another lost episode in American history

[98valk]

Professor Charles Hodge was born on December 27, 1797, was married to the great-grand daughter of Benjamin Franklin, received his doctorate from Rutgers University and taught for fifty years at Princeton University. In his Systematic Theology, Hodge wrote in 1871:

"The proposition that the United States of America are a Christian and Protestant nation, is not so much the assertion of a principle as the statement of a fact. That fact is not simply that the great majority of the people are Christians...but that the organic life, the institutions, laws, and official action of the government, whether that action be legislative, judicial, or executive, is...in accordance with the principles of...Christianity....

If a man goes to China, he expects to find the government there administered according to the religion of the country. If he goes to Turkey, he expects to find the Koran supreme and regulating all public action. If he goes to a Protestant country, he has no right to complain, should he find the Bible in the ascendancy and exerting its benign influence not only on the people, but also on the government....

In the process of time thousands have come among us, who are [not] Christians. Some are...Jews, some are infidels, and some atheists. All are welcomed; all are admitted to equal rights and privileges. All are allowed to acquired property, and to vote in every election....All are allowed to worship as they please, or not to worship at all....

No man is molested for his religion or for his want of religion. No man is required to profess any form of faith, or to join any religious association. More than this cannot reasonably be demanded.

More, however, is demanded. The infidel demands that the government should be conducted on the principle that Christianity is false, the atheist demands that it should be conducted on the assumption that there is no God....the sufficient answer to all this is that it cannot possibly be done"*

Professor Charles Hodge's assertion that that America is a Christian nation and that those who would like to remove God from government are contradicting our identity is another lost episode in American history.

*Source Citation: Charles Hodge, Systematic Theology, 3 vols., (Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1975), 3:343-346.

http://www.watchmenpastors.org/lost-episode-for-december-27/