Was America Christian Back Then?

[peaceful-forest]

I hear from the two older generations that America was a Christian nation back then. But the older I get, the less I believe this.

How was America a Christian nation back then? When did the change happen?

What's the evidence that it was not a Christian nation back then?

 

[seeking.IAM]

I think it is safe to say America was more of a church-going nation "back then," whenever that was. But, we have never been a Christian nation, per se, since our formation. Before the internet and so many other opportunities, the church was the social hub of the community where people connected. That is not so much the case presently.

 

[Maria Billingsley]

I hear from the two older generations that America was a Christian nation back then. But the older I get, the less I believe this.

How was America a Christian nation back then? When did the change happen?

What's the evidence that it was not a Christian nation back then?

One must truly define Christianity then look back through history and apply this truth wherever possible. What was considered Christian " back then" is now considered not and vice versa. If it is not founded in " love", then it is not Christian.

For example:
The original Ku Klux Klan, founded in 1865, was explicitly Protestant. Its members were mostly white Southerners who had fought for the Confederacy in the Civil War. They believed that they were defending Christianity and white supremacy from threats posed by African Americans, Catholics, and Jews.

Blessings.

 

[eleos1954]

I hear from the two older generations that America was a Christian nation back then. But the older I get, the less I believe this.

How was America a Christian nation back then? When did the change happen?

What's the evidence that it was not a Christian nation back then?

America was founded on Christian principles ... specifically protestant Christian principles ... people fled to America because of prosecution that had and was continuing to take place against them. They fled to America to escape the persecution from the church and a forced religious system (Rome).

Protestants recognized through scripture people were to have the freedom to worship to the dictates of their conscience and/or have the freedom to not worship at all .. that is .... free to make their own decisions regarding the matter ... not to be a forced issue through any church system. That is why they created the separation of church and state ... not to protect the state ... but to protect against a forced religious system running the country along with the state ... the combining of church and state.

Because the early settlers were mostly God fearing people ... early on this mind set was largely adopted and taught and largely accepted ... and over time now that has and is dwindling ... as we are told in His Word that it would. It was the early settlers that brought with them the teaching of protestant christianity and introduced same to the native inhabitants of America that was unknown to them at that time.

America is not a "christian nation" per se ... it is a free country and people live according to the dictates of their conscience whether that be from a religious stand point or not ... each have choice in the matter ... as it should be.

We are not a "christian nation" .... we are a free nation and within our nation exists people who choose to be christians ... followers of Christ. Christianity is not a forced religious system ... never has been nor should be ... nor ever could be ... God does not force himself on anyone.

The term one nation under God does not define America as a "christian nation" ... the term under God is what provides the freedom for all people to have the freedom to choose (whether religious or not) .... not dictating they must serve God as a christian nation ... but rather provides all with choice and freedom from being persecuted of their religious choices. It protects all people from a forced belief system ... because it is a choice ... christianity is a choice ... not a dictated belief.

 

[DragonFox91]

I think it took a terrible turn after World War II. Before then, I think it was very Christian. World War II softened people too much. Suddenly any authority was deemed bad - & that went all the way up to the authority of God. The Vietnam & Korean Wars just made it worse.

I think many churches decided to cave on issues. A pastor was saying many churches adopted theology from Germany at a certain point I'm forgetting, which basically said most of the Bible isn't true, Jesus is just a good moral teacher, most of it is metaphor, etc. Whenever that was, that destroyed it - b/c it took over churches. I think was the time evolution was gaining steam, you lost many people then. I think it just became a joke to many people & they continued to go just for social hour & to have their emotions scratched.

Today many pagans will tell you the US is still very Christian. I'm not sure. It's probably 40% at best.

 

[d taylor]

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When is back then?

 

[linux.poet]

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When is back then?

Exactly. The Native Americans certainly weren't Christian. There was a large number of people who immigrated from Europe who were Christian that lived in this nation, because Europe was primarily Christian at the time America was founded. Then the secularization movements swept through Europe first and then the U.S.

The Native Americans still aren't Christian and many of them hang onto their ancestral beliefs. The African-American slaves were largely forced to practice Christianity by their masters and so they mixed in enough of their culture to make a preaching and music style that was suitable for them.

 

[Tuur]

The Native Americans still aren't Christian and many of them hang onto their ancestral beliefs. The African-American slaves were largely forced to practice Christianity by their masters and so they mixed in enough of their culture to make a preaching and music style that was suitable for them.

That would have come as a shock to a Cherokee preacher I knew. Would have to the original members of First African Baptist Church in Savannah, Georgia, too. That congregation is older than the US.

 

[linux.poet]

That would have come as a shock to a Cherokee preacher I knew. Would have to the original members of First African Baptist Church in Savannah, Georgia, too. That congregation is older than the US.

There are exceptions to every foolish generalization that I may chose to make. I had forgotten about the Cherokees.

I am interested as to how the First African Baptist Church is an exception to the rule, however. America had African immigrants that weren't slaves before its founding?

 

[RileyG]

I think it is safe to say America was more of a church-going nation "back then," whenever that was. But, we have never been a Christian nation, per se, since our formation. Before the internet and so many other opportunities, the church was the social hub of the community where people connected. That is not so much the case presently.

agreed.

 

[Tuur]

There are exceptions to every foolish generalization that I may chose to make. I had forgotten about the Cherokees.

I am interested as to how the First African Baptist Church is an exception to the rule, however. America had African immigrants that weren't slaves before its founding?

You have maintained masters forcibly "converted" their slaves. First African Baptist Church from the start was a congregation of believers of their own free will. Nor were they unusual. One may claim a master force their slaves to attend church with them, but it's harder to make that allegation when slaves formed their own congregation. The First African Baptist Church was hardly the only one.

 

[linux.poet]

You have maintained masters forcibly "converted" their slaves. First African Baptist Church from the start was a congregation of believers of their own free will. Nor were they unusual. One may claim a master force their slaves to attend church with them, but it's harder to make that allegation when slaves formed their own congregation. The First African Baptist Church was hardly the only one.

Nice. I'll chalk my previous ill-guided remark to my time in secular university earning an English degree, which is where I got the "masters forcibly converted their slaves" claim from. If I hear such a claim again, I'll be sure to let them know they are incorrect.

 

[peaceful-forest]

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When is back then?

I had assumed the time frame when the Silent generation and the Boomers were growing up/were adults.

 

[Ignatius the Kiwi]

Defacto it was a Christian country inasmuch law and culture were informed by Christian principles. Dejure it was a non Christian country founded on Enlightenment principles.

Since the USA no longer embodies any Christian principle and we are told it would be wrong for it to do so, Christians ought regard the American Empire as the early Christians regarded Rome. Unworthy of devotion, unworthy of dying for.

 

[Berserk]

At the height of the great Methodist revival of the 19th century 40% of all Americans were Methodists. Methodists were required to attend weekly class meetings during which they were expected to explain the inner and outer state of their soul as reflected in their words, deeds, and atittudes


































In the 19th century Methodists were expected to attend weekly Class Meetings during which they were expected to express the inner and outer state of the soul as reflected in their attitudes, words, and deeds of the previous week. This was real accountability, so real that in the early 2000s Methodists became more respectable and were increasingly unwilling to air their dirty linen in public. So they made Class Meetings optional and in fact killed the practice. American Methodism has experiences slow, steady decline every since. But in 1870, at the height of the Methodist awakening, 40% of all Americans were Methodist, largely due to the spiritual fervor generated by these weekly Class Meetings. Back then, they were known as "the shouting Methodists!"



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[ronlion]

I hear from the two older generations that America was a Christian nation back then. But the older I get, the less I believe this.

How was America a Christian nation back then? When did the change happen?

What's the evidence that it was not a Christian nation back then?

Hi! America gained its official sovereignty in the Name of the Most Holy and Undivided Trinity when Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, and others, representing the US signed the Treaty of Paris (in the Name of the Christian Trinity) on Se 3, 1783 with the Kingdom of Great Britain ending the American Revolutionary War. (Note : there are several "Treaty of Paris'".)

So one thing that cannot be denied is that Trinitarian Christianity is the only officially recognized religion in any of the first 3 major documents of the US- the others being the later US Constitution and the earlier Declaration of Independence.

The Treaty of Paris (only Article 1 is still in effect)
Providence and Paris : The Trinity and the Treaty - Our Lost Founding - We must stand resolutely for our Christian faith or we will lose our right to practice it freely brothers and sisters, as the British Christians sadly are finding out the hard way. The others are playing for keeps-they want our kids , and country.

Thank you peaceful forest for bringing the topic up. Merry/Happy Christmas!
Can Stones Cry?

 

[ViaCrucis]

I hear from the two older generations that America was a Christian nation back then. But the older I get, the less I believe this.

How was America a Christian nation back then? When did the change happen?

What's the evidence that it was not a Christian nation back then?

America has always been a predominantly/majority Christian nation, it still is.
But it's never been a Christian nation. The US Constitution forbids the establishment of religion; there is no state-sponsored religion or church. Early American legal documents expressly reject the idea that the US was founded as, or is, a Christian nation.

Because it has always been a majority Christian nation--most people here identify themselves as Christian--virtually all public servants and elected officials have been Christian, or at least identified themselves as such. Many of the early American intelligentsia were Deists, most famously Thomas Jefferson who subscribed to a Deist view of God and held to the belief that Jesus was a great moral philosopher (but rejected the Virgin Birth, miracles, Divinity, atoning death on the cross, resurrection, and all the other major doctrines and beliefs of the Christian religion). Some, like Thomas Paine, were quite antagonistic toward religion broadly, and Christianity in particular. But the common thread is that virtually nobody wanted a state-religion, and instead wanted to keep the US a secular state that secured freedom of religion to everyone without any external pressures by the state in dictating what people could or couldn't believe.

It is that principle of religious freedom that made the US such an attractive place for so many different people in other parts of the world who often struggled with practicing their religion in their own country. Such as many of the early Lutherans who came to the United States after the Prussian Union, a forced state union of the Lutheran and Reformed churches in Prussia to create a singular state-sponsored "Protestant" church. Lutherans, not wanting to lose their confessional distinctiveness, left to start new lives in other parts of the world, including the US and Canada. It's also why many Baha'is came to the US, such as my old neighbors, they had to leave their native Iran because the Iranian government is incredibly intolerant of anyone who isn't Shi'a Muslim (even other Muslims are discriminated against and persecuted there), Baha'is in particular are especially persecuted there.

It is that secular freedom to practice one's religion with liberty and freedom of conscience that brought immigrants from around the world, whether German Lutherans over a hundred years ago, or my Baha'i neighbors who sought refuge here just a few decades ago.

Now, as far as America and Christian morality/ethics is concerned. America has never been morally Christian--from its founding America had institutionalized slavery, and racism was baked into the Constitution until amended following the American Civil War. The murder and slaughter of the indigenous peoples is hardly in keeping with the biblical principles of justice and love. So from 1776 until 2023, there was never a time when America was morally Christian either. Systemically speaking, America has been--like all other nations and kingdoms of the world--quite un-Christian. After slavery there was Jim Crow, after Jim Crow there's still massive systemic racism and abuses of power baked into many aspects of the country that negatively impacts POC and other minorities and marginalized groups.

I can't think how, in any sense, America has ever been a Christian nation except in the sense that a majority of the population identifies itself as Christian. Putting "In God We Trust" on our money doesn't make the US Christian anymore than me in high school writing in my journal how hot I thought Jennifer Love Hewitt was made her my wife.

-CryptoLutheran

 

[Ain't Zwinglian]

If there was any one description of American Christianity is its extreme theological diversity. This of course comes from the Free Exercise clause of the Constitution which allows anyone to become a theological scholar.

 

[com7fy8]

I hear from the two older generations that America was a Christian nation back then. But the older I get, the less I believe this.

How was America a Christian nation back then? When did the change happen?

What's the evidence that it was not a Christian nation back then?

There are people saying this on TV, on Christian channels. And ones say the signers of the Declaration of Independence were mostly Christians. But I did not know any of them personally so I could see if they lived . . . and related in love . . . the way the Bible says to live and love. They could have made gestures of Christianity but not have been Christian in their character.

I am not sure I could go killing sons of British people, in order to get some sort of independence. I do not find where Jesus says to kill people, in order to get things I want. And I have been told a lot of soldiers of Britain could have been poor people off the streets > I am not sure it would be right to kill people who had nothing really to do with what the higher-up well-to-do class of people wanted.

And Britain, by the way, seems to have conquered areas in Africa, in order to have land for growing things like coffee and tea and cotton. They killed a lot of people while doing that, I understand . . . while Britain claimed to be a Christian country, I think. I would say that was the opposite of Christian.

And the United States was involved in killing many people in order to take the lands where Mexicans and Native American sovereign nations lived. People claiming to be Christians used covered wagons to move into lands without permission and killing Indians, in order to move into their lands without permission of the Indian sovereign nations. And yet, now a number of people claiming to be Christians are very upset at how Hispanics are moving into the United States!! And these Hispanics are not killing people in order to move here. Christians are living on property taken by bloodshed, and yet are upset that Hispanics are coming here without hurting anyone.

So, I can say there has been an amount of what is not functional and Biblical Christianity here in the United States, all along.

But yes I can see the United States Constitution could be Christian . . . in its rightful meaning. However, I do not see any statement that Jesus Christ is our Lord and Savior and soon-coming King, now the King of the United States of America. So, there is no obvious confession of Jesus, in some number of even the original American documents, that I know of.

But do we have functionally Christian people in the United States? I would say so. And if ones are Biblical in how they live and love, I would say they represent what America really should be. Perhaps we could say such people are the real America and therefore the real America is Christian. But there are various people in other countries who also live and love the way Americans need to live and love. So, the real Christian America would include many people who were born and live all around the world . . . while many American citizens are denying Jesus, and so conceited that they feel Jesus isn't good enough for them. And so they live selfishly, and this is not Christian. But ones living "rooted and grounded in love" (Ephesians 3:17) all have the same Christian soil which is not made of any earth of this planet.

And if the blood of American revolutionaries was shed by some number of non-Christians . . . it matters who paid their blood for American freedom, and what sort of freedom. We in Jesus have Jesus Himself who paid His own blood for us. So, I can see I do not need to go only by what American written documents might say. But who shed the blood??????

With Jesus we have so much more and better than what humans have shed their blood to get.

And what about the laws? In the Bible we have >

"Do all things without complaining and disputing, that you may become blameless and harmless, children of God without fault in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation," > in Philippians 2:13-16. This is not a law that I know of in any United States legal arrangement.

And what does "without complaining" include? > not complaining against God's blessing of rain! Yet, I know that people claiming to be Jesus people can actually fear rain and talk about it like it is a curse, right while God is giving us rain so necessary for us to have life on this earth. And their complaining has them emotionally under the power of what is not love and enjoying God.

And I have heard even TV weather people calling rain "bad weather", and I do not know of any public Christian activitists who say it is blasphemy to call God's blessing of rain "bad", and who are trying to stop TV people from speaking badly of God's blessing of rain. Yes, some Christian activists work against a few non-Biblical things, but it seems no one has noticed and made an outcry against blaspheming God by complaining against His blessing of rain.

And even young children can hear this stuff during primetime weather broadcasts; but have activists Christian been concerned about this, and how criticizing rain, on TV, can plant a bad seed in young listeners?? And then they can get dismal and reap all that time, for the rest of their lives, when they will be depressed whenever it is raining, reaping all that spoiled time because of receiving and growing from their seed attitude of considering rain to be "bad" weather. We can reap emotionally, now, according to those seeds we have sown > Galatians 6:7-8.

But, of course, ones might say, Well, you can't expect worldly people to do any better. This, then, is admitting the country can't be expected to be Christian, then, right?

Arguing has not been directly outlawed, to my knowledge, also.

And the character of arguing and complaining can keep us deeply degraded so we then can do the more obviously wrong things. Arguing and complaining can keep people weak so they are suffering deeply and then able to try to get relief by doing various wrong things to feel good with pleasure and have control and security. Changing laws and stopping certain wrong behaviors, then, is not enough.

Only God through Jesus can change us to be how He desires and is committed to doing with us. God alone does real correction of our character > Hebrews 12:4-14 > Romans 8:29.

So, I can not tell you America has ever been functionally Christian, by the main focus things of the Bible.

And Jesus so loves us, that He so suffered and died on the cross, rather than hurt or be unforgiving with anyone. And this is part of our basic example of how to be Christian . . . as members of God's one "holy nation" > 1 Peter 2:9.

God's one nation is all around this earth and in eternity, I now understand. And the obedient citizens of this nation are ruled by God's own peace in our hearts >

"And let the peace of God rule in your hearts, to which also you were called in one body; and be thankful." (Colossians 3:15)

Jesus our Lord rules us by His own peace in us.

And I think of this > I have been in at least one church during an American war, where from the pulpit prayer was made for "our soldiers", but no prayer of love and blessing was said for the soldiers and other citizens of the country where the American soldiers were fighting. And it was a Bible claiming church. And we know Jesus says to love our enemies and pray for them. If we are functionally Christian we pray with love and hope for any and all people > 1 Timothy 2:1-4 > love "hopes all things" (in 1 Corinthians 13:7).

And we need to answer to God first, not only try to make others answer to us >

"For the time has come for judgment to begin at the house of God; and if it begins with us first, what will be the end of those who do not obey the gospel of God?" (1 Peter 4:17)

"Therefore submit to God." (in James 4:7)

And this way we are living in God's one holy nation all around the earth and in eternity, in family sharing with all our others. And perhaps we do not need to get worried about what labels to put on the United States and other places on this earth, but God uses example >

"nor as being lords over those entrusted to you, but being examples to the flock." (1 Peter 5:3)

And if God says to pray for any and all people, including with love for enemies . . . God is committed to making our prayer bring His own good.

 

[J_B_]

America was founded on Christian principles ...

Not really. The U.S. was predominantly made up of Christians and was heavily influenced by Christianity, but our current Constitution stems from Enlightened principles, not Christian.

Some states had specifically Christian governments. For a long time it was legal for states to have a state church and some did, but those died a natural death, and subsequent amendments made them impossible. In other cases, such as Virginia, people like Thomas Jefferson actively worked to exclude church influence in government. His plan for the University of Virginia (which most history textbooks laud as a shining model of the modern university) specifically excluded governance by a church body. He essentially proposed a "separate but equal" model for church education.

You can read texts such as Garry Wills Inventing America or Jackson Turner Main's The Antifederalists to learn about the battle over the role of the church in early America. I liken it to the frog in the pot analogy, where early America was so dominated by Christians that they didn't realize what the planting of Enlightenment seeds would lead to. They figured they were winning because they had the numbers.