▶ Key Takeaways
- There is a lot of confusion and misunderstanding today about what it means to be a Christian.
- Many who claim to be Christian have never experienced salvation from sin, nor do they have a personal relationship with Jesus.
- Cole Tomas Allen – who attempted to assassinate President Trump and cabinet members at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner – identifies as Christian.
- If he is a Christian, Allen experiences spiritual warfare in his mind between his sin nature and his new nature – as does every Christian.
- Satan seeks to gain access to the mind and poison our thoughts with lies and deceit.
- If a person – whether Christian or non-Christian – doesn’t reject wrong thoughts that enter the mind, Satan builds a fortress of lies.
- When a person believes Satan’s lies, the person’s conscience becomes “seared” or deadened.
- A seared conscience eventually causes moral collapse, resulting in justifying evil and calling it good.
- The ultimate result of a seared conscience is justifying assassination as a heroic act of social justice.
His name is Cole Tomas Allen.
He tried to assassinate President Trump and cabinet members.
And he claims to be a Christian.
He is now in jail – and he asked the judge for a Bible.
What is his real story?
Mr. Allen graduated from Caltech in Pasadena, CA with a degree in Mechanical Engineering.
He has a Master’s Degree in Computer Science.
He is very smart – at least academically.
He worked as a video game designer and as a part-time teacher – and at the age of 31 still lived with his parents.
He was raised in what could be described as a Christian home.
While at Caltech (2013 – 2017), he was actively involved in Caltech Christian Fellowship — a student group that focuses on Bible study, prayer, food and fellowship.
He also attended the United Reformed Church in Pasadena.
His manifesto attempted to justify murder based on his interpretation and application of Christian principles.
How did his moral compass flip so radically?
Here are 8 factors that may have caused Cole Tomas Allen to justify murder in the name of social justice.
- Cole Allen’s conscience became “seared” or deadened.
The apostle Paul warns Timothy—a church pastor – in1Timothy 4 that Christians can have their consciences “seared as with a branding iron” by paying attention to the lies of Satan.
Paul calls Satan’s lies “doctrines of demons.” (1Timothy 4:1-2)
People with a seared conscience will figure out how to repackage evil so that it sounds morally good.
Thus, abortion is justified by calling it “reproductive healthcare.”
Stealing money from one group and giving the money to another group is justified by calling it “social justice,” or “leveling the playing field.”
Racial discrimination is justified by calling it “affirmative action,” or “Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion.”
In Cole Allen’s manifesto, he views President Trump and his cabinet members as oppressors.
He views those whom he believes are suffering under the Trump administration as the oppressed.
From this worldview framework of oppressor and oppressed, Allen says “As a Christian, you should turn the other cheek.”[1]
But then he twists this Sermon-on-the-Mount-principle into “complicity in the oppressor’s crimes” if you are not being oppressed yourself, but instead observing someone else being oppressed.[2]
Jesus never taught any such thing.
In fact, when Jesus was being arrested and Peter pulled out his sword and attempted to defend Jesus from his “oppressors” by attacking the servant of the High Priest, Jesus rebuked Peter (John 18:10-11).
Another Scriptural reference that Allen misunderstands and misinterprets is the statement of Jesus to “yield unto Caesar what is Caesar’s.”[3]
He leaves out the second half of Jesus’ statement and argues that since the “United States of America are ruled by the law…”
And since “representatives and judges do not follow the law, no one is required to yield them anything so unlawfully ordered.”[4]
This is Allen’s justification for violating U.S. federal law…
Which directly contradicts the instructions by the apostle Paul in Romans 13 to obey the governing authorities.
And it totally ignores the main point Jesus was making.
In Matthew 22, the Pharisees attempted to trick Jesus into contradicting himself by asking him if it is lawful for the Jews to pay a poll-tax to Caesar.
After asking them to show him the Roman coin used to pay the tax, Jesus asked, “Whose likeness and inscription is this?”
They answered that it is Caesar’s.
Then Jesus said, “Then render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s.” (Matthew 22:15-21)
What bears the likeness and inscription of God?
People do.
That was Jesus’ point – we belong to God because we bear His image.
- The ultimate result of a seared conscience is justifing assassination.
People with seared consciences eventually experience a complete moral breakdown.
The polarity of their moral compass flips upside down.
Good becomes evil and evil becomes good.
Assassination becomes a heroic act.
This is Satan’s goal – to kill us all by convincing us to kill each other.
Cole Allen stated in his manifesto, “I am no longer willing to permit a pedophile, rapist, and traitor to coat my hands with his crimes.”[5]
Where did he get the ideas that President Trump is a pedophile, a rapist, and a traitor?
He got those ideas from radical Trump-hating politicians, the biased Trump-hating legacy media, and from Trump-hating social media influencers.
This Trump-hating army of radicals has been falsely accusing Donald Trump of heinous crimes for the past decade.
Victor Davis Hanson commented in a recent Daily Signal video regarding Cole Allen’s manifesto:
“It [the manifesto] is a petri dish of all of the conspiracy theories, all the lies, all the rage that’s been promulgated by the Left.”
“And it really is confirmatory evidence that when the Left threatens people, and they come up with all these crazy ideas and they endorse violence, there are people who are very susceptible to that.”[6]
Cole Allen may be a born-again Christian who has experienced a heart relationship with Jesus…
Or he may be a self-identifying Christian whose faith is only intellectual and nothing more.
In either case, his conscience has been seared by lies and unproven theories to the point that he felt compelled to do evil based on those lies.
- Fake Christianity.
There is a lot of confusion and misunderstanding today about what Christianity really is – and about what it really means to be a Christian.
Is Cole Allen really a Christian?
We don’t actually know.
He grew up in a family that was active in a United Reformed Church – which is a conservative, biblically-based denomination.
He was involved in a Christian fellowship when he was a student at Caltech.
His friends at Caltech thought he was a Christian.
He implies in his manifesto that he is a Christian.
But has he ever received Christ into his life as his Savior and Lord and been born spiritually? (John 1:12-13)
He didn’t say anything about his relationship with God or Jesus in his manifesto.
We can only listen to what other people say, and observe how they act.
We cannot see what’s inside a person’s heart.
Most people who believe in God call themselves Christians.
But that doesn’t mean they know what they are talking about.
- Real Christianity.
Real Christianity is not a set of rules to live by…
It’s not a list of beliefs to agree with…
It’s not even a set of creeds or prayers to recite.
Real Christianity is a personal relationship with the Creator of the universe – and with our own Creator – who loves us so much that He gave His life for us.
The name “Christian” was coined by the Greek-speaking Gentiles in Syrian Antioch in about 37 AD (Acts 11:26).
It was a derogatory nickname or label used to mock those who followed Christ – “those of the party of Christ.”
In the early days of Christianity, identifying as a Christian resulted in persecution and often death.
Christians living in Muslim-majority and communist/socialist countries today understand the risks and the dangers of identifying as Christian…
We in the U.S. – with few exceptions – do not.
But Jesus himself made it clear to everyone that following him entailed total commitment:
“And he was saying to them all. ‘If anyone wishes to come after me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake, he is the one who will save it.’” (Luke 9:23-24)
A cross is an instrument of death – but not necessarily physical death.
The cross for Jesus was physical – it meant maximum physical torture and death for him.
As followers of Jesus – because of what he did for us – he expects us to be willing to deny our own selfish desires, our self-promotion, our agenda – to “die” to self.
That’s what it means to take up our cross daily.
It’s a daily commitment.
That’s what it means to be a Christian…
That is real Christianity.
- Spiritual warfare.
The term “born again” comes from an encounter Jesus had in John 3 with Nicodemus – described as “a ruler of the Jews.”
A person who has been “born again” has two natures at war in the mind – a sin nature that wants to act selfishly at the expense of others – and a new nature that wants to obey God.
The apostles Paul, Peter and John address the spiritual warfare throughout the New Testament.
Some examples:
- Romans chapters 6, 7 and 8
- 2 Corinthians 10:3-5
- Galatians 5:16-25
- 1 Peter 5:8-9
We can “feed” and strengthen and grow the new nature by:
- Reading and studying God’s word.
- Meditating on God’s word and memorizing it.
- Spending time with other committed Christians.
- Getting involved in a strong Bible-centered church.
- Worshipping God through Christian music.
- Praying and asking the Holy Spirit to work in our lives.
The sin nature that we are all born with is fed by:
- Social media
- Teachers and podcasters
- Racist and DEI messaging
- Most advertising
- Biased legacy news reporting
- Most movies and entertainment
The spiritual warfare that Christians experience is continuous – day in and day out.
It’s a battle for control of the mind…
And whichever nature is fed the most will win the most.
- How Satan seeks to gain access to the mind.
Satan uses these and other strategies to try to gain access to the mind of every person – especially those who are Christians.
One of the messages that we are bombarded with every day by all of the messaging entities listed above is that there are two types of people in the world – those who are oppressors, and those who are oppressed.
This is the message of Mamdani and the socialists.
It’s the same message Satan used to entice and deceive Eve in the Garden of Eden:
“God is oppressing you by withholding from you the fruit of this one tree.”
Although no one can prevent selfish, sinful, evil thoughts from entering their mind…
A Christian doesn’t have to let them take up residence and live there.
We do have a choice.
The apostle Peter encourages Christians:
“Be of sober spirit, be on the alert. Your adversary, the devil, prowls about like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. But resist him, firm in your faith…” (1 Peter 5:8-9a)
How can a Christian resist the devil?
By substituting God’s thoughts – from His word – for the devil’s thoughts…
And by feeding the new nature… and starving the sin nature.
How can a non-Christian resist the devil?
By appealing to one’s God-given conscience.
But what if a person doesn’t resist the devil and remove the thoughts he puts in the person’s mind?
- How Satan builds a stronghold in the mind.
A wrong or immoral or evil thought that enters the mind – and is not immediately pushed out either by conscience or by God’s word – begins to fester and grow.
If it is allowed to persist, the thought takes root and begins to lead to other wrong thoughts.
Before long, Satan will build what the apostle Paul describes as a “stronghold” – a structure of lies and deceptions that can be difficult to remove.
Paul says, “For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war according to the flesh, for the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh, but divinely powerful for the destruction of strongholds (fortresses). We are destroying speculations and every lofty thing raised up against the knowledge of God, and we are taking every thought captive to the obedience of Christ…”
(2 Corinthians 10:3-5)
For someone with a church upbringing – such as Cole Allen – Satan will begin in the mind by inserting a doubt followed by a lie.
Here are some examples:
- Doubt: Can I really trust the Bible to be the inerrant Word of God?
- Lie: No. It is full of errors and contradictions. It is full of man’s made-up ideas about God.
- Doubt: Is God really a good and loving God?
- Lie: No. If he was good, he wouldn’t allow so much evil in the world. And if he were loving, he wouldn’t have allowed so much killing in the Old Testament, and he wouldn’t send people to hell.
This is the same tactic he used with Eve in the Garden:
- Doubt: “Did God really say…?”
- Lie: “You shall not surely die!”
- How the conscience becomes deadened.
Satan is a liar and the father of lies (John 8:44).
If anyone – Christian or non-Christian – begins to believe Satan’s lies instead of the moral truths of the conscience that God has put within each of us, eventually that person’s conscience will be “seared” – that is, deadened.
The apostle Paul warned Timothy, “But the Spirit explicitly says that in later times some will fall away from the faith, paying attention to deceitful spirits and doctrines of demons, by means of the hypocrisy of liars seared in their own conscience as with a branding iron…” (1Timothy 4:1-2)
A seared conscience will cause a Christian to fall away from the Christian faith without realizing it.
Scripture will be reinterpreted and misinterpreted to justify beliefs and actions that would never have been considered previously.
This is what happened to Cole Allen.
What do you think? Email me at [email protected].
FAQs:
Q: What is the difference between a fake Christian and a real Christian?
A. A fake Christian believes with the mind only but has never experienced a heart relationship with God. A real Christian has received Christ as Savior and Lord (John 1:12-13) and has a personal relationship with God through Christ.
Q: Why do Christians experience spiritual warfare?
A. Christians have two opposing natures or tendencies: the sin nature they are physically born with, and the new nature they are given when they are born spiritually (2 Corinthians 5:17).
Q: How does Satan attack both Christians and non-Christians?
A. Satan tries to gain access to the mind and introduce lies. This is easy to do with a non-Christian because there is no barrier blocking his access. He works much harder to break into the mind of a Christian because of the new nature. A Christian must give Satan access.
Q: What happens when a Christian entertains a wrong thought and doesn’t remove it?
A. When Satan is allowed continuous access to the mind, he builds strongholds or fortresses of lies and speculations. (2 Corinthians 10:3-5)
Q: What happens when Satan’s strongholds in the mind are not destroyed?
A. Strongholds of lies and speculations eventually sear and deaden the conscience, resulting in moral collapse and justifying evil actions.
About Craig Huey:
Craig Huey is a longtime direct-response marketing strategist and publisher who focuses on the intersection of faith, politics, culture, and economic freedom. He is president of ElectionForum.org and the founder of Creative Direct Marketing Group (CDMG), where his team has tested thousands of marketing variables and earned more than 100 industry awards. Craig publishes commentary at CraigHuey.com and co-hosts media projects that equip Americans to understand what’s happening—and what to do next.
[1] Steven Nelson and Chris Nesi, https://nypost.com/2026/04/26/us-news/read-whcd-gunman-cole-allens-full-anti-trump-manifesto/
[2] Ibid.
[3] Ibid.
[4] Ibid.
[5] Ibid.