Religion and the State

     The United States is a Christian nation.   This is not to say that Americans have any official church with powers of taxation or coercion fixed by law as some nations do or have in the past.  No one wants that and any claim that anyone does is a red herring designed to obscure the real issue.  It simply means that America was founded by Christians for Christian purposes and  principles.  Americans are always free peacefully to practice any religion or no religion, as the First Amendment makes clear, but the right of the people as a whole to honor God through speeches, monuments, plaques on and within public buildings, and the voluntary practice of prayer in public schools or at public events is inherent in the "free exercise" of religion, understood from the beginning to apply to the people individually and collectively.  When George Washington declared the first Thanksgiving on October 3, 1789 he stated:  "Whereas it is the duty of all nations to acknowledge the Providence of Almighty God . . . we may . . . unite in most humbly offering our prayers and supplications to the great Lord and Ruler of Nations".  The anti-Christian bigots notwithstanding, that is the core of America's purpose in the world.