During the 17th and 18th centuries you can see the development of this idea of separation of church and state. You also see the development of both scientific reason and spiritual holiness in religion.
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The Pilgrims did not sail from Amsterdam to America based on a grand idea of religious tolerance and freedom. They wanted to set up a properly-run theocracy based on Reformed Puritan ideas. We’ve already seen from the oppression of the Anabaptists in the Old World, that Reformed Christianity was susceptible to the same ills as (capital-C) Catholic Christianity.
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Roger Williams was offered the position of pastor at a Congregationalist church but turned it down because he disagreed with entanglement of church with secular authority. He evangelized to the Indians and eventually made the statement that the Indians were the true owners of this land. The authorities exiled him and, after wintering with the Indians, bought some land from them and founded Providence, which was to become Rhode Island. (See p106 quote)
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Anne Hutchinson was a midwife who led women’s meetings each week to discuss the pastor’s sermon. A “woman of ready wit and bold spirit,” Anne soon had 60 people attending her meetings. She claimed that Christians aren’t bound to obey human laws and was accused of treason. She was so sharp that they could not prove any charges against her until she claimed to inspiration by the Holy Spirit (that old debate again – scripture vs. tradition vs. spirit). She was banished and fled to Providence.
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Salem Witch Trials – Some children, caught playing occult games, claimed to have been ‘witched by the house servant. Fear of this witchcraft spread throughout the community and there began to be trials. Accused witches were subjected to various tests and tortures to get them to confess. This turned out to be exacerbated by a host of things (possible ergotism, neighbor vs. neighbor feuds, desire for more state lands).
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Isaac Newton made a great leap forward in science when he showed that gravity could be the force that was driving Copernicus’ and Galileo’s assertions about the motions of the heavens. People were astounded at the simplicity and power of his explanation.
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Deism was rampant. This is the belief that God created and started the world but then left it to run by its natural, reasonable processes – sort of like a clockmaker. People like to debate whether the various founders were Christian or Deist, but it can be difficult to separate the two or categorize any particular person because of the Reason and Logic ideas that were widespread in the educated community.
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But it seems that you can’t go too far off-track before revival takes place among a faithful remnant. Revivalism took two important forms during this period – Pietism in England and The Great Awakening in New England.
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In England, the Pietism movement took the form of small groups that got together to promote awakening, holiness, and the exercise of spiritual disciplines (prayer, fasting, etc…). These became ‘holy clubs,’ which later became the ‘Methodist’ movement within the Church of England. A couple of the early Methodist leaders were John (the “Methodist”) Wesley and Charles (the “Hymnist”) Wesley, who attended holy club meetings led by their mother, Susanna.
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George Whitefield, Calvinist Methodist (no, that’s not an oxymoron) preacher was so influential that it was his sermons in particular that were first called, ‘The Great Awakening.’
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Jonathan Edwards, New England Congregationalist pastor, preached ‘Sinners in the hands of an Angry God.’ Everybody seems to associate him with shouting hellfire and brimstone but he was a cool, quiet speaker – frighteningly so. He would literally scare the hell out of people. He may have come to regret the emotional approach to the Awakening because it seemed to almost inoculate people against subsequent preaching.
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So, what have we seen during this time period? Development of…
Methodist movement and the Great Awakening
Scientific reason and deism
Separation of Church and State
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Toward the end of this time period (ca 1789) you can see the full development of this idea of separation of church and state. The first article of the Bill of Rights:
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Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
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The debate remains, was this establishment clause instituted by deists based in scientific reason to protect the state from the church or by Christian forefathers to protect the church from the state?
ONLY 2 MORE WEEKS OF THIS STUDY. . .Next week: Optimism. Final week: Modernism and Postmodernism.
