Gary discusses a new book about America’s Christian past.
Our constitutional Founders inherited a nation founded by Christians and built, to use a phrase from John Adams, on “the general principles of Christianity,” even though not every religious believer at that time held to every tenet of Christian orthodoxy. Part of the problem with Throckmorton’s argument is that he views America’s founding as a determined fixed point in time, and he picks the point most convenient for his argument. The colonists who established the first colonial governments that later became the states that formed the national government would object to the late date of America’s founding. In fact, there are still remnants of that early religious founding circulating in documents, buildings, and ceremonies that organizations like the ACLU and Americans United for Separation of Church and State have made their living trying to eradicate.
There was a worldview before 1787 that did not pass into oblivion when the Constitution was finally ratified in 1791, with the addition of the Ten Amendments. Many state constitutions were explicitly Christian, and all were generally religious. None of this changed with the ratification of the Constitution. In fact, today the 50 state constitutions mention God using various designations, such as “Supreme Ruler of the Universe,” “Creator,” “God,” “Divine Goodness,” “Divine Guidance,” “Supreme Being,” “Lord,” “Sovereign Ruler of the Universe,” “Legislator of the Universe,” and “Almighty God” as the most common and most biblical phrase (Gen. 17:1; 28:3; 35:11; 43:14; 48:3; etc.). (The claim has been made that West Virginia is the exception. This is not the case.) For example, the Preamble to the Constitution of Pennsylvania, where Throckmorton taught at Grove City College, includes the following: “WE, the people of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, grateful to Almighty God for the blessings of civil and religious liberty, and humbly invoking His guidance, do ordain and establish this Constitution.” He is correct that these religious precepts have changed over time. This is a fact not in dispute. His book, however, is misnamed. It should be titled “The Christian Past that Was.”
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Buy NowGary discusses a new book by Warren Throckmorton about America’s Christian past. The book misses the point of what “historical” actually means, because no event or movement in history begins at one moment in time. All of history, as well as the present, is dependent on what happened before; it didn’t just begin out of thin air.
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Larry Ball’s article on the recent PCA committee report is here.