The idea that Trump is an admired "Christian" and that the US is a Christian nation kinda shows you how hollow and odd many of these Christians have been for decades. My conservative friend in Milwaukee believes both. I recently found a bible quote in a tweet that I thought beat back his claim, plus the following...:
Mark 7:6, NIV: "He (Jesus) replied, 'Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you hypocrites; as it is written: ''These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. They worship me in vain; their teachings are merely human rules.'"
Then by accident, I came across this local broadcast of The Freedom From Religion Foundation's Attorney and Director of Strategic Response Andrew L. Seidel, who talked about his new book, 'The Founding Myth: Why Christian Nationalism Is Un-American.'" I called and was happy to get permission to offer up a shortened version of their half hour show.
Here's Seidel's view of natural law:
Natural law: When discussing the Declaration of Independence, the Religious Right typically focuses on four phrases from it: “the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God,” “their Creator,” “the Supreme Judge of the world” and “Divine Providence.” Notice that not a single one of these is Christian. There’s no mention of Jesus or Yahweh or the God of Abraham.
There are two competing views on natural law. The first is that laws or rights are given to us by a divine being. The second is that we have rights because we’re human.
We know which one of these Thomas Jefferson was talking about because he wrote about natural law in several other places. A great quote from his opinion of the French treaties: “Questions of the natural right are triable by their conformity with the moral sense and reason of man. Those who write treatises on natural law can only declare what their own moral sense and reason dictate.”
Human rights — natural law — are discoverable by reason.
And yet 75% of polled American adults identified themselves as Christian in 2015.
ReplyDeleteFounding fathers were mostly freemasons and deists.
Early colonialists were mostly protestants and catholics.
Still very much a Christian nation. And thank God since so many people in America have done so little work on themselves.