Earlier this year, Secretary of State Marco Rubio mentioned Christianity in a speech to international leaders in Munich. He was referencing an important historical fact. He was not advocating “Christian nationalism.”
Usage varies, but if that term is defined so broadly that any connection between God and government is contemptible, then founding father John Adams is guilty. He called the moment America declared independence, “the day of deliverance by solemn acts of devotion to God Almighty from one end of the Continent to the other.” Also guilty is Benjamin Franklin, not known to be a Christian. “The longer I live,” he wrote, “the more convincing proofs I see of this truth – that God governs in the affairs of men.”
The early patriots understood the positive civilizational impact of personal Christian faith. John Adams described what it would look like if all citizens regulate our conduct by the Bible. “Every member would be obliged in conscience to temperance, frugality, and industry; to justice, kindness, and charity towards his fellow men.” Patrick Henry noted Christianity is the source of religious freedom. “This great nation was founded, not by religionists, but by Christians; not on religions but on the Gospel of Jesus Christ. For this very reason peoples of other faiths have been afforded asylum, prosperity, and freedom of worship here.”
One of Western Civilization’s founding principles is that all people are created in God’s image. Rabbi Jonathan Sacks points to the implications of that truth. “We are called to create order in our personal lives and in society as a whole,” he wrote. “We are God’s image. … Ahead of us is the task set by God: to be his agents of justice and compassion.”
The historical fact is that America emerged and thrived in the fertile soil of Judeo-Christian thought and values. However, the birth of America 250 years ago is not the Christian’s major point of historical reference. It is 2000 years ago when Jesus revealed Himself as “the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world” (John 1:29). It follows that our greatest motivation is neither politics nor the survival and spread of Western Civilization. It is the desire to witness a great worshipping multitude “from every nation and all tribes and peoples and tongues, standing before the throne and before the Lamb” (Rev. 7:9).
America is built on the idea that we are endowed by our Creator with certain unalienable rights, including life and liberty. When “isms” and ideologies creep in and mask those rights or contradict what is true, we are victimized by a tragic miscalculation. Our Union is less perfect, just, and tranquil. Maybe that’s why in that speech, Rubio called the Christian faith the “sacred inheritance” of those who settled and built America. It is ours, too, when we dare to claim it.