Theorizing Civil Religion and War

In her article on Manifest Destiny, Coles it seems is attempting to use an expanded and nuanced definition of manifest destiny in order to show how Civil Religion still plays an important role in American Foreign policy, albeit in a manner that changes through time and that is adapted to the needs of both the speaker and the nation.  Coles uses the religious titles of priest and prophet to describe rhetoric that on its face is more secular, but that can be traced back to the more explicit religious content of American Civil Religion.  In her discussion of the concept of mission within manifest destiny, Coles cites Tiryakian as demonstrating three varied types of mission, the third being “a civilization mission, to save the world and mold it in the image of America.”[1]  Furthermore, as part of the “Priestly” mode of civil religion, Coles states that the Priestly role “sanctifies the economic order, leg imitates the system and actions of the government, and sees the American Way of life as unique and desirable.”[2}

If Tiryakian, and Coles, are correct, then we should be able to apply this theory to what Lawrence describes in “Conjuring Islam II.”  For example, in describing the thought of Fukuyama (which Lawrence disdains), Lawrence states that “his well-known thesis [is] that capitalist democracy is the inevitable tide of the future, crossing economic, political and finally cultural boundaries in forging a global society. So strong is ‘the inner historical logic to political secularism,’ according to Fukuyama, that it will inevitable produce a more liberal strand of Islam.  In the meantime, however, there will be spoilers—the Islamo-fascists.”  Lawrence goes on to state that according to Fukuyama, the Islamo-fascicts hate America because it is “dedicated to religious tolerance and pluralism, rather than to serving religious truth.”[3]

Fukuyama sees America as providing a “civilizing” model to Arab nations, one that he might even say, to borrow the words of Coles, would “save the world and mold it in the image of America.”[4]

This Priestly (conservative, according to Coles) view of Civil Religion could also be applied to theorize about the role of “conservative” civil religion in the conflicts of World War I, the Spanish-American, and others.  However, Presidents such as Wilson and McKinley are generally considered “progressives,” not conservative, with McKinley being the President who ushered in “the Progressive era.”   What then does this theory mean for these Presidents, their politics, and the complicated role that religion and politics always play in American war making?

[1] Roberta L. Coles “Manifest Destiny Adapted for 1990s' War Discourse: Mission and Destiny Intertwined”, Sociology of Religion 63, no. 4 (Winter 2002): 407.

[2] Ibid.

[3] Bruce B. Lawrence, “Conjuring with Islam, Ii”, The Journal of America History 89, no. 2 (September 2002): 490.

[4] Coles, 407.