The paranoid attitude displayed by Jesus in his statement, “Whoever is not with me is against me” (Matthew 12:30), has been recycled into a Washington Times op-ed this week by a band of infamous Christian nationalists.
Rogue Oklahoma schools Superintendent Ryan Walters, discredited purveyor of made-up quotes David Barton and the Blaze TV broadcaster Steve Deace, describing themselves as “conservative evangelists,” are urging Christians to vote for Donald Trump because “he will end atheism as a state-run religion.” They write, “This battle is not just cultural; it’s a fundamental struggle for the soul of America, deeply rooted in spiritual warfare. The election ahead is more than a political contest; it is our opportunity to affirm our commitment to our nation’s Judeo-Christian values.” The rest of the op-ed makes it pretty clear they really mean “Christian values.”
These extremists, like Jesus, cannot distinguish between neutrality and hostility, when he said “He who is not with me is against me.” If the government is not espousing and enforcing their religion, they think it is evincing outright hostility. A persecution complex is an intrinsic part of Christian nationalism. Ben Franklin would have corrected them: “When a religion is good, I conceive it will support itself; and when it does not support itself, and God does not take care to support it so that its professors are obliged to call for help of the civil power, ’tis a sign, I apprehend, of its being a bad one.”
Christian nationalists — and they’ve been around since the Puritan days — believe in theocracy, which won’t countenance religious liberty or freedom of conscience. As the old joke goes, the Puritans loved religious freedom so much they decided to keep it all for themselves. Bizarrely, the trio actually praise the fact that the original colonies “each had ties to some vestige of the Christian faith.”
Let’s briefly look at religious freedom in what the authors apparently believe were the “good old days” of the 13 colonies. All but two had established religions — official state religions. Prosecutions and persecutions were rife. In Virginia, anyone but Anglicans were second-class citizens. Quakers were roundly targeted in almost all the colonies. Baptists were often persecuted. Even in Maryland, where the landmark Act of Toleration of 1649 was adopted, the death penalty and forfeiture of estate still befell anyone who shall “blaspheme God, that is curse Him, or deny our Savior Jesus Christ to be the Son of God, or shall deny the Holy Trinity.”
It’s instructive to look at just one colony with an established religion: Virginia. It’s no coincidence that two of the most ardent advocates of secular government came from Virginia with its established Anglican Church. What did establishment of Anglicanism mean? One example: You were required by law to attend an established Anglican church, which all citizens were taxed to support.
In its early days under the laws of 1612, Virginia punished by death anyone who would “speak impiously of the Trinity or one of the Divine Persons,” “blaspheme God’s holy Name” or who was convicted of a third offense of “cursing” or breaking the Sabbath. These laws were softened over time, but fines continued to be imposed for nonattendance of church services and tithes were compulsory. Local taxes paid for parish churches, and Anglican parsons were given land. Conversely, Puritan clergy were banished, Quakers fined, imprisoned and banished. Catholics were notably disqualified for public office, and a Catholic priest entering the commonwealth was subject to instant banishment. There were even penalties for failure to baptize infants.
Aware of his colony’s history, James Madison in 1785 wrote his famous “Memorial and Remonstrance Against Religious Assessments,” protesting even “three pence” in taxes being used to support “a provision for Teachers of the Christian Religion.” He wrote, “During almost fifteen centuries has the legal establishment of Christianity been on trial. What have been its fruits? More or less in all places, pride and indolence in the clergy, ignorance and servility in the laity, in both, superstition, bigotry and persecution.” The proposal died.
The following year, Virginian Thomas Jefferson wrote the landmark “Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom,” a precursor to the First Amendment, in which he argued for true freedom of conscience, noting “civil rights have no dependence on our religious opinions, any more than our opinions in physics or geometry” and that “to compel a man to furnish contributions of money for the propagation of opinions which he disbelieves and abhors, is sinful and tyrannical.”
The act, which passed and which inspired similar language (now under attack) in more than 30 state constitutions, concludes that no one “shall be compelled to frequent or support any religious worship, place, or ministry nor shall be enforced, restrained, molested, or burthened in his body or goods, nor shall otherwise suffer, on account of his religious opinions or belief; but that all men shall be free to profess, and by argument to maintain, their opinions in matters of religion, and that the same shall in no wise diminish, enlarge, or affect their civil capacities.” Amen.
It was knowledge of the Protestant persecutions in the New World, preceded by the religious wars, inquisitions, witch hunts, pogroms and Crusades in the Old World, that prompted the Framers of the Constitution to purposely become first in the world to invest sovereignty not in a deity but in “We the People.” Then they adopted the Bill of Rights with its First Amendment explicitly barring any establishment of religion while promising no prohibition of the free exercise of religion.
An atheist government? Hardly.
Public school teachers are not forcing kids to recite an atheist manifesto or putting Richard Dawkins quotes calling God a delusion on the walls. Kids are not reciting a pledge that says “one nation, under no God” or singing anthems making fun of religion. Freethought groups are not demanding to make atheism the national philosophy, to prefer atheist citizens by law, or grant them privileges or more rights than their religious neighbors. As Thomas Jefferson pointed out, “The legitimate powers of government extend to such acts only as are injurious to others. But it does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are 20 gods, or no god. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg.”
Our secular Constitution and Bill of Rights ensures that the government does not endorse religion over nonreligion, likewise irreligion over religion. Maybe what this band of theocrats needs is not only a class in constitutional law, but also one in logic.
Note: Most of the colonial history cited is thanks to the renowned legal scholar Leo Pfeffer, author of the classic “Church, State and Freedom.”
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