despite his narcissism, deception and extra-marital affairs. In his five-part Radio 1 podcast ‘God’s President’, Robin recently travelled through the Bible belt in the US.
Robin spoke to a range of different people and was even witness to ‘circus Trump’. He was preoccupied with the question: how is it that so many people see Trump as their angel of salvation? The series shows what happens if you look at the situation in America through the eyes of evangelicals and how this affected Robin.
Trump through the eyes of conservative Christians
“I have a tendency to ask questions about everything. About what other people think but also about what my own views are. I’m never completely sure about anything. That’s why I think I find religion so interesting. Whenever I talk to someone with very strong convictions about how the world fits together, I always find myself asking: what if you’re actually right?” While making ‘God’s President’, Robin experienced life in America and the culture war between left and right from inside and out. “I wanted to see what effect it has to live your whole day in Trump’s America. How that makes you start thinking. I think it worked: I noticed that I also started thinking differently. Why is Trump so popular among conservative Christians?”
The podcast series takes you on the road with Robin and you start to gain a different picture of people you might have prejudices about at first glance. “You get to know some warm and friendly people who are really hospitable. The feeling I got from their stories was: it could all soon be over and Trump can protect us. That’s interesting, and almost impossible to believe from the perspective of our secularised Dutch society.”
Understanding cultures by studying religion
But is the study of faith still of relevance in the Netherlands? “In the Netherlands, it’s actually really important to gain a good understanding of religion. I often get the impression that many Dutch people see religion as something of the past, but there are still several million believers in this country. And they’re very much in the majority worldwide. If you want to understand other cultures, religions are just unavoidable.”
This is exactly what Robin learnt in his pre-Master’s and Master’s programmes: “Looking at what people believe and researching it. It really enriched me. It’s an endless quest.” The multi-faith environment at VU Amsterdam also helps in this. “During my Master’s programme, I found it really interesting attending lectures with people from different backgrounds. One student would be Protestant, another one a Muslim girl and a few seats back there was an imam. We all sat together in a lecture room.”
Want to know more about Robin’s experiences? View an interview recorded earlier (in Dutch).
