Is America a Christian Nation? American Reform tells us
The Journal for American Reform has published its first original essay, on what it means to call America a 'Christian nation.'
(WM Round-Up) – The Journal for American Reform has published its maiden Substack essay, titled: Contra Lazar: is America really a Christian nation?
(AR) offers a frank account of his nation’s history and philosophy:[There are a] group of modern Catholics who attempt to downplay—even ignore—the substantial incompatibility of the founding spirit, principles and aims of the American founders with Roman Catholicism. To stress, it is not merely an accidental incompatibility.
The men in this camp claim to be motivated by a love of the American patrimony, which there is no reason to doubt, but they unfortunately have a tendency to exaggerate the good aspects of America, while minimizing the (considerable) bad aspects.
Other times, they make tenuous claims about the founding, as they try and paint a rosier picture of the beginnings of our dear country than what transpired. Whitewashing revolutionism is never a good idea.
AR intriguingly lists a “so-called right to revolution” as one of “ten errors that would make it impossible to say America is [or was ever] a Christian nation.”
Indeed?
AR continues, painting a more balanced picture than some:
The set of errors seems to be generated—to some extent—as a reaction to traditionalist critiques, which sometimes error in the opposite direction. Critiques of America, from a Catholic perspective, that are, perhaps, too harsh.
Directionally, these are correct, but their presentation can be needlessly inflammatory, or make it seem like reforming America is a hopeless task.
The latter is not true, and we know from the words of Our Lord (Matt. 19:26) “With men this is impossible; but with God all things are possible.” Our duty, then, is a true and lasting reform of America, which must be at a foundational level, despite the obvious difficulty.
He goes on to give a thorough analysis of the role of religious liberty—a topic which is a recurring theme for us at The WM Review:
AR has previously focused more on translations and classic texts, as well as mini-essays on Twitter. He adheres to the Cassiciacum thesis of Bishop Guérard des Lauriers.
Go and check his work out.
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Interesting:
As a political theorist, I’m wondering whether there is much difference between “reform at a foundational level” and revolution.
It seems to me there are at least two “foundational” problems with the American political system which irretrievably place it at odds with Catholic social doctrine:
1. Secularism
2. Social contract theory (ie., authority comes from “we the people” rather than God).
But rectifying these foundational issues would be so revolutionary as to completely transform (for the better) American society.
This causes me to suspect the authors’ desire for moderation may be overriding his appreciation of both tge degree to which the American political landscape opposes Catholic principles, and therefore the degree to which “foundational reform” would revolutionize same. And for those reasons, I’d count myself as one of those Americans who believes there is no hope for this country.
Having said all this, I do accept that the demarcation between reform and revolution does not avail itself of mathematical precision, and that others may view the American situation through rosier lenses than I do.