Trump reaches out to religious leaders, tries to convince voters he has faith

Republican presidential frontrunner Donald Trump has faith -- or at least he is trying to convince Republican voters that he does.

Trump made a new effort Saturday to show he has support within the faith community, a key part of the GOP voting bloc he will need to help win the party nomination.

At a press conference before his rally in Norcross, Ga., Trump was joined by several dozen Evangelical and African-American church leaders in a bid to explain why religious officials are behind his candidacy.

“I don’t know what type of legislator he would be,” said the Rev. Dr. Darrell Scott, a minister from Cleveland, Ohio. “But I know one thing, he is a hell of a chief executive. He's a heck of a guy."

Scott, who was sporting a "Make America Great Again" hat, met with Trump in late September and with other religious figures to discuss the billionaire businessman's ties to faith. 

Bishop George Bloomer, from Durham, N.C., suggested Saturday that his connection to Trump and his firebrand campaign rhetoric is “a spiritual thing.”

“Scripture about fire, purifying and consuming, Bloomer said, “what determines if it is consuming is what you put in it. It’s time for us to have somebody to bring jobs to this nation and look out for the Christians.”  

Trump has said that the Bible is very important to him and even showed it off to a crowd at an event last month hosted by the Family Research Council.

"Some evangelical leaders believe that Christians are abandoning their values if they support Trump,” Robert Jeffress, a pastor with the First Baptist Dallas in Texas, told FoxNews.com. “I think that is much too harsh of a judgment."

Jeffress, who has also met with Trump in the past but hasn't made an endorsement, says religious voters know Trump won't "be leading Bible studies in the Oval Office."

But they are focused on picking a "leader who will solve problems -- and rightly or wrongly they assume Trump is the person to do it,” he said.

Trump perhaps might be visiting African-American churches in the near future. When Scott suggested he needs to see their houses of worship and meet their parishioners, Trump said, "Yeah, I got to do that.”