How Christian is America?

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Few themes in public discussions are more guaranteed to arouse emotion than the assertion that America is a Christian nation. As non-Christian religious groups increase their percentage of the general population, as atheists, criminals, immigrants, and gays receive non-discriminatory advantages, and as immorality appears rampant, Christians become anxious about losing the dominance in American culture and politics they once enjoyed. One enticing way to respond to this challenge is to avow that any perceived drift away from the principles of our founding fathers, who were Christians, is both a betrayal of our political heritage and a falling away from God's grace. To accept that we no longer are a Christian nation is to give up our blest distinctiveness, it seems, and betray our divinely manifest destiny.

There is no want of evidence that our nation is navigating treacherous shoals today. But if we do not guard against making use of Christianity for variant political agendas, we run the risk of bastardizing the meaning of our heritage. If we really are and have been, at least until now, a Christian people, are those who sound the warnings about looming apostasy credible? Can we trust them to safely pilot us back into the strong current charted by our virtuous founders?

We are told in I John 4:18 that "perfect love casts out fear," but less recognized is the reverse, that fear can cast out love, along with good sense. Does the call to reclaim the fundamentals of our spiritual/political heritage reflect the teachings of the New Testament and the catechism of our Constitution? Let's put this call to the test.

First, let me reshape the question slightly. there is no doubt that Christianity informed our founding fathers and has inspired the best in us as a nation. If those who think we are "losing it" do personally represent what we should "return to," then let's ask not how Christian is America, but rather, how Christian are our would-be mentors today? If they pass the test, let's gather round them. If not, the Christian legacy they display is fool's gold, and they are illegitimate custodians of our heritage.

Here are some key areas on which many Christians feel our stature as a Christian nation stands or falls. I'll flip the light on so we can inspect them.

1. Social programs (Health Care)

2. Tolerance (Enemy combatants, Muslims, Gays, Immigrants)

3. Law enforcement (Enemy combatants, Illegal immigrants, Ethnic profiling)
4. Capitalist enterprise

5. War

I. Social Programs.

A. What I hear Christians saying:

1. Health Care.

Universal health care is unAmerican, because the added numbers of patients will

gum up the availability of doctors, equipment, and facilities, and make my own requests
for care more inconvenient.

2. National Debt.

Government bailouts for corporations that are "too big to fail" are alright, but paying

the cost of health insurance for millions of individuals "too poor to join" will irresponsibly

increase our national debt. The necessary rise in taxes will then unfairly cost me more.

.

[The message here is that, if some draw the short stick, too bad for them. I'll take

care of myself. Those who suffer want can blame themselves anyway.

The good Samaritan would not fit into this "Christian" America. And Jesus himself

would have been out of place in our country feeding, for free, 5,000 people who couldn't

think ahead to bring their own lunch.]

B. What the Bible Says:

Jesus famously disregarded the cherished social stereotypes of his day. He befriended
prostitutes, gave healing touches to lepers, counseled with inquisitive rulers and high

officials, taught in the synagogue, dined with known sinners, elevated women and children.

In his mind, neither social position, reputation, title, intelligence, talent, age, nor gender set

anyone apart. With all social, ethnic, career or financial curtains lowered, he devoted his

time and energies ministering to any and all without contracts, validation papers,

stipulations, or pre-agreements. He asked no qualifying questions and withheld his
ministrations from no one. You asked, he gave; and expected his followers to do the same.

(The stories are too familiar to need chapter and verse references; where would I

begin?)

II. Tolerance

A. What I hear Christians saying:

1. Americans first.

I am an American before I am a world citizen. Americans are something special. Our

President should not be traveling around the world kissing up to other national leaders

whose interests and policies are not in line with ours. We have fought for our position as

strongest nation and beacon of light. We have earned the right to call the shots and

define for ourselves how to protect and further our chosen interests.

2. Enemies.
Our constitutional standards and international laws do not apply to "enemy

combatants." With no legal standing in our system, we can treat these undesirables as

our understandable emotions dictate. They won't make it into heaven, so we might as

well inflict God's arbitrary judgment on them now.

3. Muslims.

After the attack on the World Trade Towers, we should have zero tolerance toward

Muslims. Certainly the plan to build a mosque near ground zero is an insult to families

and survivors of the massacre of innocent Americans, and it should be stopped. That

those who would worship there had nothing to do with the attack, and that most Muslims

do not condone such actions, does not matter. A Muslim is a Muslim as assuredly as all

humans are sinners.

4. Gays.

The same goes for this group. One gay person is as bad as another. The very fact

of being gay, makes one guilty of all the sinful perversions gays engage in. If you have not

done "it" yet, you want to and will. If our Christian founding fathers had known 10% of

their population were gays in the closet, they would have included restraints on them in

the Constitution.

5. Ethnic profiling.

This limitation of rights is a disadvantage any group unwilling to assimilate into our

Anglo-Saxon, Protestant traditions should learn to accept. Raising our children in the

American way is hard enough without enduring the presence and irritations of minority

groups. When their language and accent, skin tone, dress, odd ceremonies, or other

peculiarities make the rest of us uncomfortable, they should have the decency to stay

out of view and not make demands.

B. What the Bible says:

Love your neighbor as yourself (Mark 12:31). Do to others as you would have them

do to you (Luke 6:31). Don't consider yourself better than others (Matt. :5). Go into all the

world, including the gentiles, and preach the good news (Mark 16:15; Rom. 11:13-21). If

your brother eats food you don't eat, join with him to not give offense (1 Cor. 8:13). Don't

fall into the hypocrisy of ignoring the log in your own eye while pointing out the splinter in

someone else's eye (Luke 6:41). Forgive those who oppose you for they are not aware of

the full meaning of what they do (Luke 23:32; Matt. 5:38-40).

III. Law Enforcement

A. What I hear Christians say:

"Enemy combatants" should not be granted any considerations, whether it be access to a

lawyer, a day in court, the right of habeas corpus, or freedom from torture. Torture is not

torture when justified--when the captive deserves it.

.

Ethnic profiling applied for black skin, brown skin, or Arabic features is an inconvenience

that citizens should accept as a cost for being different. The safety of our people is too

important to allow observance of legal niceties.

.

Illegal immigrants should be denied all rights allotted to citizens; and any benefits or

concessions should be withheld. Upon being caught they should be deported post haste.

B. What the Bible says:

If someone steals your coat, add your shirt to his take; if he hits you, drop your dukes.

Look at law suits against you, and other inconveniences, as opportunities. (Matt. 5:38-42,

(Luke 6:27).

Considering God's people had experienced mistreatment as aliens in Egypt, the

Israelites were enjoined to not oppress or mistreat any aliens in their midst. (Ex. 25:21).

IV. Capitalist Enterprise.

A. What I hear Christians saying:

Jesus said ask and you will receive. Americans are free to ask, and it is God's will that

we receive wealth and prosperity, that is if we are willing to work for it. Our capitalist

system is the vehicle. Those who are not enterprising enough to put action to their asking

are disqualified from the benefits of the formula. If you don't work, you don't deserve to

eat.

.

Our country's international economic dominance is a sign of God's blessing on capitalism,

but spending billions of dollars to benefit those who do not contribute to the program of

"invest and enjoy" puts an unfair and unconscionable drag on all of us. Parasitism defeats

capitalism and hinders the fulfillment of God's blessing.

.

As practiced in America, the operative notion of capitalism, one can impute, is that profit

comes at someone's expense. The sellers make money from the buyers; investors make

money charging interest. Capitalist-practicing Christians are proud to point out that the

profit and loss statement is a measure of how good ones entrepreneurial skills are.

.

Those who work for hourly wages are chaff. Chaff is necessary to protect the seed and

preserve a good crop, but chaff is not what the value of the harvest is based on. Capitalism

puts the premium on seed sowing. Coddling the chaff turns the system upside down.

.

B. What the Bible says:

When the rich young ruler sought Jesus' counsel on how to be righteous, Jesus told him

to give away his money to the poor. He did not ask this gentleman to give up his civil

leadership status and pick some worthy projects for his money. He intuited that the

problem was his use of money as a crutch. To Jesus, wealth was a severe handicap for

righteous living (Luke 18:22). Remember the camel struggling to squeeze through the eye

of the needle (Mark 10:25), and the judgment that Jesus said waited the oppressors of the

poor, meaning the rich (James 2:6-8).

.

Money is not the root of evil in its tangible, inanimate form. But it is the lubricant of

selfish immaturity, ungodly hoarding, grasping for advantage, discourteous patronizing,

unethical practices, and other unspiritual behaviour. In contrast, Jesus expected his

followers to abandon the thrust for material accumulation. They were to live on trust that

supplies would arrive as needed (Mark 6:7-8).

.

God is not impressed with monuments. And the economic systems we concoct do not

build God's kingdom if they deviate from biblical principles. As Christians we are directed to

empty ourselves of all stipulations and preconditions before God. Materialism, which is

capitalism stripped down, must be discarded and replaced by unquestioning, instinctual

trust. We do not magnify God by acclaiming a system of capital gain as the Divine's modus

operandi for his/her people. [Does it bother you that I included "her" with "his' in refernce

to God? I think it is the "her" side of God that exposes the flaw in capitalistic economics.]

.

In the Old Testament, God ordained the economic system of the Jubilee (Lev. 25:8-10),

by which every 50 years debts were forgiven, and any capital gains made at the expense of

less fortunate people were returned to the original owners. Obviously this meant to

prevent the amassing of wealth in what today we dub, capitalistic style. Jesus said nothing

to overturn this practice. Indeed, all his comments about money were in perfect sync with

the spirit of Jubilee.

.

Opposition to this kind of "redistribution of wealth" as un-American is a mantra with

many conservative Christians today. The very thought of such a program is anathema, and

central to the cries of "socialism." Besides the attempt to politicize religion by purging the

word socialism of its dictionary definition, it appears that these Christians have the

religion/economics relationship exactly backwards (Deut. 15:4).

.

By the way, where in the Constitution does it say that our laws are supposed to promote

a (supposedly) Christian economic system under the guise of "protection of rights"? Reread

the 1st Amendment.

V. War

A. What I hear Christians saying:

Our Christian founders came to America for religious freedom and fought England for

independence. The Declaration of Independence and the Constitution planted firmly what

we won in war. Until recently, God has honored us by enabling us to win all our subsequent

wars against those who would deny us the land destined for our republic, and against

Godless foreign regimes who attacked or conspired against us. In modern years Korea,

Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan have smudged our record, but this is because we have lost

our resolve. God's plan for our nation depends on our willingness to defend our heritage in

accord with the vision and example of our ancestors. Today, with terrorism creating a new

menace, we must fight with traditional might against those who would attack us. The

enemy must be taught that our military power can overcome theirs.

.

As a nation founded on Christian principles, the United States has been a beacon of

morality, and custodian for democratic polity. With our military might, we have the

responsibility to share our traditions with other nations and counter the enemy at its own

game. If they can torture our prisoners, we can do it better. If they would bomb us, we can

clear the deck with our superior might. Since the Babylonian defeat of Israel in Old

Testament times, we are the New Israel, meant to fill the shoes of God's chosen until

prophecy is fulfilled in the Middle East. The apostle Paul told us [metaphorically] to put on

the "whole armor of God."

B. What the Bible says:

In the Garden of Gethsemane Jesus rebuked Peter for drawing his sword against the

arresting officials (John 18:10-11). God's kingdom will not be consummated by worldy

methods (John 18:36). Yield to those who challenge you, as the better way to resolve

disputes (Matt. 5:38-41).

If the remarks that I have listed of what I am hearing Christians say sound o.k. to you, then send me a marker pen so I can black out the appropriate portions of my Bible.

Doug Good

Dis the Poor and Spare the Rich

I have decided that as we approach the November election, I will not listen to any candidate or media pundit who engages in inane finger pointing. Watching people tie our national financial dilemma to "the other guys" bores me.

Currently the Republicans are playing the "opposition game." I just read an "information" piece detailing all the negative effects of the tax increases we can expect if the Democrats are not turned out in November. To keep the time I spend reading articles from being a waste, I like to breath life back into banality by analyzing the shortcomings of the piece. I find two problems with this standard opposition pitch about money management.

1) It presumes that tax increases are unAmerican, that our national experience has been positive only when taxes do not increase, as if today's expected tax increases are an anachronism in America.

There was a time (1800s) when our country did not need high amounts of tax revenue because we had plenty of public land yet unsold and little competition abroad for the sale of our plentiful resources; and we avoided international political involvements and responsibilities. Indeed, the income tax was judged unconstitutional during much of our national history--but it no longer is, by anybody. To suggest a constitutional amendment to end the income tax acknowledges that it is constitutional now. Those who find taxes unbearable do not deny their usefulness, they only want to avoid the pain.

2) But more to the point, the underlying premise of the "vote against taxes" entreaty is that the defining feature of American democracy is a polity guided by the principle that a citizen has the right to make and keep money with no interference.

There is nothing wrong with money. Money is not the root of evil in its tangible, inanimate form. But it is the lubricant of selfish immaturity, ungodly hoarding, and a lack of concern for our citizen-family. I don't like taxes, but I like even less the spokespersons for capitalism-run-amok, as in the Robber Barons of old, or more recently, the golden bungee jumping CEO's, and model enterprisers like Lay, Skillings, Madoff, etc. (and etc.). Politics is a complicated jungle, financial legislation is clouded by lobbyists and hopeful (wealthy) political candidates; subsidies and public assistance usually are poorly administered, if even monitored. But an attitude of narcissism about personal rights to control tax spending should not misguide us into demeaning the less moneyed members of our population who are endowed with talents and dreams that enrich our country but not themselves.

I do not find myself drawn to the competition to reach the pantry's high shelves. I don't consider it my American right to have more money than someone else. The opportunity to make money is one of the great benefits of our democratic system, but any given wealthy American draws on the bounty of our national prosperity. The rich and the poor are in this together. Democracy does not just grant "rights." It expects equal returns in response.

Our founding generation was notably both democratic and christian. To cling possessively to a particular right that promotes imbalance in the citizen-family is neither democratic nor moral. That is not our heritage. As a student of American history and as a professing Christian, I will not stand mute when democracy and religion are divorced. If Jesus had thought the rich young ruler, who sought his counsel, could follow him while keeping his wealth, there would have been no need for him to give up his money. Jesus did not ask him to give up his civil leadership status. Jesus apparently intuited that narcissism was this gentleman's problem and money was his crutch.

I believe democracy and Christianity are a natural match. When the two tag-team, it is beautiful. But when the two fall out of rhythm, both become shallow, ephemeral specters of their real selves.