President Donald Trump frustrated religious conservatives last week when he posted a Truth Social image seemingly depicting him as a Christ-like figure that was widely thought to be equating the commander in chief with Jesus.

The AI-generated image of a man wearing a white robe with a red shawl was later deleted from Trump's social media account. Trump later said he understood the image to be of him, not as Jesus but as a doctor. Then, on April 21, Trump participated in a marathon Bible-reading event, during which he shared a passage from the seventh chapter of 2 Chronicles, an Old Testament scripture about Solomon and the temple.

"If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land," Trump read.

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Trump's complicated relationship with the Bible can be traced back to before he served in government. His Bible reading comes on the heels of a Pew Research poll conducted April 6 through April 12 that found that 7 in 10 Americans say President Donald Trump is not too or not at all religious. In October 2024, 62% of U.S. adults said Trump was not too religious or at all religious, compared with 70% this April.

The Pew Research study also found that Republicans and White evangelical Protestants still believe that Trump will defend their religious beliefs.

Controversy arose following a 2015 Trump interview with Bloomberg Politics reporters Mark Halperin and John Heilemann, when the Republican candidate said he didn't want to "get into specifics" about citing his favorite Bible verse, "Because to me that's very personal."

When asked by one of the "All Due Respect" hosts if he was "an Old Testament guy or a New Testament guy," Trump told Heilemann, "Uh, probably equal. I think it's just an incredible... the whole Bible is an incredible... I joke very much so, they always hold up 'The Art of the Deal,' I say '(It's) my second favorite book of all time.'"

Critics have resurfaced the clip and said that at the time, it sounded like Trump was bluffing.

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His own book, "The Art of the Deal," released in 1987 with ghostwriter Tony Schwartz, is seen as both a memoir and a business manual. Trump has said he was raised in the Presbyterian Church, but in 2020, he told a religious publication he considered himself non-denominational and aligned himself with evangelical Christianity.

Toward the end of his first term as president, he courted controversy for awkwardly handling the holy book.

Former Vice President Joe Biden, then a presidential candidate, criticized Trump for staging a dramatic photo-op outside St. John's Episcopal Church near the W. Two months before he defeated him in the race for the White House, Biden claimed during a CNN town hall that Trump had improperly held a Bible upside down.

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Fact-checking services Snopes and PolitiFact determined this was false and said Trump had held the book right-side up. Four years after his loss to Biden, Trump cruised to victory over Vice President Kamala Harris with broad support from Christian conservatives.

Last week, he upset some conservatives with his comments that Pope Leo XIV, the first American pope, was "weak on crime," "terrible" for foreign policy and needed to shape up. Trump's team pulled down the social media post after backlash about the AI savior image on Truth Social.

And then on Tuesday, April 21, he read from the Bible.

Contributing: Greta Cross

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: As Trump reads from Bible, are his supporters losing faith?