Wayne Baker, a professor at the University of Michigan who runs a blog called “Our Values” at the website “Read the Spirit,” is running a five-part series this week on Was America Founded as a Christian Nation: A Historical Introduction. Baker writes:
We Americans debate our values so strongly because values matter—values help us understand who we are, what we have in common, and where we are going. Our history is a part of the story of our values. That’s why debates about the founding of the nation are relevant today. With the 2012 elections looming, this debate about the founders’ story is heating up once again.
“Was America founded as a Christian nation?” Historian John Fea has tackled this question in a thoughtful new book by that title. One angle he takes is focused on the religious beliefs and practices of the founding fathers. Liberals and conservatives alike can cherry pick quotations from our founding fathers and offer them as proof that our founders were (or weren’t) Christians. Fea’s book is a warning of the hazards of doing so. The reality of our founders’ beliefs and practice is more complex and often more ambiguous. The founders were, in Fea’s words, “an eclectic religious group.” Washington regularly attended church services, for example, but seemed to do so more because it was an opportunity to meet and discuss political matters. His true religious beliefs are a mystery.
Also, tomorrow afternoon I will be interviewed on the John Hall and Kathy Emmons Show on WORD-FM (101.5) in Pittsburgh about the book and my appearance at this weekend’s Jubilee conference. The interview will take place at 5:10pm EST. You can listen live at the station’s website.
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Was America Founded as a Christian Nation?
Although I have read the limited access to the book, Fea's idea of cherry-picking quotes is one of several issues I have with it already.
They aren't just quotes. They are statements made by Congress; just as the Holy Trinity Court explained; organic statements made by the people at large, reflecting the religious views of a Protestant people.
Along with the above mentioned liberties, Fea repeats the same secularist drivel that John Witherspoon was the only clergyman signer of the DOI. Robert Treat Paine and Lyman Hall were also Clergyman, yet not practicing at that time.
Fea misquotes the Treaty of Tripoli:
“As the government of the United States of America is not in any sense founded on the Christian religion.”
In the text there is a semi-colon after religion. The treaty is not referring to the Christian religion. The quote refers to the Christianity of Europe which waged wars and hated muslims. Secularists continue to ignore the semi-colon.
Fea writes on page 5,
“Known as the Second Great Awakening..Theology moved away from a Calvinism..preached most powerfully and popularly by Charles Finney.”
Are you kidding me? Finney wasn't even a Christian! When Timothy Dwight and Jedidiah Morse started the Great Awakening, Finney was 10 years old!
Finney didn't claim to be a Christian until 1824.
I pray your book is more correct than the teaser on Amazon.
This comment has been removed by the author.
OFT: Thanks for your prayers!
And by the way, I just looked at five major American history textbooks and all of them treat Finney in the context of the Second Great Awakening. As a Christian, I would think that you would be pleased to know that most scholarship in the field sees the Second Great Awakening as extending well into the nineteenth century with Finney as one of the primary catalysts in the Burned Over District and elsewhere.
Thanks for the comment. I wish I had more time to respond to all of your remarks. I hope you will read the book soon, but please do so with an open mind.
Finally, if you would like to continue to comment on my blog I hope that you will do so with a little more civility than your previous posts. Thanks.
Finney not part of the 2nd GA? Semicolons? John, I'm betting that you never imagined those objections. Thanks for modeling a gracious response.
OTF: I hope you'll put your money where your mouth is by buying the book, reading it, and then responding to its substance rather than, you know, cherry-picking perceived problems.
John,
My comment about Finney was in the context of your quote, not what the history books say.
Given Finney was not a Christian, I highly doubt Finney was the most powerful or popular preacher. If anything, he led people away from Christ, since he rejected the fundamental biblical teachings regarding the personhood of Jesus Christ.
Brantley, look up the original quote you refer to. It has nothing to do with the Christian religion.
OTF,
Ok, I'll bite–not on the Treaty of Tripoli but on Finney. I took your initial post to mean that Finney was not yet a Christian. But are you really claiming that Finney was not a Christian at all? I am not sure I have ever seen that claim made before, so I'd be interested in your evidence.
I assume that you would level the same charges against some of the more prominent “Founding Fathers” who also had unorthodox Christologies–right?
Brantley,
If you google Finney, it says he rejected the Atonement, Trinity, Deity of Christ, etc.
The older he got, the further from the text of the Bible he went.
Which FF's had unorthodox Christologies?