Michael Brown expanded his efforts to downplay the threat of Christian nationalism in politics with his March 25 column:
With the ever increasing warnings about the alleged danger of “Christian nationalism,” however ambiguous that term might be, it is only fair to ask: Is America a Christian nation? And, just as importantly: Has America ever been a Christian nation? And how does this relate to Christian nationalism?
One of the latest fear-provoking headlines, this one posted on Mother Jones, stated plainly, “It’s a Good Time to Start Worrying About Christian Nationalism.” This contrasts with the assessment of the Catholic New York Times journalist Ross Douthat who noted that “today’s religious conservatives are mostly just normal American Christians doing normal American Christian politics, not foot soldiers of incipient theocracy.”
Is this what is meant by Christian nationalism? Earlier this month, I restated my own views on the subject. Here, we’ll focus on the question of whether America is (or was) a Christian nation.
Brown then rehashed the right-wing controversy over Barack Obama’s comments about whether American is a “Christian nation,” though he at least fully quoted Obama’s words in context, unlike many other WND writers:
In June 2007, President Obama created a firestorm when he said on CBS, “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.”
Two years later, during a press conference in Turkey, he said that we Americans “do not consider ourselves a Christian nation, or a Muslim nation, but rather, a nation of citizens who are, uh, bound by a set of values.”
This caused quite an uproar across the country, as many Christians raised their voice in protest. “Of course this is a Christian nation. Who doesn’t know that?”
Responding to Obama’s comments in April 2009, attorney and professor John Eidsmoe wrote, “There is a sense in which this writer agrees with him. Unlike England at the time of our nation’s founding, we do not have an official state church. And I don’t want one – I don’t want Barack Obama to be the head of the church.
Nevertheless, Brown tried to parse Obama’s otherwise clear words anyway:
Can we say, then, that America was a Christian nation?
If we mean that it had strong Christian foundations, that it was presupposed that the vast majority of Americans would be professing Christians, and that Christianity, in that sense, was privileged in our country, then the answer would be yes. America was a Christian nation.
If we mean that Christianity was the required state religion or that as Americans we conducted ourselves as fully Christian, the answer is no. Just ask the Native Americans and the early African American slaves to weigh in if you have any doubt.
What about today? Is America a Christian nation – or at least, was it a Christian nation in 2007 when President Obama made those initial remarks?
If we mean that America is (or, recently was) Christian in the sense of “majority Christian,” with Christian holidays and customs having a more privileged place in our society than do Islamic or Buddhist or Hindu holidays and customs, the answer is yes.
In that sense, America is a Christian nation just as Israel is a Jewish nation, even though the large majority of Israeli Jews are not observant. In the same way, some other countries are Muslim, rather than Christian or Jewish, even though many of their people are not religious Muslims.
Surely, America is Christian rather than Buddhist or Muslim or Hindu, even though the percentage of professing Christians in America has dropped from over 78% in 2007 to less than 65% today.
Or, to put this in the simplest terms, the statement, “Americans celebrate Christmas” is overwhelmingly truer than the statement, “Americans celebrate Ramadan.”
Of course, Americans do, in fact, celebrate Ramadan — just not as many of them. That doesn’t make Ramadan less valid, however, as Brown seems to suggest. Brown concluded by claiming that it’s a bad idea for Christians to force their views upon others, even as he suggests doing just that:
Any effort, then, to seek to impose Christian values on others, not in terms of advocating for our values in the public square and in the voting booth, but in terms of forceful imposition, is misguided and dangerous.
What, then, should our attitude be as committed followers of Jesus?
First, we should view America as part of a fallen world, therefore in need of the Gospel. Our nation has been a ripe mission field for many years.
Second, at the same time, we should appreciate the many positive aspects of America, most particularly our freedoms, which are a direct result of the best of our Judeo-Christian roots. And we should use those freedoms to advocate for our values.
Third, because we are not a Muslim or Hindu nation, we should recognize that the key to America’s well-being is a healthy, thriving, life-giving church. Revival in the church could lead to awakening in society. Both are desperately needed.
It seems that Brown doesn’t really want non-Christians involved in government or even the nation as a whole — which suggests that he does, in fact, want to impose Christian ideology on all Americans.