Reverend Peter Marshall's Commentary Archive

 The Battle Over the Role of Religion in American History

". . .Why do you not know how to interpret the present time?" (Luke 12:56)   

     In last week's commentary ("The Stealth Jihad of Islam in America") I forgot to include additional evidence of the growing number of Muslim attacks on persons and locations in America. Anyone who doubts that Muslim terrorist attacks are continually being plotted on American soil is simply not informed. Here are some examples: In the week leading up to the "Islam on Capitol Hill" event on September 25 (which, by the way, was a total bust -- they fell about 47,000 people short of their announced goal of 50,000 attendees) two Muslims, one of them an imam (cleric), were arrested for their alleged involvement with an elaborate plot that included other Muslims in New York City and Denver, who were apparently planning a major attack at a sports stadium. Also, Hosam Maher Husein Smadi was arrested after he placed a (non-activated) car bomb at a 60-story office building in downtown Dallas. A third Muslim, an American convert who calls himself Talib Islam, was arrested for planning to blow up the Paul Findley Federal Building in Springfield, Illinois. All of this in one week. It should also be noted that at the Capitol Hill Muslim event there was not one word said about these terrorist plots. No criticism, no mention -- nothing.

 Neither have I seen any rebuke or criticism whatsoever from Muslims about the murders and attempted murders of family members by Muslim husbands and fathers who are outraged because their wives or sons or daughters stray from living by strict Islamic laws and customs. These incidents are always treated as isolated and random cases of violence that seemingly have nothing to do with the fact that the perpetrators are Muslims. That kind of head-in-the-sand attitude deliberately ignores the obvious. When are we going to start calling a spade a spade?

 Now to this week's commentary. (First, let me again remind you of the notice above: there will be no commentary on October 29, because I will be at an ACSI [Association of Christian Schools] convention in Sacramento).

I thought my readers might be interested in seeing our local Cape Cod paper's editorial on the battle in Texas over the guidelines for the teaching of social studies in the state's public schools.  As some of you may know, I have been involved in this, because one of the conservative members of the Texas Board of Education nominated me to the review committee which was tasked with the responsibility of critiquing the revised set of guidelines used by textbook publishers and teachers in preparing the curriculum for the social studies classes. Unfortunately, to a great extent the Board of Education is politically motivated, although given that sad reality the good news is that it seems to be almost equally divided between conservatives (all of them seem to be Christian believers) and liberals. This means that the conservatives have at least a fighting chance to change the guidelines toward truthfully including mention of the influence of the Christian faith on the founding of America. We shall see, for although my involvement in it is concluded (as far as I can tell), the entire process won't be completed until next March.

The Cape Cod Times printed a two-part editorial, but I shall only give you the more relevant second part: 

"Like democracy, striking a balance between religious expression and the establishment of religion in the public square is often a messy business. 

Just look at what is happening in Texas, where battle lines are being formed over what gets taught in the state's social studies classrooms. 

The Texas Board of Education asked six outside analysts to review the K-12 social studies curriculum. Of course, they were only asking for trouble because three analysts were chosen by social conservatives on the board and three by moderates and liberals.

The hottest debate, according to the First Amendment Center, is over the role of religion in American history.

"The Texas board appears to be divided over how to characterize the role of religion -- specifically Protestant Christianity -- in our nation's founding," said Charles Haynes of the First Amendment Center. The analysts on the left ignore the question, which is unfortunate because the current curriculum says far too little about religion in U.S. history.

"But worse than ignoring religion in history is using the curriculum to promote religion," he said. "And that's what two reviewers on the right, David Barton and Peter Marshall, are trying to do by calling for teaching the 'biblical foundations' of a 'Christian America'."

In another recent church-state battle in Georgia, over whether cheerleaders at a public school in Georgia could use biblical phrases on their banners, one local elected official proclaimed: "Our founding fathers had one thing in mind when they founded this country, and it was a Christian nation built upon the principles of Jesus Christ."

Actually, the founding fathers had many things in mind when they drew on a variety of sources -- Greek, Roman, biblical, Enlightenment -- to invent a new nation.

Some founders, such as Samuel Adams, Patrick Henry and Alexander Hamilton, were orthodox in their Protestant convictions, while others, including Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Paine and Thomas Jefferson, held deist and other unorthodox views.

"The Constitution they wrote establishes a secular state built upon the principles of religious liberty," Haynes said. "At the heart of that liberty is freedom from state-imposed religion, especially in our public schools."

In the Texas case, the Texas Freedom Network, an advocacy group, charges that Barton, Marshall and the board members who appointed them are pushing a religious agenda in public schools that would violate the establishment clause of the First Amendment.

Barton is the evangelical founder of WallBuilders, an organization that, despite the name, is focused on tearing down Jefferson's wall of separation between church and state. And Marshall heads a ministry dedicated to "helping to restore America to its Bible-based foundations," Haynes said.

Of course, biblical religions have influenced Western civilization, and it's undeniable that early America was mostly Protestant, although it was a diverse assortment of Protestants.

"But it would be educational malfeasance for Texas public schools to teach that America was founded as a Christian nation in any formal or legal sense," Haynes said.

The framers of the Constitution were influenced by many ideas -- religious and secular. But they produced a document that nowhere mentions religion except to prohibit any religious test for office. "The Convention of 1787," writes historian Clinton Rossiter, "was highly rationalist and even secular in spirit."

Of course, millions of Americans proudly boast today that the words "separation of church and state" appear nowhere in the Constitution.

That may literally be true, but that is akin to saying that Jesus supported slavery because it is promoted in the Bible. Anyone remotely familiar with the intent of the founding fathers, and in particular those who crafted the Bill of Rights, knows that separation is a cornerstone of our nation's foundation.

Carole Shields, the daughter of Southern Baptist ministers, and member of People for the American Way, a civil liberties group, said she is often asked why a preacher's kid and evangelical Christian fervently defends the separation of church and state.

"The separation of church and state actually strengthens our freedom to believe -- or, as the case may be, our freedom not to believe," she says. "Some among the Religious Right are spreading the myth that our tradition of separation has created a wall that detaches morality from public policy. Nothing could be further from the truth."

Despite the separation, the United States is the most religious nation among all Western democracies -- nine of every 10 Americans believe in the existence of God; three-fourths say prayer is an important part of their daily lives.

Where religion is imposed on society, in places like Iran, there is little democracy. Where societies still collect taxes for state-sponsored religion, as in several Western European countries, the life of the church is anemic at best.

"We are the most religiously diverse nation in the world," Shields says.

And it's become that way as a direct result of church-state separation and the First Amendment."

I felt the need to respond to the editorial, partly because of an error or two, but also because I wanted to refute the false accusation of the Texas Freedom Network. The paper limits letters to the editor to 200 words, so here is my letter:

"As one of the persons mentioned in your Oct. 19 editorial, I was gratified to see that here, where our own Massachusetts Pilgrims and Puritans laid the foundations for a just society based on Biblical principles, the Times has given us a reasonable and nuanced two-part treatment of the need to strike a "balance between religious expression and the establishment of religion in the public square."

My response to Texas Freedom Network's politically motivated, hackneyed and utterly wrong accusation that "Barton, Marshall and the board members who appointed them are pushing a religious agenda in public schools that would violate the establishment clause of the First Amendment" is: Nonsense!

Our "agenda" is that the accurate teaching of American history must include the Biblical motivations and worldviews of so many of those who discovered this continent, settled the original colonies, fought for our independence, and created our government.

One tiny but important quibble: Neither I nor David Barton "call for teaching the biblical foundations of a 'Christian America.'" Neither of us uses that phrase because it is confusing and misleading. In my books and talks I simply call for schools and textbooks to teach the Biblical foundations of America."

The paper has offered me the opportunity to write a guest editorial, but I have decided that I didn't want to take the time away from working on the civil war book to compose a 650-word article. In addition to the points in the Times editorial that I addressed there are others. For example: 

"The Convention of 1787," writes historian Clinton Rossiter, "was highly rationalist and even secular in spirit."

That's not even remotely true. Rossiter was a respected historian, but he got this one wrong. Most of the delegates were practicing Christians, whose Biblical worldview shaped the thinking that went into the formation of the Constitution. About 40 percent of them were office-holders -- not merely members -- in Bible societies, dedicated to spreading the Word of God. Ben Franklin's famous plea for prayer at the opening of each day's business, even though it failed for lack of finances to pay a chaplain, was warmly received. The spirit of the convention was far more Christian than secular -- many of the delegates, including George Washington, attended a Fourth of July anniversary service at the Calvinist church, where Reverend William Rogers prayed for them. And at the successful conclusion of the convention, future President and chief architect of the Constitution James Madison (who was not normally given to enthusiastic Christian sentiment) wrote to Thomas Jefferson, who was in France: "It is impossible to conceive the concord which ultimately prevailed, as less than a miracle." In the Federalist Papers, Madison also stated: "It is impossible for the man of pious reflection not to perceive in it (the Constitution) the finger of the Almighty hand which has been so frequently and signally extended to our relief in the critical stages of the Revolution." Secular is hardly the right word to describe the Constitutional Convention. 

Then there is this: "Actually, the founding fathers had many things in mind when they drew on a variety of sources -- Greek, Roman, biblical, Enlightenment -- to invent a new nation."

Research has revealed that Enlightenment philosophy was far less influential in the thinking of the Founding Fathers than has been taught in recent decades. A 1984 article in the American Political Science Review revealed that 34 percent of the most important quotes used by the Founding Fathers in the creation of the Constitution came directly from the Bible. True Enlightenment sources were quoted only 7 percent of the time. So the Bible turns out to be five times as influential as the Enlightenment.

Lastly, I want to comment on the quote from Carole Shields, who seems to have strongly rebelled against her Southern Baptist background by joining  People for the American Way (which in its militant anti-Christian agenda couldn't possibly be more un-American!). She says: "Some among the Religious Right are spreading the myth that our tradition of separation has created a wall that detaches morality from public policy. Nothing could be further from the truth."

Actually, the problem is not the tradition of the institutional separation of Church from State. The problem is the prevailing secular mentality that insists that the Christian faith is to have no influence on the formation of public policy. And People for the American Way is dedicated to that destructive proposition. However, nothing could have been further from the minds of the Founding Fathers than that ridiculous idea (see our first book, The Light and the Glory, and my Restoring America teaching seminar). They understood clearly that without the influence of Christianity in political life, morality would indeed be separated from public policy. There are literally hundreds of quotes that could be marshaled as evidence of their thinking on this, but I shall restrict myself to George Washington's famous quote from his Farewell Address. (It shall also be the farewell statement of this commentary).

"Of all the disposition and habits which lead to political prosperity, Religion and Morality are indispensable supports . . . And let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion . . . reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle."

Copyright, 2009, Peter J. Marshall. All rights reserved.     

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