Here in Central Texas it seems that many believe America would be a great country to live in if we’d just return to its foundational principles – aka the Bible. On my Nebraska hometown paper’s web page last week, this header appeared.

I have been asking myself what I think about this since.

First, it makes me so sad to imagine that there are still so many people in America who actually believe that America is founded on “biblical principles”. Any paradigm of thought that this is true is simply not backed up by America’s historical documents. It is true that the Bible influenced many of the founding fathers personally, but that hardly translates into a nation founded on those Biblical principles.

The US Constitution guarantees that there will be no establishment of a national religion but many are working diligently to change that. Though the only way legally possible way to make this a reality is to propose a new Amendment to the Constitution. Since that matters little to many a preacher influenced by its plethora of faux historians like David Barton, there is no serious effort to do that. Instead, under a huge umbrella of thought they call Biblical principles, what these Christians really want is to heal a world around them through the imposition of Christian mandates within governmental structures. Participation and belief have become irrelevant in this quest for Christian Nationalism. It is as if they believe that God is more apt to protect places where a state declares its nationalized belief on public lands and buildings or something. One example of this being done here where I live is how vital it is has been to pass legislation that requires public schools to display signs that say, “In God we trust.” I just laugh now when I see that sign as I pick up my grandsons at school alongside the Hindu and Muslim parents there. I am certain that those behind this effort think of it as a positive witness but everyone knows that it means only the Christian God.

The Texas legislature is very literally now an Evangelical legislature. This has taken place bit by bit but has most of all been the result of Christian oil barron, Tim Dunn in west Texas. He genuinely owns them. Last year, the TX Legislature chose not to impeach AG Ken Paxton solely because Tim Dunn told 12 of his state senators that he would stop contributions to their campaigns if they voted in favor of impeachment. The evidence was clear but the money mattered more. I find the narrative of making any return to biblical values quite hollow now that I’ve experienced the actions of Christians here who imagine themselves to be exercising them through state government. This is one of hundreds of examples of these so called founding principles in action.

There is no question that the Bible was an important book to many Americans from the moment that first shoe stepped on Plymouth Rock but the founding fathers themselves were by and large intellectual giants with a worldview that also included familiarity with Greek and Roman philosophies. The Enlightenment period authors were also of influence to these well read men. There was no one set of principles used to establish this country.

It is vital for each of us to remember that the American government established after the Revolutionary War was done so in direct opposition to the Christian monarchy it had been ruled by prior to the war. The very fact that the British believed the King to be anointed by God and that they were responsible to obey that king was exactly what the colonists went to war over. It was their supreme motivation to establish a country without a central religion and without one man in control as king.

I would ask those who are asking the question in the image above to consider this. America is only ever as ill as its people are. It is only ever as dysfunctional or divided as its people are. The founders set it up that way.

It is necessary for us to realize that because something bothers one of us individually, that doesn’t mean that it is a sign of ill health in my country. Change is hard. With a world growing at light speed, it is taking all we have within us to adapt to life. The strength of this country thus far has been in the profound soundness of its structure. The solution to what we find stressful living in a democratic republic is not to return our country to some undefinable set of founding principles we imagine to be forgotten. It is to instead embrace the gift that our founders gave us. It to recognize the strength of every citizen in the outcome of the whole. By all means if you can personally grow to value the words of Jesus and especially his sermon on the Mount, do it. The beautiful reality is that here you actually can!! The truth is this. We get to live as we do because we actually are living the foundational principles our founding fathers gave us from the very best of themselves. Every single day.