You may deny any one of the old doctrines and few will be shocked, but you may not ridicule the flag or the Crown, not interrupt the two minutes' silence on Armistice Day....
Rousseau argued that rather than have any transcendental religion, such as Christianity, we must find unity, or uniformity, in our religion of state, or civil religion. The elements of this civil religion are flags and national holidays. Imagine how right Belloc is when you think of the fourth of July versus the feast of Ascension or some other religious festival. Despite lapel pin campaigns to remember that "Jesus is the reason for the Season," we have excised much of the Christian aspects of Christmas from any and all public displays of the celebration. Now imagine that instead of Armistice Day, a day I never heard of celebrating until recently (apparently we don't think much of World War 1 in America), we ignored or interrupted 9/11 celebrations. Which would get you in more trouble politically or socially?
We have a civil religion in our country and it doesn't reflect much of a Christian character. God help us train the next generation to pay more attention to the transcendental and eternal things than just be flag wavers and public holiday devotees.
No comments:
Post a Comment