Faith (in) America

» BoGlobe: The politics of religion in America (James Carroll)

Here I was, saying "no time to blog, no time to blog" ... and then I stumble onto this BoGlobe article. It essentially captures the crux of what I see as the problem with Mitt Romney's "Faith in America" speech. I don't accept much of Carroll's view of faith, but I do think he captures how Romney's speech misses the mark on how faith & politics ought to operate in concert with one another. I do think that Carroll gets more correct on the founding of the US, though.

I don't think Carroll's take reflects some sort of anti-Mormon point, or anti-Romney point. What truly concerns me as one who certainly appreciates how faith informs one's politics is that there's been this artificial fusing of faith AND America as two indivisible entities. As Greg Boyd might put it, that's the misguided fusion of "cross and sword." Recently, I attended an event put on by the Houston Area Pastor Council where I got an up-close look at how this view was rationalized and put into practice.

The root of it is that the Constitution is given the air of religious authority and hence, accepted as firmly as any book of the Bible. Idolatry be damned. You see this in moments where, for instance, Mike Huckabee will point out - erroneously - that the majority of the signers of the Constitution were clergymen. There's also a reference to a study by Univ. of Houston PoliSci profs that the most relief-upon document for the Constitution isn't some French Revolutionary thinker ... but the Bible. You prop up the Constitution as something akin to the final book of revelation, and the argument for "strict constructionism" cannot be viewed as a worldy viewpoint, but rather a religious one.

Below is an audio recording of David Fannin, pastor of Nassau Bay Baptist Church, elaborating on the concept. The audio isn't all that great - I just used my cheapy MP3 player's recorder. But if you've got the patience to endure the audio quality, the argument Fannin makes is essentially the same as above.

David Fannin [mp3]