Christians Need to Revise Their Notion of America as a Christian Nation

Perhaps you have heard people refer to America as a "Christian nation." The claim is based on the fact that some Christian values were incorporated in the United States Constitution. Of course the Constitution clearly protects the right to practice any form of religion, or lack thereof, one might choose. So the so-called "Christian nation" argument is a myth.

It is a powerful and sustaining myth, nonetheless, because it links up cleanly with the contention that America was somehow a better place when a certain brand of conformity centering around Catholic and Protestant religion ruled the country. But behind that veil of Christian conformity lay a bitter mystique of institutionalized prejudice and denial of basic human rights for many Americans.

Granted, when implemented as a social order, Christian conformity can provide a foundation of values and order to society. The challenge comes in understanding that conformity should not be turned into law, else we turn the United States into a theocracy. There are probably plenty of people who might like to see that happen. I hear them talking every week at the conservative church I attend and on Christian radio. Their conversations usually carry a tone of indignation, as if someone has stolen "their" America away from them. They express the lament that America is not the same harbor of innocence it used to be. This is not only useless sentiment, it is a dangerous perception about the true nature of America.

America has never enjoyed so-called "innocent" or better period in history as some people claim. Ugly issues such as slavery, prejudice, greed and inequity have been with the nation right from the start. There may have been periods where one class of people or another thrived, but often these glory zones came at the expense of other Americans, whose claim to their share of liberty was being oppressed. This is what Thomas Jefferson had to say about the difficult but important process of maintaining equality in America; "All, too, will bear in mind this sacred principle, that though the will of the majority is in all cases to prevail, that will to be rightful must be reasonable; that the minority possess their equal rights, which equal law must protect, and to violate would be oppression."

Oppression. Therein lies the risk in promulgating the notion of a so-called Christian nation. An America ruled by strictly Christian morals equates to theocracy, making us no better (or worse) than a similarly structured theocracy based on Muslim law, or any other religion for that matter. The risks of theocratic rule are often more sinister than the flaws in humanistic governance.

The problem with theocracy is that conformity is not only often blind, it can also be cruel. An America that tolerated segregation by race, gender and orientation is not the America of the Constitution. And while Christians participated and often helped lead the revolution of the 1960s (Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr, for example) it was not Christians alone who pushed for human rights across the board.

It is important to note that America is capable of change and goodness even without advancement of Christian morals. America's humanist strain and populist voice gives vital direction to the moral compass of the nation. For Christians to claim they are the only people capable of doing good in America is a falsehood that should be resisted from within and without the religion.

The other falsehood in Christian majority thinking is this notion that things were somehow "better" in the past, the Good Old Days. Again, this idea is not even accurate by biblical standards.

The truth is that things are not better or worse today than they were 50, 100 or 200 years ago. Christians, of all people, should know better. It is both ironic and unbiblical to suggest that America was somehow a more moral nation in the past. The Bible denies this idea on principle. Even the so-called "Greatest Generation" that resisted Hitler and fought World War II was full of flawed, human, sinful people if you believe a single word written in the Bible. Yes, they did the right thing fighting the war, giving their lives and making sacrifices. But it is naïve to think they were somehow better people simply through response to circumstance.The Bible tells us Christians are saved by grace, not by acts. Our acts are an expression of appreciation for this grace.

In my book "The Genesis Fix: A Repair Manual for Faith in the Modern Age," I label this principle "grace appreciated." That is, the grace of God can be extended to others through acts of charity, of compassion and love. Thus is the kingdom of God expanded. Not through laws, government or moralizing, but through unselfish contributions of real time and money in the name of God is our faith expressed in the world.

To put things in perspective, one could logically argue that the humanist response to the tragic spread of AIDS worldwide is equally impressive in terms of scale and compassion. Is a war on a devastating disease any less magnanimous than a war against fascism or any other cause?

Ironically, some Christians apparently view the war on AIDS in a strictly prejudicial light, choosing to focus more on its association with the homosexual community, whom they view as immoral, rather than recognizing that the disease is both widespread and non-discriminatory by sexual orientation, gender or race in terms of who it affects. AIDs is the sickness, not homosexuality. It is important to understand this operative distinction.

When it came to helping people afflicted by disease, Jesus Christ embraced lepers as readily as the healthy, and had compassion for people afflicted by many difficult circumstances. He also saw how judgmental people could be in blaming the condition of others on not being right with God. Jesus dismissed this notion out of hand. In some cases the Bible shows Jesus healing people, then challenging others to accept that the healing is not what made them right with God, but that faith was the instrument of salvation. What a powerful example for Christians today. Do you not feel the proper righteousness in this example? Or are you allowing age-old prejudices to run your faith?

For example, so-called Christian prejudices against homosexuality are based on several very small passages in the Bible. Yet these passages continue to be wielded as a weapon against an entire segment of society that has done nothing to earn the true wrath of God. Yes, several authors in the Bible mention wanton homosexual lust as a depraved state of mind, but the same indictment is equally cast toward heterosexual lust, and by the same authors. It is depravity (sex outside the respect of relationships) that is primarily in question, not the acts themselves. Where indictments are specific, we must consider that the same scripture that indicts homosexuality on one page apparently embraces slavery on another. Where is the discipline or morality in that? We are called to balance and grow our understanding this regard.

In America homosexual relationships are increasingly being recognized as positive, productive factors in American society. The full rights of civil union and yes, even the rites of marriage should be bestowed on these relationships. Christians need to get out of the way and stop pretending that homosexuality is a "lifestyle" or a "choice." Even if it were either of those things, the Constitution clearly protects the rights of Americans to live as they choose. This is a nation of freedoms, not a country of elective repressions based on religion alone. We should seek to expand freedoms to the benefit of all Americans, not selectively legislate those freedoms so that some people are more equal than others.

The Bible sends numerous contradictory messages about all sorts of human behaviors. There are far more indictments of greed and covetousness in the Bible than there are castigations of homosexual love. If we really want to create a theocracy, then the Bible should be thrown at greedy Wall Street traders. Instead, Christian conservatives have traditionally lined themselves up ideologically with a brand of fiscal conservatism that supports free market economics and social darwinism of an order that lends not one whit of credence to Christ's instruction for sharing and even abandoning wealth. The hypocrisy of this association trumps all other Christian contentions of high morality. The conservative wing of Christian morality certainly does not have its entire moral house in order.

The hand wringing contention that America suffers declining morality and that God has something against America for bestowing full freedoms on people of all races, creeds and sexual orientations is not accurate from either a biblical or constitutional point of view. The view that America is in moral decline is popular among some evangelicals because it is a convenient and effective recruiting tool. Some Christians seem to need to feel the country is in moral crisis in order to feel needed themselves. This is the "holier than thou" psychology that Jesus Christ found so abhorrent in religious leaders during his physical presence on earth. Evangelical Christians speak in terms of "spiritual revival" in America while refusing to recognize that we will be glorified as a nation when we finally include all of the nation's citizens in full rights and privilege.

As we consider the moral state of America as it relates to Christianity, we must consider the issue of abortion rights. Some politicians have stated the likely solution quite simply: "It would be best for the nation to make abortion both legal and rare." That is a necessary compromise and a grand solution. The nation must protect the right to an abortion as an issue of secular health. Court rulings to that effect addressed abortion from a question of privacy, and that is no coincidence. Having an abortion is an individual and private matter, and should ever be so.

That does not mean the moral factions in our country should have no influence on that decision. Christianity can play an important role in making abortions rare. The religion must first guard against its crippling propensity to turn abortion into a black and white issue and to leverage the abortion issue as a single issue voting bloc. Both these seemingly clear doctrinal statements undermine the ultimate Christian goal of reducing the number of abortions in America. If we step back and consider why so many women choose to have abortions, it is not the availability of legal abortions that is the problem, it is the need. Women are deciding they need abortions for a wide range of reasons. Changing that perceived need is not a question of outlawing abortions. That only forces women in perceived need to pursue unsafe options. That was the history of abortion before it became legalized, and the ugly truth is that it causes women and their unborn children to suffer consequences that may be worse than those stemming from legalized abortion.

Christianity must instead almost reverse its role on the abortion issue by becoming relevant to the world at large in the most practical sense of the word. This may require Christianity to return to the core of its being for answers, to examine what opportunities and insights the faith has to offer a culture that has raced ahead of anachronistic faith traditions known to oppose abortion so adamantly. We are speaking here of the fundamentalist Christian world view that simultaneously patronizes women as incapable decision-makers and then expects women to "choose life" even when the choice to bear a child may have tragic life consequences. The inherent disconnect here is that the fundamental Christian perspective inherently disrespects a woman's ability to choose. Until Christianity learns to respect and honor women as intellectual and social equals to men, the case for "choosing life" cannot be effectively made. Despite growing numbers of abortions in America, the number of women who choose to have an abortion is still a huge minority. Respecting the challenges facing any minority is the ultimate solution, not forcing the majority's will on the population at risk.

In summary, America has struggled hard to achieve the delicate balance between moral structure and personal liberty from its very inception. Like it or not, the minority in America always has a say in the affairs of this nation. Even if one religion or another should profess its dominance or superiority, America is founded emphatically on its platform of equal rights. We are not a Christian nation, as some may claim. Instead we are a nation that tolerates Christian faith along with every other belief system known to man. And that, my friends, is a great place to live.