“Christian America”: Corporate Invention or Founding Fathers’ Vision?
At Religion News Service, Jonathan Merritt interviews Princeton historian Kevin Kruse, author of One Nation Under God: How Corporate America Invented Christian America. The idea of “one nation under God” has historical roots in corporate America’s opposition to the New Deal, Kruse explains. Furthermore, today’s polarization of religious rhetoric is traceable to President Nixon, who used it to justify programs like the Vietnam War. “As conservatives coopted this language, liberals shied away. In the end, the combination of piety and patriotism that had once brought Americans together only drove them further apart,” Kruse said.