the myth of a christian nation. background: the catholic church in renaissance europe (ca. 1500) led...
TRANSCRIPT
![Page 1: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/1.jpg)
The Myth of a Christian Nation
![Page 2: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/2.jpg)
Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500)
• Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome)
• Claims to inherit “power of keys” from St. Peter
• Church institutional path to salvation
![Page 3: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/3.jpg)
Background: Control over Sacraments: Baptism,
Penance/Confession, Eucharist
![Page 4: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/4.jpg)
Background: Established Church as “the standard”
• Claim to universal sovereignty over Christendom
• Popes often challenge kings and emperors over worldly authority
![Page 5: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/5.jpg)
Background: The Protestant Reformation
• Martin Luther denies power of Pope & institutional church 1517
• Bible and faith alone paths to salvation
• Given by God directly to believer
![Page 6: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/6.jpg)
Origins: Evangelicalism
• Gospel, good news• Luther, Die
Evangelische Kirche: revival of Gospel-era Christianity
• Ev (or eu, good) + angelos (messenger)
![Page 7: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/7.jpg)
Background: Luther’s Reforms
• Sees leadership in Catholic Church of his own day as corrupt and immoral
• Seeks to revive Christianity of biblical times
• But depends on German rulers for support and protection
• Lutheran (Evangelical) Church also established
![Page 8: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/8.jpg)
Background: Church of England
• Henry VIII breaks with Pope over marriage annulment 1530s
• Church of England becomes independent national established church with King as leader
• But not much change in worship & belief
![Page 9: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/9.jpg)
Background: English Puritanism
• Arises late 16c at Cambridge Univ.
• Aim at purifying C of E
• Opposed to RC theology & worship
• Corrupt, immoral, uneducated clergy
• General state of public morals
![Page 10: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/10.jpg)
Massachusetts Bay Colony
• Non-Separating Puritans
• John Winthrop & Arbella 1630
• “Errand into the Wilderness”
![Page 11: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/11.jpg)
The “Pilgrims”
• Separating Puritans• Sojourn in Holland• Mayflower arrives
Plymouth 1620
![Page 12: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/12.jpg)
New England Puritanism
• Desire to start anew, without government interference
• Like Luther, return to apostolic Christianity
• Bible only source of religious truth
• But from beginning Puritan (Congregational) churches established
• Intolerant of dissenters like Roger Williams
![Page 13: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/13.jpg)
Central Practices & Beliefs
• Bible = central authority
• Emphasis on preaching
• Predestination (John Calvin)
• God chooses “saints”
• Godly life best evidence of being chosen
• Entire society designed to proclaim and enforce God’s Law
![Page 14: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/14.jpg)
Sense of Divine Purpose
• Images: New Israel, City set on a Hill
• Reenactment of Exodus
• Basis for American sense of mission
![Page 15: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/15.jpg)
Colonial Diversity
• Puritans (Congregationalists) in New England• Anglicans in NY & South • Baptists in RI• Presbyterians & Dutch Reformed in Middle
Colonies• Quakers & Lutherans in PA• Methodists in NY & MD• Catholics in MD & PA• Jews in Atlantic seaboard cities• African Indigenous Religions & Islam throughout
![Page 16: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/16.jpg)
The Great Awakening and Myth of a Chosen Nation
• 1740s• Begins in New
England with Jonathan Edwards
• Revival preaching• Aimed at emotions• Response to
perceived decline in religious fervor
![Page 17: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/17.jpg)
George Whitefield
• English Calvinist• Spends most of career in
colonies• “Grand Itinerant”• Need for personal
conversion experience• Attack on “parochial
principle”• Helps shape sense of
common American identity
![Page 18: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/18.jpg)
Summary: American Evangelicalism
• Origins partly in New England Puritanism (Congregationalists)
• Multi-denominational – also Presbyterians, Baptists, Methodists
• Stress on need for personal conversion experience
• Authority and centrality of Bible• “Missionary imperative”: evangelize all
nations
![Page 19: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/19.jpg)
Meanwhile…The Enlightenment
• Late 17th – Early 19th centuries C.E.
• Core of Enlightenment thought = epistemological…– i.e. how do we know
things to be true?– Tradition?
– Authority?
– Revelation?
• Observation & REASON!!!
![Page 20: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/20.jpg)
Deism & the Myth of Nature’s Nation
• Benjamin Franklin• Thomas Jefferson
• God as clockmaker --- notion of ‘deus otiosus’• Rejection of supernatural
• Common Sense philosophy (Scotland)– Thomas Reid --- all humans possess innate “moral
compass”
![Page 21: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/21.jpg)
Question for Discussion
• Reflecting back, why do you think 18th century evangelicals like Jonathan Edwards and George Whitefield felt threatened by the Myth of Nature’s Nnation?
![Page 22: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/22.jpg)
The Question of Establishment in the New Nation
• Isaac Backus & Baptists in MA
• Thomas Jefferson &
other American philosophes
• Practical convergence of positions
![Page 23: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/23.jpg)
Result: The First Amendment
![Page 24: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/24.jpg)
Features
• Establishment Clause
• Free Exercise Clause
• De jure follows de facto pluralism
• General terms: actual implications subject of on-going litigation & court decisions
![Page 25: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/25.jpg)
Consequences and Contexts of 1st Amendment in New Nation
• Formal separation of Church and State
• Established church no longer possible
• Large percentage of Americans not church affiliated
• Challenges of expanding frontier in south and west
• Difficult to continue Puritan quest for unified Christian society
![Page 26: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/26.jpg)
Evangelical Response: The Second Great Awakening
• 1790s-1830s• Possibility of de facto if not de jure Evangelical hegemony (dominance)Strategies:• Revival preaching• Equation of Ev. Xnty with patriotism• Opposition to enemies of Church & Nation• Imposition of Xn morals through voluntary
societies, organization, & lobbying: Benevolent Empire
![Page 27: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/27.jpg)
Two Leaders: Beecher and Finney
![Page 28: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/28.jpg)
Lyman Beecher in Cincinnati
• 1775-1863• Congregationalist
from CT• Revivalist preacher• Preaches against
liberalism in Boston• Comes to Cincinnati
as president of Lane Theological Seminary
![Page 29: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/29.jpg)
Charles Finney in New York
• 1792-1875• CT lawyer turned
evangelist• Ordained
Presbyterian but independent revivalist
![Page 30: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/30.jpg)
The Burned-Over District
• Upstate NY 1820s• Displaced New Englanders
![Page 31: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/31.jpg)
“New Measures” revivalism
• Anxious bench• Protracted meeting
![Page 32: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/32.jpg)
Another Strategy: The Benevolent Empire
• 1820s• Ca. 2 dozen voluntary
societies• Goal: evangelism &
moral reform• Overlapping
membership• Interdenominational• Beecher major
organizing force
![Page 33: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/33.jpg)
Causes
• Bible & tract societies• Home & foreign
missions• Missions to sailors,
Indians, prostitutes• Anti-dueling• Sabbatarianism• Colonization: Liberia
![Page 34: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/34.jpg)
Challenge
• Competition among denominations on the frontier
• New groups such as Baptists and Methodists challenging more established Congregationalists and Presbyterians
• Catholics beginning to make presence felt…
![Page 35: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/35.jpg)
Question for Discussion
• How did American Evangelicals adapt the myth of a Christian Nation to respond to the rapid influx of Catholic emigrants in the 19th century?
![Page 36: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/36.jpg)
Strategy: Depict Catholic Church as Enemy of American Liberty
![Page 37: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/37.jpg)
“A Plea for the West” 1835 – Lyman Beecher
“It is…clear that the conflict which is to decide the destiny of the West, will be a conflict of institutions for the education of her sons, for purposes of [Roman Catholic] superstition, or evangelical light, of despotism, or liberty.”
![Page 38: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/38.jpg)
Strategy
• Identification of Evangelical Protestantism with American institutions
• Catholic Church now major enemy of American institutions
• New theme of Manifest Destiny: American future in West, Evangelicals must provide leadership
![Page 39: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/39.jpg)
20th Century: Retreat & Reemergence of Evangelicals
• Scopes “Monkey” Trial – 1925– Creationism?– Evolutionism?
• Evangelicals withdraw from mainstream society & politics and form subcultures for @ 50 years
• Reemergence of Evangelicals on the political scene through Jimmy Carter’s campaign – 1976-1980
• Emergence of the New Religious Right: – Reagan, Bush & Bush; – Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell
![Page 40: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/40.jpg)
Summary: Tracing the Contours of the Myth of a Christian Nation
• American Evangelicals & the First Great Awakening…
• Enlightenment and Deism…
• Second Great Awakening & Benevolent Empire…
• Retreat of Evangelicals from mainstream society from 1925 – 1976…
• Reemergence of Evangelicals/Rise of the New Religious Right – 1980s-present
![Page 42: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/42.jpg)
Challenge #1
• Perceived assaults on Evangelical Christianity from:
– Darwinian Evolution– Scopes “Monkey” Trial– Biblical Criticism
• RESPONSE = FUNDAMENTALISM
![Page 43: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/43.jpg)
Challenge #2
• Christianity =– Imperialism/racism– destruction of the
environment
• Post-Vietnam War – influx of Asian immigrants;
c.f. Hart-Cellar Act of 1965
• RESPONSE:– Rebuild Christian Nation (Robertson- Regent U & Falwell- Moral Majority)
![Page 44: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/44.jpg)
Challenge #3
• September 11th, 2001 – WTC bombings
• RESPONSE #1: Interpreting 9/11 in covenantal terms…
• RESPONSE #2: Demonization of non-Christians
![Page 45: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/45.jpg)
Parting Questions
How has the myth of a Christian nation endured the variety of challenges arising throughout the past four centuries?
Have encounters with these challenges altered the myth itself? How so?
How does the history provided in the article, “Servants of Allah”, critique the myth of a Christian Nation?
Why aren’t critiques of this myth (such as that provided by the article: “Servants of Allah”) more widely known, taught in public schools, or reinforced through mass media?
![Page 46: The Myth of a Christian Nation. Background: The Catholic Church in Renaissance Europe (ca. 1500) Led by Pope (Bishop of Rome) Claims to inherit “power](https://reader036.vdocument.in/reader036/viewer/2022081519/56649e315503460f94b21bbb/html5/thumbnails/46.jpg)
A Kitten Brothers Production