June 07
Was America founded as a Christian nation?
By John FeaPage:
- 1
- 2
I have spent a good portion of 2011 and 2012 on the road and on the radio waves promoting my book Was America Founded as a Christian Nation? In the process, I have learned a lot about what Americans think about the founding of the United States. Many people have been thoughtful, open-minded and willing to listen to my interpretation of the relationship between Christianity and the American Revolution. Others have not.
I have been keeping a journal to reflect on what my encounters with “Christian America” tell us about how American evangelicals, and Americans more broadly, engage the past. Here are a few of the more interesting things that have happened to me recently:
— In a talk to a group of mainline Protestant clergy I was accused of anti-Catholicism for quoting John Adams. Fortunately, cooler heads prevailed and the other ministers in attendance explained to their colleague that I was not personally endorsing anti-Catholic views, but only trying to make the point that the worldview of some founders, particularly Adams, was profoundly anti-Catholic.
— A conservative talk radio host in Orange County, Calif., asked me if the founding fathers would have opposed the placing of American flags near gravestones at Arlington National Cemetery. (There was apparently a news story dealing with this issue at the time of my interview.) When I said that I did not know, he went off on a tirade about how liberal history professors were destroying this country. At one of the commercial breaks (off the air), he changed to a friendly tone of voice and praised my answer to his question. He said that the interview was “going well” and called it “one of the best I have done in a long time.” When we returned from the break he continued his tirade.
— A syndicated Christian radio host asked me if I thought Thomas Jefferson was a Christian. When I said that it is hard to label a person “Christian” who rejects the resurrection of Jesus Christ, he responded, “Well, he may not have been a Christian, but he was a believer!” (He then promptly cut to commercial break before I had a chance to respond.) I am still trying to get my head around this one.
— A Christian podcaster conducted a one-hour interview with me as her dog barked relentlessly in the background. I am assuming the canine did not like the answer to the question in the title of my book.
— A talk radio host in Atlanta asked me if I was a Christian. I said yes, fully expecting him to ask how a Christian could not endorse the idea that America was founded as a Christian nation. Instead, he asked me if I had ever heard “Jesus Freak,” a song made popular by the Christian rap group D.C. Talk. When I told him that I had indeed heard the song, he seemed rather excited and started talking about D.C. Talk with his co-host/sidekick. He then took a commercial break, and when he came back on the air for the second half of the interview he played “Jesus Freak” and announced, “This one is for you, professor!”
— A Christian radio host asked me to define George Washington’s position on abortion.
— During the Q&A following a talk to a group of youth workers in Minneapolis, a man said that he would not buy my book unless I told him what I thought of David Barton. No sale was made.
— After hearing me talk about Was America Founded as a Christian Nation? at Colonial Williamsburg, a man asked me if Messiah College “was still a Christian college?” At the same lecture, a woman wanted to know if I believed in “collective salvation like Barack Obama.”
Page:
- 1
- 2
Comments
-
America wasn't founded as a CHRISTIAN nation. There is no such thing. It wasn't then and it isn't now.
Strange, but true, England (our Mother country) considered herself a Christian nation under a divinely anointed King. Christianity (Church of England) was and is the State Church. Does that make England a CHRISTIAN nation???
-
I was in tears by the time I got to your last comment, which was by far the funniest. Given the brainpower of your previous audiences/interrogators, this audience probably thought you, in your somewhat disheveled and disoriented state, were a genius! No disagreements that day, eh? Seriously, hope your ankle healed well - I did a flight of stairs once so I have no idea how you carried on.
-
With all the global and economic turmoil going on, I don’t understand why the MWR editors consider this issue of deep concern to current Anabaptists & Mennonites. What this article does not do is define Christian. What I read from other MWR articles is that you are really not a fully developed Christian unless your beliefs satisfy the Anabaptist measuring stick. I believe there are core Bible principles that identify Christians from the world therefore I will use the word Christian in that context.
The Church was birthed at Pentecost under the anointing of the Holy Spirit. No, this nation was not birthed under similar conditions as the Church. However it was founded by people who were seeking religious freedom to freely worship God in the dictates of their conscience, had strong Biblical family values and by nation leaders who freely and openly had a deep respect for God of the Bible. Look at the reference to God in the preamble in all the state constitutions.
The Bible says, ‘Righteousness exalts a nation but sin is a reproach to any people. In the birthing process of this nation and many years thereafter, God did openly bless this nation as no other nation.
When you consider that the vast majority of the early settlers were Christian, that our churches were almost exclusively Christian, that our civil leaders considered themselves to be Christian and were often required to adhere to fundamental Christian doctrine in order to hold public office, that civil governments were established on covenants and constitutions based on Biblical teachings and principles, that the schools were taught from the Bible and other primary texts like the New England Primer that drew heavily on Scripture, that our most important founding documents like the Declaration of Independence referred very specifically to the Christian God on four different places, and that even the U.S. Supreme Court concluded in 1892, after an extensive review of historical documents, that America was indeed a Christian nation. Therefore, I believe we can conclude that the United States of America was founded as a nation by people having strong Christian values as no other nation.
Comment on the blog post Was America founded as a Christian nation?
Please keep comments civil. MWR editors reserve the right to remove any comment. When posting a comment, you agree to the MWR Comments Policy. Name and comment will be posted; commenters are strongly encouraged to give their full name. Email address is for follow-up only and will not be made public.
Download