Civil religion

“The civil religion is obviously involved in the most pressing moral and political issues of the day. “God” has clearly been a central symbol in the civil religion from the beginning and remains so today (Bellah 13)”. This statement was posed by Robert Bellah in his paper “Civil Religion in America”. I agree that people turn to and use religion as a scapegoat in the midst of conflict just as they do with politics. In order to observe the closeness between the two entities, politics and religion, we must realize that they are bound together by the people and government recognition of, “the existence of God, the life to come, the reward of virtue and the punishment of vice, and the exclusion of religious tolerance,” (Bellah 5). The American…

article “American Civil Religion,” Bellah describes the way that the United States government not only interacts with religion, but actually has religion ingrained in it. From the America’s founding documents, to holidays, to the Pledge of Allegiance, to the phrase “In God We Trust,” religion everywhere in our government even when it isn't supposed to be anywhere within our government. However, Bellah makes the argument that even though there is religion in our government it serves a different…

There are some weird cultures in the world. In Liberia, genital mutilation, forced initiation into secret societies, accusations of witchcraft, ordeal trials, and ritualistic killings are all common. These violate natural rights that are supposedly given to everyone. By definition on United States History, natural rights are “the rights of life, liberty and property” conceived by John Locke and they “belong equally to all men at birth and cannot be taken away”. According to this definition, does…

Wesley’s look at politics, which affected faith and preaching during the Civil War, is different from his former counterpart historians. Wesley strives to prove that both the North and South were heavily influenced by its preachers during the Civil War. Wesley provides his theses with valuable evidence that the politics, which were preached by South and North leaders of the church, were different, but the goal was the same: to encourage their troops and supporters on their side of the war,…

bring all the boys together in one collective form and was thereupon the source of power and organization. It continued to be used to call the boys together for civil meetings where the power was distributed in a democratic fashion amongst the boys through the passing of the shell. Over time, however, as the boys tendencies towards animalistic and savage direction heightened, the shell lost its value and presence, and along with it the order on the island diminished as well. Finally, in the…

that spiritual realm or sacred authority involving the particular view of the world’s religious systems, which works on concealing the elements and practical alternatives. In Civil Religion in America, Robert N. Bellah compares the differences between public and private religion and how civil religion is not the same as religion found in places of worship but are influenced by them (i.g. Christianity). Bellah talks about how the American civic consciousness was influenced by God and church, how…

Other than the ideological criticism, a major argument against the Uniform Civil Code is the problem of its practical application. One often faces the question as to how a Uniform Civil Code would be drafted? Every person believes in the superiority of the values of one’s religion. In such a scenario, how can the state come up with a law that is not disproportionally favorable to any particular religion but is widely accepted by people of various religions? It needs to be understood that Uniform…

Public Religion in the New Republic As a whole, post- Revolution Americans believed that God had a special vocation in store for the country, which was expressed in both the country’s culture and government. At the time, a vast amount of the citizens were Christians; and as a result of their shared beliefs, religion in church coexisted with religion in the government. In this time period, most citizens belonged to a protestant religion. The largest were the Congregationalists,…

In the words of Robert Bellah, civil religion is “an apprehension of universal and transcendent religious reality revealed through the experience of the American people (Bellah, 172). The nation’s history of fighting for freedom and equality are documented with words from our founding fathers and wise historical figures. They are recognized through sacred texts and symbols including, but not limited to, the Declaration of Independence, the Star Spangled Banner, phrases such as “God Bless…

A Letter Concerning Toleration Analysis and its Relevance Today John Locke’s “A Letter Concerning Toleration” lays out an argument explaining the need for the separation of church and state with religious tolerance as the foundation of society. Locke defines religious toleration as the acknowledgement of an individual’s right to believe, and practice the faith of their own choosing. Toleration does not imply acceptance, but simply allowance; it is the ability to allow individuals around you to…