Messianic interventionism, as McCullough has fashioned the term, plays the part of connecting the Christo-nationalist tendencies of Western imperialism, throughout history, with the current American policy of world police force. The Spanish-American War marks the beginning of this new era of American foreign policy, and is the framework for interpreting America's global conflict involvement as providential. As McCullough contends, in borrowing Ernest Tuveson's words, this may be the dawn of the great American voyage as a "redeemer nation"--one that, while being notably isolationist, is concerned with justice, and the general well-being of humanity abroad.[1]
McCullough's dissertation is helpful here in the way that it provides primary source examples and critiques of rhetoric that are contemporaneous to American civil religion at the close of the 19th century; however, it is precisely these inclusions that provide me the most pause. The most grievous citation for me was that of Baptist minister Robert S. MacArthur and his divinely-inspired sermon, "The Hand of God in the Nation's Conflict."[2] Within the sermon, MacArthur expresses an immutable grouping of Christian motifs: Commander Dewey bears an inspiring resemblance to Christus Victor (albeit he did not die), or, at the very least, he is depicted as an anointed man of God, in whose conflict Godself is actively present.[3]
My trouble then, comes from the lack of progress that we, as civically religious citizens, have experienced since the time of the Spanish-American War. I wonder how this civil religion is any different from our current gods? Ultimately, I wonder if American civil religion is inseparable from the idea of messianic interventionism? Has any war, before or since, lacked this understanding?
[1] McCullough, Matthew, "My Brother's Keeper": Civil Religion, Messianic Interventionism, and the Spanish-American War of 1898 (Nashville: Vanderbilt University Graduate School [dissertation], 2011), 6.
[2] Ibid., 60.
[3] Ibid.
No comments:
Post a Comment