Who Is The God In Whom We Americans Trust?

As  noted yesterday, I do not plan to participate in any so-called ecumenical National Day of Prayer tomorrow, regardless of where it is located. That's not because I'm unpatriotic or do not believe in prayer. It has to do with more basic beliefs.

We Americans have our own unique religion. That was recognized and lifted up by Robert Bellah's essay, "Civil Religion in America," published in the Journal of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in the winter of 1967. Bellah starts,

While some have argued that Christianity is the national faith, and others that church and synagogue celebrate only the generalized religion of "the American Way of Life," few have realized that there actually exists alongside of and rather clearly differentiated from the churches an elaborate and well-institutionalized civil religion in America. This article argues not only that there is such a thing, but also that this religion—or perhaps better, this religious dimension—has its own seriousness and integrity and requires the same care in understanding that any other religion does.[i]

Writing against the background of President Kennedy's Inaugural address of January 20, 1961, Bellah continues,

It might be countered that the very way in which Kennedy made his references (to God) reveals the essentially vestigial place of religion today. He did not refer to any religion in particular. He did not refer to Jesus Christ, or to Moses, or to the Christian church; certainly he did not refer to the Catholic church. In fact, his only reference was to the concept of God, a word that almost all Americans can accept but that means so many different things to so many different people that it is almost an empty sign. Is this not just another indication that in America religion is considered vaguely to be a good thing, but that people care so little about it that it has lost any content whatever? Isn't Dwight Eisenhower reported to have said "Our government makes no sense unless it is founded in a deeply felt religious faith-and I don't care what it is,"[ii] and isn't that a complete negation of any real religion?

Bellah goes on to quote from Benjamin Franklin's autobiography and George Washington's Farewell Address to point out that religion, particularly the idea of God, played a constitutive role in the thought of the early American statesmen. Then he continues,

What we have, then, from the earliest years of the republic is a collection of beliefs, symbols, and rituals with respect to sacred things and institutionalized in a collectivity. This religion—there seems no other word for it—while not antithetical to and indeed sharing much in common with Christianity, was neither sectarian nor in any specific sense Christian. At a time when the society was overwhelmingly Christian, it seems unlikely that this lack of Christian reference was meant to spare the feelings of the tiny non-Christian minority. Rather, the civil religion expressed what those who set the precedents felt was appropriate under the circumstances. It reflected their private as well as public views. . .  

. . . But the civil religion was not, in the minds of Franklin, Washington, Jefferson, or other leaders, with the exception of a few radicals like Tom Paine, ever felt to be a substitute for Christianity. There was an implicit but quite clear division of function between the civil religion and Christianity.

Read the essay yourself. I think Bellah is correct. We Americans do have a "civil religion" with some fundamental beliefs about us being God's chosen nation with a destiny to preserve and spread democracy in the world. Our president is almost our national high priest whose duty it is to call us as a nation to pray to "God" at least once a year. Further, we believe that "all men are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights" and have a right to equal protection under our laws. We sing "God bless America," and close our political speeches with that same phrase. We even put the phrase "In God we trust" on our money.

But who is this God in whom we trust? 

My allegiance is to but one God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. And when I pray I am guided by these words of my God, my Savior and my Lord,

Jesus said to him, "I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. - Jhn 14:6 ESV

How then can I pray to some other God or gods or join in with those who reject my Lord and God? I shall pray for my nation. I do pray for my nation, but I will not pray to any other god than the Triune God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, regardless of what law is passed!