DELIBERATELY DIVERSE | Rev. Jim Newman
“Deliberately Diverse” represents the individual thoughts and opinions of a group of Taylor friends who almost never fully agree about anything but are grateful for the opportunity to stimulate deliberately diverse discussions in our beloved community.
Today’s column contains the thoughts and opinions of the Rev. Jim Newman (PCUSA retired) and not the Taylor Press.
Is the United States a “Christian nation?” Is there anything in our Constitution that gives special treatment or preference to Christianity? Did the founders intend to create a government that gave special recognition to Christianity? The answer to these questions is no. The Constitution is a wholly secular document. It refers to religion only twice, in the First Amendment, which bars laws “respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,”’ and in Article VI, which prohibits any “religious test” for public office. The country was not founded to be Christian or even religious.
The founders didn’t create a secular government because they disliked Christianity or any religion. Many were believers and several were clergymen, but they knew the dangers of a government mandating an official religion. They had seen devastating religious wars in Europe, and the oppression of colonial governments which required particular forms of religious
observance. Thomas Jefferson and James Madison ended Virginia’s establishment of the Anglican Church with the passage of the Virginia Statue of Religious Liberty guaranteeing religious freedom to all. Jefferson and Madison’s viewpoint carried the day when the Constitution and the Bill of Rights were debated and adopted. Jefferson proclaimed that the First Amendment built a “wall of separation of church and state.”
President George Washington, in a 1790 letter to a Jewish congregation in Rhode Island, celebrated that Jews had complete freedom of worship in America, noting that “all possess alike liberty of conscience and immunities of citizenship.” His administration later negotiated a treaty with the Muslim ruler of North Africa that specifically stated that the United States was not a Christian nation, and the Treaty of Tripoli was unanimously approved by the Senate.
Throughout our history, factions of Christian nationalists have fought against the time-tested separation of church and state, but all their efforts have failed because they were not in keeping with the founding spirit of the nation.
America’s religious diversity has greatly expanded since our founding. The number of Jews has increased.
There are more Muslims living and worshipping in America. The country is welcoming high numbers of Hindus and Buddhists. The fastest growing segment of Americans say they have no specific religious faith, or identify as atheists, agnostics or humanists. Scholars have identified over 2,000 distinct religious groups in America.
Even though most Americans identify as Christian, the vast majority do not back official government recognition of the Christian faith or any other. They are staunch supporters of the Constitution’s guaranty of the principle of separation of church and state and the religious liberty it protects.
