america’s origins, christian or not?
by Mike James
With the rise of Christian nationalism in the United States today, there is an ongoing debate in various forms of media as to whether the United States originated as a Christian nation. Many of the early settlers who came to America came from states (nations) that were known as confessional states. This means that the monarch of those nations decided the religion of their people. The early leaders of our country were aware of the problems this caused in Europe with many conflicts that arose over religious differences.
With this in mind, our founding fathers made sure our founding documents provided a separation of church and state. But it is important to note that prior to the Revolutionary War, most of the Thirteen Colonies were confessional states, although of different Christian denominations. Connecticut remained one until 1818. Those that were not made it clear in their constitutions that they believed in the biblical God. Other American states required each town or individual to support some Christian religious body without the state deciding which one. This was also abolished. The last state was Massachusetts, which restricted the obligation in 1821 and ended it in 1843.
But it is beyond dispute what the primary religion of our early settlers and founding fathers was. Those who came to Plymouth Rock and Jamestown were not Hindus and Muslims. Those who formulated our founding documents were primarily Christians, with some Deists among them.
But to teach that America had a secular founding is just not truthful. According to Justin Dyer, author of The Classical and Christian Origins of American Politics, The Declaration of Independence starts with an invocation of the "Laws of Nature and of Nature's God," it bases human equality on creation, defines rights as the endowment of our Creator, appeals to the "Supreme Judge of the world," and declares the signers' "firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence." The God, Creator, Supreme Judge, and Divine Providence the founding fathers were referring to is the Christian God!
The founding fathers were influenced by the natural law tradition. That tradition developed with Christianity's involvement with classical philosophy. Natural law tradition states that reason can identify what is best for human beings by studying human nature. The good for human beings includes things like life, health, knowledge, and friendship. When we have good things in our lives, we succeed and are happy. When we fail to develop those good things, as an individual or as a society, we will be unhappy.
Ancient pagan philosophers believed in some of these concepts, but Christians emphasized that the Christian God was the source of the natural law and of human equality.
Before the Civil War, Abraham Lincoln stated the following in 1858: "in their enlightened belief, nothing stamped with the Divine image and likeness was sent into the world trodden on, and degraded, and imbruted by its fellows." Lincoln was referring to the founding fathers in this statement. The founding fathers wrote that "all men are created equal." This idea came from no other source but the Bible and the book of Genesis, where we read that men were made in the image of God (Genesis 1:26-27).
Critics will argue that some of the founding fathers owned slaves, and this is true. But we have to remember these men were born into a culture in which slavery was a normal practice. That does not make it right, but we have to remember God is working out a greater purpose. He is not trying to make the world right now. That comes with the Kingdom. God is allowing mankind to do his own thing (slavery, war, racism, hate, etc.) now as lessons as to why we need God to govern us.
Due to the founding documents, men like Lincoln and later Martin Luther King Jr. could use those same documents to abolish slavery and petition that we needed to live up to our Christian ideals!
In a debate between Alexander Hamilton and the royalist Episcopalian Bishop Samuel Seabury Jr., Hamilton accused Seabury of being influenced by the English philosopher Thomas Hobbes who was against natural law.
What Hamilton and others objected to about Hobbes was his belief that reason was a tool that served human desires; ideas of what is good for human beings were completely subjective. There were no moral rules except for the will of a king who could lay down the law and keep the peace.
Hamilton, on the other hand, stated: "Good and wise men in all ages" have taught that God had "created an eternal and immutable law, which is, indispensably, obligatory upon all mankind, prior to any human institution whatever." The reason Hobbes believed such an "absurd and impious doctrine," Hamilton concluded, is "that he disbelieved the existence of an intelligent superintending principle, who is the governor, and will be the final judge of the universe." Obviously, this founding father believed in the biblical God.
As America moves further and further from our Christian origins, we need to be reminded of what the ramifications of that could be. Once again, the answer is in the Bible. What happened to Israel and Judah when they moved further and further away from God?
Sources:
"The Faiths of the Founding Fathers," Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Faiths_of_the_Founding_Fathers#:~:text=the%20largest%20group%20consisted%20of,in%20the%20Judeo%2DChristian%20tradition.
"Is America a Christian Nation? Yes and No," by Justin Dyer, The Washington Post, January 3, 2023.
"Confessional State," Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confessional_state.
"Religion in the Original 13 Colonies," Procon.org, January 6, 2009, https://undergod.procon.org/religion-in-the-original-13-colonies/.