In response to Charlie Kirk’s death many people began calling for national unity. I like the sentiment, but also believe it to be impossible in our condition. You can’t just have unity, there has to be something that we unite around. And that is missing in the United States right now.
We note this in many other areas of life. A football team can be united because they have the common goal of winning. Soldiers unite in a brotherhood as they train and go to war together to fight for their country. A Church is united as they understand their common salvation in Jesus Christ and strive toward their common mission of making disciples. Families unite because of their common bonds and heritage with common goals and aspirations.
Recent events have caused me to think a lot about this. When a major figure was shot and a lot of people celebrated, it made me think about how divided we are as a country.
When more people tried to kill people for similar reasons, it made me think about how bad things really are.
People don’t just unite. They must have something to unite around.
Think about it for a moment. The people that inhabited the very same land we are on now constantly fought and killed each other. Tribes of Native Americans fought and killed one another and took each other’s lands for many years. Why couldn’t they just get along?
It takes more than just residing in the same location to be united. There must be something more. And today that doesn’t seem to exist for large portions of our country.
To some extent, recent history has bred some cynicism. I’ve lived through dozens of events where people said, “we need to unite as a country.”And it doesn’t happen. For a moment everyone slows down a bit, but that’s the most they can muster.
I think people really want it to happen. I don’t believe they’re being disingenuous. They just don’t realize that unity doesn’t just happen. People don’t just unite around the idea that we live in the same country. There must be something more to bind us together.
Protestant Christianity And A Unified Country
America was overwhelmingly Protestant in its founding. This is beyond dispute. The British called it the Great Presbyterian revolt for this reason. Most estimates place Roman Catholics at less than 2% of the population at this time. The estimates on church attendance range broadly in 1776. But people, much like today, would say they were Presbyterians, Anglicans, Baptists, or some other Protestant denomination even if they only went to church 2 times in a decade.
This does bring a national cohesion. The same belief in God, sin, the nature of people, how families are to operate, and how a government is supposed to work does give something for people to unite around. That common understanding of the world is enough for people to win a war for independence and create the strongest country the world has ever known.
Today
There have been rough times in America. We even fought a Civil War. Some of the pains of that war still exist today and the time period right after that was pretty ugly too. But we came back together, fought in two world wars, and created the most powerful nation to ever exist.
Of late we’ve been pulling apart at the seams. There is not a national religion that binds us together. The secularization of America has continued over the years and plateaued this past year. This left Christians at around 60% of the population. While that seems encouraging, I wonder how many of that 60% believe Christian things. I’ve seen enough weirdness around to have real doubts about that kind of survey.
The freedoms Americans once held dear are not held dear by everyone in our society. In fact. 1/3 college students believes violence is an appropriate response to speech they do not like. So much for freedom of speech… And the celebration of Charlie Kirk’s murder helped us all to see how badly many people hate freedom of speech and Christianity. The other side upholds the freedom of speech as massively important.
Around half the country believes it’s okay to murder babies in the womb, if the baby could inconvenience the mother in some way. The other group believes all life is sacred.
A lot of the country thinks that upholding the nation’s laws is immoral. Many believe it’s racist to uphold the law. While the other side believes that upholding the law is the only way to have a functioning society.
Right now there are riots in the streets over whether or not illegal immigrants should be rounded up and sent back to their home countries. While the other side believes you can’t have a country if you don’t police who is in and who is out.
I’ll stop here, for this could go on for a long time. Around what can this nation unite?
Currently the Christian beliefs that built this country are hated by a lot of the country. And even among those who tolerate it, it’s not believed by close to half of the population. Upholding laws that keep society from falling apart is thought of as immoral by a lot of the population. We can’t even come together to say that life is sacred and babies shouldn’t be murdered in the womb.
What is there to unite around?
Pray and Work for the Evangelization of Your Community
I am a Christian and believe that the only real solution is a Christian one. I believe it is the Christian one.
My hope and prayer for our country is that out of the chaos something wonderful will come. I hope that we are being shaken so that the unshakable Christian faith is all that remains (Hebrews 12:26-27).
This can only happen as Christians in this country take their commission to go forth with the gospel seriously and God the Holy Spirit works powerful among us.
In other words, I’m hoping and praying for a revival, for that is the only hope that I see.
Image Attribution: https://flickr.com/photos/146321178@N05/51111707766
Leave a Reply