Religious Right organizations often claim that the United States was founded to be a Christian nation. While common, this assertion does not stand up to critical scrutiny.

It’s helpful to approach this question as an attorney might in a court of law. What does the historical evidence indicate? Consider the following points:

The Text of the Constitution

The Constitution is the governing document of the nation. It does not say that the country is officially Christian. In fact, the Constitution contains no references to Christianity, Jesus Christ or God, save for an incidental reference at the end, where the document is dated “In the year of Our Lord.”

The Constitution contains a provision, found in Article VI, that bans religious qualifications for federal office. This provision was championed by a delegate named Charles Pinckney of South Carolina. It was debated and received majority approval. Had a Christian nation been the intent of the founders, it’s unlikely they would have added a provision to the document guaranteeing non-Christians the right to hold federal office.

Luther Martin, a delegate from Maryland, later reported on this matter to legislators in his state. Martin was dismayed over the “no religious test” provision and stated, “There were some members so unfashionable as to think that a belief in the existence of a Deity and of a state of future rewards and punishments would be some security for the good conduct of our rulers, and that, in a Christian country, it would be at least decent to hold out some distinction between the professors of Christianity and downright infidelity or paganism.” Martin’s report is evidence that the “Christian nation” faction had its say but lost.

The Political Beliefs of the Founders

The key founders were not advocates of church-state union. Thomas Jefferson, James Madison and others were aware of the difficulties spawned by state-established religion in Europe. In addition, they had experienced the problems created by church-state union in the colonies, many of which had official churches.

The Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom is considered by many scholars to be a precursor to the First Amendment. It was written by Thomas Jefferson and guided through the Virginia legislature by James Madison. The law disestablished the Anglican Church in Virginia and guaranteed religious liberty for all. During the debate over the bill, Madison wrote a document called “The Memorial and Remonstrance” that listed reasons why state-established Christianity was a bad idea.

When the bill was being debated, an attempt was made to limits its protections to Christians only. This was soundly defeated. Some years later, Jefferson reflected, “The insertion was rejected by a great majority, in proof that they meant to comprehend, within the mantle of its protection, the Jew and the Gentile, the Christian and Mahometan, the Hindoo, and the Infidel of every denomination.”

Madison helped draft the First Amendment. Some years after its adoption, Jefferson, in a letter to a Baptist group in Connecticut, used the famous “wall of separation between church and state” metaphor to describe the church-state language of the First Amendment.

The Religious Beliefs of the Founders

It’s unlikely that the founders would have established an officially Christian nation since many of them held unorthodox religious views. Many were Deists – they believed in a force that created the universe but did not accept the tents of orthodox Christianity.

George Washington was an Anglican officially, but he often spoke of God in deistic terms, employing phrases like “Supreme Architect of the Universe.” He usually left church before communion was served and seemed to believe in a “social utilitarian” view of religion – the idea that faith is necessary to maintain order and morals.

John Adams rejected core Christian concepts. He was especially skeptical of the Trinity. In 1756, a military officer named Major Greene visited Adams, and the two discussed religion. Greene was a Christian and argued in favor of the Trinity. When Adams asked Greene to explain how one god could manifest itself in three aspects, Greene replied that it was a mystery beyond human understanding. Adams later wrote in his diary, “Thus mystery is made a convenient cover for absurdity.”

Thomas Jefferson’s views were highly unorthodox. Jefferson rejected the divinity of Jesus and once wrote, “And the day will come when the mystical generation of Jesus, by the supreme being as his father in the womb of a virgin will be classed with the fable of the generation of Minerva in the brain of Jupiter.” (Letter to John Adams, April 11, 1823)

Jefferson once listed the doctrines of orthodox Christianity that he did not accept. They include: “The immaculate conception of Jesus, his deification, the creation of the world by him, his miraculous powers, his resurrection and visible ascension, his corporeal presence in the Eucharist, the Trinity; original sin, atonement, regeneration, election, orders of Hierarchy, etc.” (Letter to William Short, Oct. 31, 1819)

Madison was reluctant to discuss his religious view publicly. As a young man, he went through a period of intense religiosity, but it faded. He was perhaps the strongest advocate for church-state separation among all of the founders. Most scholars consider Madison to have been a Deist.

The Reaction in the 19th Century

Shortly after the Constitution was adopted, it was attacked by conservative ministers for its lack of religious references. New York pastor John M. Mason thundered in 1793 that the lack of references to God in the Constitution is “an omission which no pretext whatever can palliate.” Mason opined that God would seek vengeance and would “overturn from its foundations the fabric we have been rearing and crush us to atoms in the wreck.”

In 1811, the Rev. Samuel Austin told his congregation the Constitution “is entirely disconnected from Christianity.” Austin said this “one capital defect” would lead “inevitably to its destruction.”

The attacks continued. In 1845, the Rev. D.X. Junkin wrote, “[The Constitution] is negatively atheistical, for no God is appealed to at all. In framing many of our public formularies, greater care seems to have been taken to adapt them to the prejudices of the INFIDEL FEW than to the consciences of the Christian millions.”

These ministers knew that the Constitution did not establish an officially Christian nation. They considered this a defect and attacked the document. Eventually, ministers who held this view formed a

lobbying group called the National Reform Association. This group had a wide-ranging agenda, but among goals was adoption of a constitutional amendment officially declaring the United States a Christian nation. The amendment was first proposed in 1864. Ten years later, it received a vote in the House Judiciary Committee, which rejected it. The Committee said it took the action “in full realization of the dangers which the union of church and state had imposed upon so many nations of the Old World, with great unanimity that it was inexpedient to put anything in the Constitution or frame of government which might be construed to be a reference to any religious creed or doctrine.”

The amendment was reintroduced in 1882 and resurfaced as recently as 1965. It died every time.

The Origins of the Myth

If a Christian nation was not the intent of the founders, how did this myth arise? Its origins can be traced back to the late 19th Century. This was a traumatic period for the nation. Our country was emerging from a bloody civil war, and the resulting social changes were very difficult. The chaos left some people searching for answers. At times like this, it’s not unusual for religious revivals to spread.

Some conservative ministers began arguing that the Civil War had been a form of divine punishment from God. The Supreme Being, the argument went, was unhappy at being slighted in the Constitution, thus he punished the nation with a violent factional conflict. During the war, a Pennsylvania minister recommended putting a reference to God on coins as a way to placate the angry deity. This measure was adopted by the Secretary of the Treasury, and “In God We Trust” first began to appears on coins. It was used sporadically and was not mandated for use on coin until the 1950s – an era when the United States was battling “godless communism.”

The ministers formed a lobbying group called the National Reform Association. The group pushed for adding a “Christian nation” amendment to the Constitution and also sought the imposition of laws curtailing Sunday commerce and measures giving preference to Protestant worship in the growing public school system.

The “Christian nation” myth remains alive today because it suits a political purpose. Many Religious Right groups foster a form of “historical creationism” – just as they reject evolution in favor of a new “science” they call creationism, they reject accepted history in favor of a substitute “Christian history.”

The myth also feeds a common social phenomenon called the “stolen legacy.” This idea teaches that, at some point in the distant past, a Golden Age existed where certain ideas were exalted. This legacy was “stolen” or suppressed by another group. Thus, in the Religious Right’s worldview, the Golden Age is one of a “Christian America,” and it is being subverted or covered by up secularists, progressives, gays, feminists, etc.

The Christian nation myth is not harmless. It excludes millions of Americans by implying that they are second-class citizens in their own nation. It promotes bad history and spawns ignorance. It also downplays the importance of church-state separation, one of America’s greatest contributions to the world.

For these reasons, the Christian nation myth must be resisted at every possible avenue.