Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®
- Publication
- Publication Type
Articles 1 - 2 of 2
Full-Text Articles in Entire DC Network
American Civil Religion: An Idea Whose Time Is Past, Frederick Mark Gedicks
American Civil Religion: An Idea Whose Time Is Past, Frederick Mark Gedicks
Faculty Scholarship
From the founding of the United States, Americans have understood loyalty to their country as a religious and not just a civic commitment. The idea of a 'civil religion' that defines the collective identity of a nation originates with Rousseau, and was adapted to the United States Robert Bellah, who suggested that a peculiarly American civil religion has underwritten government and civil society in the United States.
Leaving aside the question whether civil religion has ever truly unified all or virtually all Americans, I argue that it excludes too many Americans to function as such a unifying force in the …
Trends In Black-White Church Integration, Philip Q. Yang, Starlita Smith
Trends In Black-White Church Integration, Philip Q. Yang, Starlita Smith
Ethnic Studies Review
Historically, the separation of blacks and whites in churches was well known (Gilbreath 1995; Schaefer 2005). Even in 1968, about four years after the passage of the landmark Civil Rights Act of 1964, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. still said that "eleven o'clock on Sunday is the most segregated hour of the week" (Gilbreath 1995:1). His reference was to the entrenched practice of black and white Americans who worshiped separately in segregated congregations even though as Christians, their faith was supposed to bring them together to love each other as brothers and sisters. King's statement was not just a casual …