Thursday, January 20, 2005
Religion in America
No, we don't even have a particularly religious president right now. We just have a particularly godless godless Left.
George W., in fact, has lately become more sensitive to secularist sulking than most of those predecessors. He has toned down the telling of his embrace of the born-again religion of the Methodist camp meeting. He first set liberal teeth on edge in the 2000 presidential debates when, in answer to a question, he identified Jesus Christ as his favorite "philosopher." (This irritated more than a few of his fellow evangelicals, who regard Christ not as a philosopher but as the unique Son of G-d.) When he goes out of his way now to reassure the blockheads who insist on misreading what he says, the president is careful to refer to the divinity in more or less neutral language.
He isn't quite as bland as Dwight D. Eisenhower, who, like generals will, imagined that he spoke to G-d as (at least) an equal. Mr. Eisenhower neatly summed up the prevailing Potomac piety five decades ago: "Our government makes no sense unless it is founded in a deeply felt religious faith — and I don't care what it is." Presbyterian, Pentecostal or Hottentot, all same-same.
This is not far off par for our present day. "When an American president closes an address by saying 'G-d bless America,' " writes Michael Lind in Prospect magazine, "this is not a signal that the United States is about to become a theocracy. It is the equivalent of 'may the Force be with you.' "
George W., in fact, has lately become more sensitive to secularist sulking than most of those predecessors. He has toned down the telling of his embrace of the born-again religion of the Methodist camp meeting. He first set liberal teeth on edge in the 2000 presidential debates when, in answer to a question, he identified Jesus Christ as his favorite "philosopher." (This irritated more than a few of his fellow evangelicals, who regard Christ not as a philosopher but as the unique Son of G-d.) When he goes out of his way now to reassure the blockheads who insist on misreading what he says, the president is careful to refer to the divinity in more or less neutral language.
He isn't quite as bland as Dwight D. Eisenhower, who, like generals will, imagined that he spoke to G-d as (at least) an equal. Mr. Eisenhower neatly summed up the prevailing Potomac piety five decades ago: "Our government makes no sense unless it is founded in a deeply felt religious faith — and I don't care what it is." Presbyterian, Pentecostal or Hottentot, all same-same.
This is not far off par for our present day. "When an American president closes an address by saying 'G-d bless America,' " writes Michael Lind in Prospect magazine, "this is not a signal that the United States is about to become a theocracy. It is the equivalent of 'may the Force be with you.' "
