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American Religion: Religion of America

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Wilfred McClay has neatly summarized the creed, scriptures, sacraments, and sacred places and times of America’s civil religion: “The same mix of convictions can be found animating the rhetoric of the American Revolution, the vision of Manifest Destiny, the crusading sentiments of antebellum abolitionists, the benevolent imperialism of fin-de-siecle apostles of Christian civilization, and the fervent idealism of President Woodrow Wilson at the time of World War I. No one expressed the idea more directly, however, than Senator Albert J. Beveridge of Indiana, who told the United States Senate, in the wake of the Spanish-American War, that ‘God has marked us as His chosen people, henceforth to lead in the regeneration of the world.’”

“The American civil religion also has its sacred scriptures, such as the Mayflower Compact, the Declaration, the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, the Gettysburg Address, and the Pledge of Allegiance. It has its great narratives of struggle, from the suffering of George Washington’s troops at Valley Forge to the gritty valor of Jeremiah Denton in Hanoi. It has its special ceremonial and memorial occasions, such as the Fourth of July, Veterans Day, Memorial Day, Thanksgiving Day, and Martin Luther King Day. It has its temples, shrines, and holy sites, such as the Lincoln Memorial, the National Mall, the Capitol, the White House, Arlington National Cemetery, Civil War battlefields, and great natural landmarks such as the Grand Canyon. It has its sacred objects, notably the national flag. It has its organizations, such as the Veterans of Foreign Wars, the American Legion, the Daughters of the American Revolution, and the Boy Scouts. And it has its dramatis personae, chief among them being its military heroes and the long succession of presidents. Its telltale marks can be found in the frequent resort to the imagery of the Bible and reference to God and Providence in speeches, public documents, and patriotic songs, as well as in the inclusion of God’s name in the national motto (‘In God We Trust’) on all currency.”

posted by Peter J. Leithart on Wednesday, December 28, 2011 at 2:46 pm

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American Religion: Religion of America

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