Paul Rosenburg in Salon (see the article Celebrate religious freedom — the way the Founding Fathers originally intended) explains how the religious right has hijacked the idea of religious freedom to impose Christian doctrine on the unsuspecting Americans.
Before fake news there was fake history, and one of the most significant examples has long been the religious right’s idea that America was founded as a “Christian nation.” It’s a popular misconception sometimes used to promote a profoundly anti-democratic agenda, the "Handmaid’s Tale"-style belief that Christians have a biblical mandate to control all earthly institutions – including government – until the second coming of Jesus.
We arrive once again at Religious Freedom Day on Jan. 16, when the Christian right will claim that its “freedom” to oppress others is under horrendous assault. For the third year in a row, they’ll be countered by a growing movement of modern-day Jeffersonians seeking to reclaim the real meaning of that day, and the real history that it celebrates — the hard-won freedom of all to practice whatever form of religious belief, or non-belief, their consciences guide them to.
“When Christian Right leaders talk about religious liberty, they often really mean theocratic supremacism of their own religious beliefs inscribed in government,” author Frederick Clarkson pointed out in 2016, when I first wrote about Religious Freedom Day. Nothing has changed in their core agenda, but the awareness and willingness to confront it has grown, along with the understanding of how they operate.
In fact, the U.S. Constitution was remarkable precisely because it didn’t claim to derive authority from God in the typical top-down manner, but instead, bottom-up, from the people, following the arguments used by John Locke to justify government, as well as his views on religious tolerance and the distinctions between secular and religious spheres of power. God is never mentioned in the Constitution, nor is any form of religion except in the negative: “no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States.”
In the same Salon article, Paul interviewed Frederick Clarkson (who writes about the Dominionist Family Research Council’s approach to organizing within churches in a forthcoming article at The Public Eye, “A Manual to Restore a Christian Nation that Never Was”) on how to expose the lies of Dominionists and Christian nationalists and how to preserve religious freedom in the US and protect Jefferson's legacy. Some of the questions and answers are reproduced below:
In discussing the myth that America was founded as a Christian nation, you write, "This feature of the movement — one that stokes much of its followers’ passion — may also contain the seeds of its undoing." What do you mean?
The problem for Christian nationalists is that it doesn’t hold up under scrutiny. For example, when it came time to forge a coherent national government out of the 13 colonies, the mostly Christian religious and political leaders of the time opted for religious equality under the law, recognizing that if the government could favor a sect or religion, it could control how people think. This is one among many flaws that have always been present in the Christian nationalist narrative, but since most of society didn’t see it, or did not take it seriously, the movement has advanced without being much challenged on the point.
The religious supremacism inherent in Christian nationalism is repulsive to most people, regardless of their political and religious views. I think if we got serious about taking Jefferson and Madison’s foundational ideas of religious equality under the law into the 21st century, Christian nationalism would crumble.
The Declaration of Independence is used to smuggle God into the Constitution, but it was written by Thomas Jefferson, who by Cureton's standards was lacking in the very "Christian worldview" that he claims as our nation's lost foundation. How do people like him deal with this contradiction?
They mostly avoid addressing it. They sometimes point out that Jefferson invoked God at various time and attended church while president. That he said religious things and attended religious services is not, of course, proof against his very public stances in favor of separation of church and state as the best way to guarantee religious freedom for all. That is a problem they cannot actually solve. History is not on their side.
What can we learn by comparing the actual history of religion in America to the Christian nationalist fantasy?
When we learn that Christian nationalism is a lie, we get a much clearer sense of hope and possibility in seeing that we are all in this together. We also learn something about what we are up against and therefore have the opportunity to better figure out what needs to be done. I think we also learn that we have been complacent, taking hard-won freedom for granted. But we can also learn of the weakness of their argument, and begin to formulate strong, fact-based arguments against it.
We can also learn that religious freedom is a powerful, inspiring and authentically revolutionary idea. It is as dangerous to the rich and the powerful today as it was in the 18th century. Religious freedom made possible the best advances in human and civil rights in our history. But we can also see how forces of oppression see that too, and are doing everything they can to neutralize it.
How does this historical comparison relate to the one you focus on, regarding the history of religious freedom in Virginia and the Bill of Rights?
I think looking at the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom, and its role in shaping our constitutional approach to religion and government, exposes the lie of Christian nationalism in a way that allows us to clear away the fog of the long, slow religious war they are waging in America. We also get to see their techniques of strategic misdirection. It’s like learning how a magician performs an illusion: They show us a map of history that points to the Declaration of Independence as the source of the Constitution’s approach to religious freedom. But once we know the story of the Virginia Statue for Religious Freedom and the truth about the origins of our Constitution’s approach to religious freedom, the misdirection is revealed. It is helpful to know our actual history and its meaning, and it is humbling to know how we have allowed the Christian right to use this false narrative to its advantage.
What is the best way to understand the threat to America that Dominionism represents? How can we best respond to that threat?
First, we need to take the time to understand that the challenge that we face may not be what we think. Dominionism is not as exotic or as rare as it is sometimes portrayed. It is a comprehensive theology relating to conservative Christians taking control over all areas of life, not just church and state. Its influence is getting wider and deeper, partly because there are many dedicated thinkers and capable doers in this movement. Some are political and governmental leaders.
Now one might say, what’s wrong with that? Don’t they have a right to bring their Christian values into the public square? To which we say, of course. But by the same standard, we are not required to turn a blind eye to their words, their actions, and their unambiguous intentions. This is what theocratic theorist Gary North called “the dilemma of democratic pluralism.” North asserts that we are obliged to tolerate views that are in fact antithetical to democratic pluralism. The Christian right knows this, and is smart about exploiting our dilemma. How do we oppose something our philosophy requires us to tolerate?
Let’s not kid ourselves about the profoundly antidemocratic nature of the Dominionist mission. Religious freedom and democracy are not settled matters. We are living the dilemma of democratic pluralism.
How do we address that dilemma?
There are a lot of things we can do, but here are three things for a start. One is that we need to become much better informed about Dominionism and the way it manipulates the idea of religious freedom to advance an agenda that is anything but free.
Second, we need to be much better citizen activists, especially in electoral politics. The system we have is competitive. Let’s not cede the playing field to the Christian right, which has invested so much in ideological development and the building of electoral capacity for several generations. It has worked well for them, but they are a well-organized minority: They cannot prevail if the rest of us mobilize in our own best interests.
Finally, when we hear politicians and religious or interest-group leaders go on about how religious freedom is a “cherished” or “treasured” value, let’s ask them to get real. Religious freedom is not a lovely antique, a family heirloom or a relic of a bygone era. It is a dynamic, progressive value that underlies every other constitutional freedom we have -- and it is under siege. We need to require our leaders to lead in this regard and stop patronizing us.
