A Nation of "Faith"

Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards, who says he prays daily and has a personal relationship with God, rejects the notion that America is "a Christian nation."

"There's a lot of America that's Christian. I would not describe us, though, on the whole, as a Christian nation," he told the Web site Beliefnet. "I guess the word 'Christian' is what bothers me, even though I'm a Christian. I think that America is a nation of faith."

"My faith informs everything I think and do," he said, but he added that he strongly believes in the separation of church and state.

Dubbing this a "nation of faith" is insipid garbage. It's akin to saying: "We're a nation of belief." No kidding. Everyone believes something.

He falls on his face at the altar of church and state separation, but our Founders did not; otherwise, they would have enshrined it in the Constitution.

So what makes a nation Christian? Here are a few points for pondering:

1. U.S. Census estimates the Christian population of the United States at 79.8%, in the most recent (2001) statistics. The next highest affiliation is Non-religious/Secular at 15%. All other religions combined come to 5.2%. Assuming these figures are roughly correct, this means that Christians outnumber secularists by a more than 5-to-1 margin; and all other religions by more than 15-to-1. Even taking into consideration the nominal Christianity of many respondents, Christians still constitute the vast majority in the U.S.

2. The majority of the Founding Fathers were Christians, notwithstanding revisionist "history."

3. Christianity heavily informed the formulation of this nation. The Constitution and the Declaration of Independence--our two most important founding documents--express a Christian worldview and understanding of man's sinful nature, and of his God-given right to liberty.

I contend that the United States of America is a Christian nation--to the extent that any nation may be labeled such. And to the degree that this heritage has eroded and decayed over time, becoming a shadow of its former self, we have people like John Edwards to thank for that.