Grove City College has a study abroad program in France. One of the profs, Debra, had her class interact with excerpts from my Dr. Klaw & ET blog on how the past has contributed to shaping the spiritual climate in France today.
Terraformer (SG1) shaping the physical climate on planet P5S-381
Subsequently the students submitted questions that they would have liked to ask me had I been in class. While I have not been able to carve out the time to make a guest appearance, I nonetheless wanted to respond, especially in light of the fact that the these questions are amazing, showing both interest and insight.
So let’s do some Q & A. Here is the students' first question (see full list below):
Why didn’t America have so many philosophers that spoke against God like in Europe?
The French philosophers decried the abuse of religious power. Voltaire actually stood up for Huguenot refugees inviting "all of Europe to cry out" against the Roman Church + Monarchy's oppression. His solution, however, was to guide France toward the amorphous belief of deism.
An example of his diatribe against the Church is found in Candide ou l’optimisme (required reading in many French high schools today). Candide, the main character, was fascinated by the priests of the country of Eldorado. The old man with whom he spoke replied,
“My friend, said he, we are all priests.” Candide retorts, “What! You have no monks who teach, who argue, who govern, who plot, and who burn the people who are not in agreement with them?”
America was, and remains, pragmatic. Free from the religious oppression experienced in Europe, the philosophers turned their pens elsewhere.
Benjamin Franklin is a prime example: "A penny saved is a penny earned." Such advice was much more pertinent to the people of a developing nation than railing against religious atrocities that most people had neither experienced nor ever would.
Later on, another folksy philosopher, Mark Twain, would write against organized religion. But Twain's mockery was not aimed at brutality, but rather at hypocrisy and the nonsensical aspects of 19th century American religion.
The current French and American societies were both founded at the end of the 18th century, with the signing of the Declaration of Independence (1776) and the French revolution (1789). Both agreed that State Religion—at the time the Roman Church wedded to the Monarchy—was dangerous, even lethal. And the Church had become a formidable obstacle to creative, free thought, the Inquisitions torturing and killing those who deviated, or were suspected of deviant thought, from the Church’s approved positions.
Some of the American Founding Fathers—Jefferson, Franklin & others—were profoundly influenced by the French (see the helpful HBO series “John Adams”). So it is no surprise that both fledgling nations codified "the separation of Church and State." But they took different tacks in doing so.
American society was designed to protect freedom OF religion. French society was designed to protect people FROM religion.
France had experienced numerous religious wars between Muslims, Catholics and later Protestants; the Catholic Church won out. The European emigration to N. America had a large number of God-fearing people who sought freedom from persecution by the State Church—English, German…. They settled in N. America hoping to find a refuge where they could live out their faith, as they understood it in the Scriptures, without interference from the State Church or Monarchy.
This was the case for the Brethren denomination to which I belong. It was founded by Alexander Mack and seven others in Germany in 1708. Influenced by the German pietistic movement, they sought to be obedient to Christ’s teaching in Scripture and baptized one another in the Eider river. This made them anabaptists, thus, persecuted by the State Church and government causing them to flee to N. America.
The French, with centuries of religious infighting and abuses, began to see religion as inherently
dangerous, thus their Founding Fathers protected people against religion and founded a secular state, hostile to religion.
The Founders of the United States were favorable toward religion, but adamantly opposed religious power. They passed legislation which forbade ecclesiastic authorities from imposing religious absolutes on citizens, and gave people freedom to live out, or not, their faith as they saw fit.
Here is the students' full list of questions. I am not sure that I will get to them all, but will respond to some:
- Why didn’t America have so many philosophers that spoke against God like in Europe?
- What are the atheistic philosophical assumptions or presuppositions that many Europeans carry?
- To what extent is the French’s study and love of philosophy actually good for Christians, and what should we do to prepare for this heightened sense of philosophy?
- Is the French culture more anti-Christian or anti-Religion?
- America’s plausibility versus France’s plausibility structure?
- Depth of French friendships without shared beliefs?
- Best way to broach the subject of religion, starting point?
- What do French people think of Christians as individuals?
- How knowledgeable are they about Christianity?
- If a French person were to choose a religion would it tend to be one other than Christianity?
- Do they not think about death?
- What about the Huguenots, origins, beliefs, what happened to them after they left France?
- What does the average French person know about believers?
- What are they taught in school about religion? Crusades? Inquisition…?
- How successful has Klawitter been in his ministry?
- Where did the 7 year-old girl’s cynicism likely come from – her parents or her teachers?
- Is the government essentially indoctrinating all school children to be irreligious/anti-Christian?
