Political Religion

by digby

Pastordan sent this Jon Meacham piece along and it’s worth sharing today on George Washington’s birthday. I’ve been hard on Meacham in the past, but I think this is good.

…For the wonderful thing about American public religion—or what Lincoln called our “political religion”—is that its creed is liberty and the rule of law, not coercion or forced belief or a link between one’s civil and religious lives. George Washington promised that the government would “give to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance,” a promise that I think is as fundamental to America as the promises of the Declaration of Independence.

[…]

We are right to be reverent about our nation—and we obligated to be respectful of the rights of others to do as they please, within the spirit of the democracy whose leaders we celebrate today.

I don’t think we have proved ourselves as exceptional as Adams and the other founders hoped we would, but there is no doubt that we are a better and more successful nation on the occasions when we follow enlightened, democratic principles in actions as well as words. Our shared respect for the Bill of Rights and the Constitution as the governing documents of our civic life is what binds us together as a people.

So, as the current administration openly undermines this civic faith, hiding behind religious faith to do it, it undermines the “political religion” that’s held this country together over two centuries. That’s something to ponder isn’t it?

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