The United States is Not a Christian Nation

On June 28, 2006, Obama gave the keynote address at Sojourner's magazine "Call to Renewal" conference.

The entire text is linked below, but here is the quote that produced the firestorm:

"Whatever we once were, we are no longer a Christian nation – at least, not just. We are also a Jewish nation, a Muslim nation, a Buddhist nation, and a Hindu nation, and a nation of nonbelievers."

If you doubt that he spoke those words, feel free to examine the video evidence.

Skip forward 65 seconds.

Obama was factually correct, which is the only thing that matters in questions of fact.

In other words, we are either a Christian nation, or we aren't.

Opinion is irrelevant.

We are not, nor have we ever been, a Christian nation.

The Constitution doesn't say this:

“In the Name of the Most Holy Trinity, from Whom is all authority and to Whom, as our final end, all actions both of men and States must be referred…. Humbly acknowledging all our obligations to our Divine Lord, Jesus Christ, Who sustained our fathers through centuries of trial.”

That's an extract from the Constitution of Ireland.

If the U.S. Constitution was establishing the United States as a Christian nation, wouldn't it have been as explicit as the example above?

That is a reasonable expectation, yes.

But the U.S. Constitution contains nothing like those phrases.

Instead, it says this:

"The Senators and Representatives before mentioned, and the Members of the several State Legislatures, and all executive and judicial Officers, both of the United States and of the several States, shall be bound by Oath or Affirmation, to support this Constitution; but no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States."

Read that last sentence again, carefully:

"... no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States."

The United States Constitution -- literally the highest law in the land -- nowhere emphatically declares the United States a Christian nation, yet it emphatically forbids a religious test from being required for office.

The Treaty of Tripoli took effect as U.S. law on June 10, 1797.

It was signed by President John Adams, and ratified unanimously by the U.S. Senate.

Here is what it said:

"As the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion; as it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion, or tranquility, of Mussulmen; and, as the said States never entered into any war, or act of hostility against any Mahometan nation, it is declared by the parties, that no pretext arising from religious opinions, shall ever produce an interruption of the harmony existing between the two countries."

The entire treaty was read aloud on the Senate floor.

President Adams wrote this signing statement on the treaty:

"Now be it known, That I John Adams, President of the United States of America, having seen and considered the said Treaty do, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, accept, ratify, and confirm the same, and every clause and article thereof."

Thomas Jefferson wrote this to the Virginia Baptists:

"Because religious belief, or non-belief, is such an important part of every person's life, freedom of religion affects every individual. Religious institutions that use government power in support of themselves and force their views on persons of other faiths, or of no faith, undermine all our civil rights."

Note that Jefferson is supporting the rights of non-believers, centuries before Obama did.

In his autobiography, discussing the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom, Jefferson wrote this:

"The bill for establishing religious freedom, the principles of which had, to a certain degree, been enacted before, I had drawn in all the latitude of reason & right. It still met with opposition; but, with some mutilations in the preamble, it was finally passed; and a singular proposition proved that it’s protection of opinion was meant to be universal. Where the preamble declares that coercion is a departure from the plan of the holy author of our religion, an amendment was proposed, by inserting the word “Jesus Christ,” so that it should read “a departure from the plan of Jesus Christ, the holy author of our religion.” The insertion was rejected by a great majority, in proof that they meant to comprehend, within the mantle of it’s protection, the Jew and the Gentile, the Christian and Mahometan, the Hindoo, and infidel of every denomination."

Note particularly the latter half of the final sentence:

"... they meant to comprehend, within the mantle of it’s protection, the Jew and the Gentile, the Christian and Mahometan, the Hindoo, and infidel of every denomination."

James Madison said this:

"What influence, in fact, have ecclesiastical establishments had on society? In some instances they have been seen to erect a spiritual tyranny on the ruins of the civil authority; in many instances they have been seen upholding the thrones of political tyranny; in no instance have they been the guardians of the liberties of the people. Rulers who wish to subvert the public liberty may have found an established clergy convenient allies."

Bejamin Franklin wrote:

"Lighthouses are more helpful than churches."

And:

"I have found Christian dogma unintelligible. Early in life I absented myself from Christian assemblies."

This quotes aren't obscure or secret. Do any of these men sound as if they would be inclined to constitutionally enshrine Christianity, or any religion?

Many people believe that the U.S. is a Christian nation out of innocent ignorance.

Others use it as part of their ideological platform, because it allows them to make fabricated claims that seem to support their cause.

Those in the second category chiefly make dishonest claims about prayer in schools, the reading of the bible in schools, and the general erosion of U.S. freedoms.

They frequently tie all of these deceitful assertions together to make their other unsupported claims seem more urgent.

The United States isn't a Christian nation, but neither is it a godless one.

You can pray in schools.

Anything that you have been told which contradicts this is a lie.

From the Supreme Court case, Santa Fe Independent School District v 530 U.S. 290:

"Thus, nothing in the Constitution as interpreted by this Court prohibits any public school student from voluntarily praying at any time before, during, or after the schoolday."

From the US Department of Education guidelines:

"Students may pray when not engaged in school activities or instruction, subject to the same rules designed to prevent material disruption of the educational program that are applied to other privately initiated expressive activities. Among other things, students may read their Bibles or other scriptures, say grace before meals, and pray or study religious materials with fellow students during recess, the lunch hour, or other noninstructional time to the same extent that they may engage in nonreligious activities."

Students can't disrupt classes with prayer --they can't disrupt classes with animal sacrifices, either -- but they can definitely pray. That right is unequivocally guaranteed.

Did you miss the part above where the U.S. Department of Education approved the reading of the Bible in school?

Their approval was based on another U.S. Supreme Court decision, Schempp, 374 U.S. at 225.

"It might well be said that one's education is not complete without a study of comparative religion or the history of religion and its relationship to the advancement of civilization. It certainly may be said that the Bible is worthy of study for its literary and historic qualities. Nothing we have said here indicates that such study of the Bible or of religion, when presented objectively as part of a secular program of education, may not be effected consistently with the First Amendment."

Kids can pray in school.

Kids can read the Bible in school.

But they can't be forced to pray or read the Bible by teachers.

Before you complain too loudly, remember that this restriction prevents a Muslim teacher from forcing children to pray to Allah, or to read the Qur'an.

A Mormon teacher can't compel children to read the the Book of Mormon.

That's why these prohibitions exist; to prevent coercion.

Remember those erosions of U.S. freedoms that I blame the scaremongers for inventing?

The erosions are real, but not in the way that the scaremongers claim.

The first photo is of a group of German schoolchildren performing a Nazi salute.

It is a sad testimony to the power of brainwashing and propaganda.

U.S. citizens -- or anyone who loves freedom -- are rightfully appalled by it.

The second photo is of US. schoolchildren performing the Bellamy salute, named after Francis Bellamy.

Bellamy wrote the original Pledge of Allegiance, and this was the salute that he created for it.

President Franklin D. Roosevelt instituted the hand-over-the-heart gesture because the Bellamy salute too closely resembled the Nazi salute.

The Pledge of Allegiance is an erosion of our civil liberties, but not because the United States has fallen from a Christian nation. Any country valuing freedom of dissent should not require citizens to pledge allegiance to it.

Bellamy was a Christian minister.

In 1954, the insertion of the words "under God" to the Pledge of Allegiance was another erosion.

President Eisenhower succumbed to pressure from George MacPherson Docherty, the pastor of New York Avenue Presbyterian Church, to have the words added.

That makes two erosions, both under the guise of patriotism, and both using godly pretense.

There is one indisputable reference to Jesus in the Constitution.

Article VII -- which ratifies the document -- uses these words:

"Done in Convention by the Unanimous Consent of the States present the Seventeenth Day of September in the Year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred and Eighty seven."

This means nothing. The European dating system is an artifact of Western culture.

Any claim to the contrary is merely embarrassing to the claimant, and disingenuous.

No, it isn't.

But it doesn't need to be.

If you read everything presented here with an open-mind, it is clear that the Founding Fathers were not in favor of an ecclesiastical government, so they did not enshrine Christianity or any other religion in our Constitution.

David Barton deserves a hub of his own, but I'm not going to be the guy to write it.

He has digested a lot of information about his subject, but only to aid him as a propagandist for the Christian right.

Read the article linked at the bottom of this hub if you are interested in assessments by real historians of Barton's work.