View From the Christianist Cocoon

On my Facebook page this morning, a "status update" from an old high school friend, a Mormon Republican living in Wyoming:

"[I] didn't know we were one of the largest Muslim countries in the World."

I have discussed politics with this friend in the past and he appears reasonable and open-minded enough, for a Republican. And remembering the comment President Obama actually made earlier this week, which was "If you actually took the number of Muslim Americans, we'd be one of the largest Muslim countries in the world," I actually took it as a statement that my friend was perhaps getting Obama's message of the unity of all Americans and that America is not alien to Islam.

And maybe he has; he hasn't written anything more about it. (Incidentally, Obama was wrong that we would be one of the largest Muslim countries. A reader of Andrew Sullivan pointed out that we'd be something like the 35th largest Muslim country based on our population of Muslims.)

But other friends of his have. One wrote:

We are a Christian nation and will always be so - just because BHO says we are not does not make it so, but many people will simply buy into what he's saying and what the media promotes, and then go along with that agenda. Where is the outrage? Where is the definitive action that will shut this guy down? We're losing our country...

If we are losing our country, it is because of this type of thinking. I shot back quickly:

I am a Jew, and have lived here all my life. My wife and my children are all Jews. Are you saying that as Jews we are just guests here? That this country only belongs to Christians? I don't think that's what you're saying. So it isnt just BHO saying it -- I'M SAYING IT. We are Americans, and this country belongs to ALL faiths, and to NO faith.

This person reminded me who she was, that she sat next to me at high school graduation (in hindsight, how wonderful it is that I'd forgotten all about her). Her response blew me away:

I totally disagree... We were founded on Christian principles - other ethnicities, religions, and beliefs certainly co-exist here, but we cannot compromise what our founding fathers intended and clearly spelled out. We are a diverse nation, but we must have overarching policies in place one way or the other.

My italics. This one Christianist is convinced that I and my entire family, who date back to the 18th and 19th centuries here in America, not to mention all other faiths, are afforded the ability to exist in American by the grace of white Christians, not because all human beings are created equal by God and have the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness regardless of our social or cultural differences.

Not only that, but our founding fathers (all of whom were white and many of whom were slave owners) always intended for our laws and social mores to be based in "scripture." The entirety of American diversity, therefore, is conditioned on those who are not white and/or not Christian feeling somehow grateful and indebted to white Christians that we can live here, and that we recognize and defer to white, Christian supremacy as the giver of American freedom. Underlying this, mind you, is the far more sinister idea that it can somehow be taken away from us if they so choose.

If you know someone like this woman, go tell them to shove it up their ass the next time they mouth off about our "Christian nation."