Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion…
--The Bill of Rights

"America is the only country in the world where religious tolerance is recognized, and there is no state religion."

Sounds familiar? America has long boasted of its lack of any "official" or universally-recognized state religion. But that simply is not true; a very real state religion does exist. Some people call it "Americanism," while many others use the term "Civic Religion." Whatever the name, there is in the USA something that acts exactly like a popular mass religion that puts together ideas left over from times of Protestant majority rule with a very powerful sense of national identity. It even has its own rituals, prophets, "religious" holidays and holy places. Throughout the history of America, its Civic Religion has challenged all other faiths on its soil, ultimately forcing them into submission and assimilation-to this very day.

Until the 19th Century, Protestantism had been supported as the quasi-official faith of America. Government, media, and educational institutions all supported Protestant aesthetics and values. Public Protestantism instilled values in the New England Colonists that helped them "tame" the wilderness. It also provided images and allusions that affected the thinking of even the most "secular-minded" political thinkers.

At the time of the American Revolution, much of the rhetoric in churches and pubs compared British forces to "an overseas army of Satan's troops." Other comparisons were made where England was portrayed as an incarnation of Pharaoh's Egypt oppressing and enslaving the American "Children of Israel." This was, of course, pretty ironic, considering that many of the colonists themselves owned black slaves. But that detail did not keep the patriots from fighting their holy war against England.

At the same time, a ritual arose in New England where all the citizens of a town would hold ceremonies around a chosen "Liberty Tree." There, speeches or sermons would be given to stir emotions, or effigies of kings would be hung and burned. Whole communities were thus provided with a center to immerse themselves in the values of the Revolution. The branches of the trees were meant to symbolize the colonists' ascent upon the limbs of their aspirations. Whenever they could, British soldiers made it a point to destroy Liberty Trees to weaken colonist morale. Yet in later years, the remains of these trees became sacred relics, carved into walking sticks and other objects.

As more and more secularists and deists joined the ranks of America's ruling elite, God started to be spoken of as the "Great Governor" of the universe, who bestowed His complete faith on the Americans, granting them the power run things for themselves, while He did not interfere. Just as Jews of the Bible had thought of God in political terms as their "king", patriotic Americans thought of God as a supreme, yet passive overseer of their government. This had two seemingly contradictory effects: the new United States of America would get God's blessing without the interference of traditional organized religion.

George Washington, as leader of the revolutionary army and first President, became a unifying demigod. Locks of his hair were treasured, babies were baptized in his name, and many legends about him were told and recorded. Actors read speeches in his honor, and his route from New York to his first inauguration became the scene of elaborate rituals. At Trenton, several hundred young girls dressed in white to serenade him, and a little child crowned him. Washington was compared by his contemporaries to Jewish and Roman heroes. He was called the Moses of his people, leading them from the grip of Pharaoh, or a Joshua, the biblical war leader chosen by god to save Israel, or a Cincinnatus, the Roman farmer who left his plow to become a great general. The veneration of George Washington was perpetuated well after his death by the engraving of his image onto American money. American school systems still honor his birthday and teach stories about his honesty & values to the children. (Yes, sadly, the story about the cherry tree is mere legend.) In the rotunda of the Capitol in Washington DC, one can look up and see a painting of Washington ascending to the heavens as a god.

Similarly, two other major symbols of civic religion, the original Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, reside in Washington as more holy relics honoring the act of independence. They even have their own air-tight shrines where they are kept, to be visited by American "pilgrims", almost like Hajj. (It is interesting to note that neither document was ever on public display until the 20th Century.)

After Congress proclaimed independence, the Declaration was solemnly read throughout the colonies as cannons were fired, and people cheered and drank themselves silly. In 1778, Congress gave official orders to honor the 4th of July as a national holiday, and many Chaplains were instructed to prepare suitable sermons for the event to honor America. A "sacred time" for American civic religion had now been established.

The reverse of the Great Seal of the United States (adopted in 1782 and pictured on the back of the $1 bill) was conceived early-on as a symbol of the emerging American Civic Religion. Early design suggestions included an image of Moses dividing the Red Sea (by Benjamin Franklin), the children of Israel marching in the wilderness (by Thomas Jefferson) and Hercules at the foot of a mountain (by John Adams). The final design rejected both Jewish and classical themes, showing that the American Civic Religion was meant to be something brand new: an uncompleted pyramid topped by one watchful eye of a generic God. In this way, American leaders were sending the message to the world that they had created something new, not quite Christian or Jewish, but intended to create a new and lasting "deeni" world order for the ages.

The "creed" of Civic Religion was based on the idea that the United States was a God-chosen and millennial nation, living under a Constitution that literally came from a God who, once again, merely by coincidence, was the God of Jesus (AS) or Moses (AS). Americans saw themselves under the double obligation of being an example of democratic equality, and bringing that same democracy to others. Such thinking gave an aura of spirituality to all approved political activities. Voting in elections became a sacred duty of the citizen, and people who failed to vote were considered morally bad. When citizens were male, they could be called upon for the ultimate sacrifice: service in their country's armed forces, and even death in its defense as a human offering for the new state religion.

Meanwhile, on the domestic front, Americans were encouraged to advance economically and technologically so that the new millennium, the new order, would fully arrive.

The "code" of civic religion went beyond how Americans should act in their own country. It also commanded how the political community should behave toward the rest of the world. Even though America wouldn't become a superpower until the 20th Century, the Revolution's rhetoric always assumed that it would become such someday. Thus, today's world leadership has become a self-fulfilling prophecy. Similarly, wars in which the US engaged itself were always fought and sold to the people under the banner of "moral crusades." The lead-ups to the conflicts in Korea, Vietnam, Iraq, etc, all show how the US has rallied its citizens around the cause of exporting its brand of justice and righteousness to the world.

As other faiths had their sacred spaces, American Civic Religion established special spaces of its own in the places where the "great men" lived, worked, and were buried. These included the White House, Washington's Mount Vernon, Jefferson's Monticello, the tombs of Grant and Garfield, Arlington National Cemetery, as well as Independence Hall in Philadelphia and Boston. In plans for its new capital in Washington DC, classical temple-like buildings were mixed with memorials on a grand scale. As time went on, historical sites like battlefields became honored sacred spaces as well.

In the revolutionary era, Washington's Birthday and July 4th were already sacred times. As the years passed, other sacred days joined them, such as Memorial Day after the Civil War, and Armistice Day after WWI. Each sacred time was commemorated with public addresses, sacred processions, or other events. They were all meant to unify an increasingly diverse people into a single political community and a nation: to make many into one (E pluribus unum).

There was also a growing catalogue of national "saints" to be honored because they embodied the values and ideas of the civic religion. These included Thomas Jefferson, Ben Franklin, John Adams, and later Andrew Jackson, Abraham Lincoln, Franklin Roosevelt and John F. Kennedy. Lincoln & Kennedy stand out for many Americans as martyrs who paid for American freedom with their own blood, much in the way that Christians believed Jesus had died for their redemption.

From fireworks and solemn speeches on the 4th of July, to larger than life idols found at the Lincoln Memorial, Mount Rushmore, and the Statue of Liberty, make no mistake-America truly has a Deen all her own. It consists of sacred acts (voting and faith in democracy), pilgrimages (visiting shrines & documents), shahadat and sacred oaths (pledge of allegiance, national anthems), sacred places, sacred times, and values and ideals which are often quite foreign to any of the major world faiths. The manufacturers of America did this all consciously and meticulously, with every intention of making all traditional religions-including Protestant Christianity itself-take a back seat to US nationalism.

America encourages diversity in religion partly to ensure that no other single creed can arise and challenge the dominant cult of Civic Religion. Limited freedom is allowed to potential rivals like Islam, but it can be taken away when rules are not followed. In earlier times, upon arrival in the United States, many religious minorities had to face the challenge of "getting along" in a new environment. Thinking that it was only a matter of following the norms of the Protestant majority, many Jews and Muslims moved their Sabbath & Jum'uah services to Sunday morning. Other religious communities, be it Buddhism's adoption of "bishops" or Mormonism's outlawing of polygamy, have tried to acquire a main-line Protestant flavor, in order to gain acceptance as Americans "like all the rest."

Nowadays, though, Muslims at least are learning that the American establishment doesn't really care whether the great day of assembly falls on Friday or on Sunday. Instead, they now feel an intense pressure to limit their Islam to a few carefully defined beliefs and rituals, and subordinate every political, social, and economic thought they might ever have to the demands of the dominant American Deen. Even questioning the justice of these demands in public might well subject one to at least a visit from the Grand Inquisitors of the FBI!