Church and Nation: A Credal Nation, Part 3
At the heart of Barack Obama's "Patriotism Tour" speech (discussed recently by Dr. Fleming and Dr. Trifkovic) lies the concept of credal nationhood. In the previous two installments of "Church and Nation," I have mentioned that credal nationhood makes no sense whatsoever without reference to the state, because the promotion of credal nationhood has always been about increasing the power of the central state at the expense of any organic sense of American nationality.
Historically, that should be obvious, but we need to be cautious about the conclusions that we draw from this history.
For a Chronicles audience, I don't need to rehearse Honest Abe's use of an abstract nationalism to justify his actions during the Late Unpleasantness. Even after 1865, however, it was still possible that an American national identity, regionally Anglo-Saxon or Anglo-Celtic, could coalesce despite the destructive and divisive effects of the war. In fact, as John Lukacs has shown in Outgrowing Democracy, such an identity, with obvious regional differences, was beginning to emerge.
But other forces intervened, particularly a demographic shift in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. As Lukacs writes:
In 1850, 2.5 million of the population were foreign-born, in 1910 over 14 million (a total that equaled the number of natives in twenty-two states of the Union). In 1850 English was the native language of 97 percent of citizens who were foreign-born (this includes, of course, the great mass of the Irish), in 1910 it was 58 percent and decreasing fast, since by then the overwhelming majority of immigrants were coming from southern and eastern Europe and Russia.
Before World War I, German-Americans, long a significant minority, had overtaken Anglo-Americans as the dominant ethnic group in the United States. (The latter, however, still largely held the reins of political, cultural, and economic power, at least at the national level.) This demographic shift, combined with the condition that the new Southern and Eastern European immigrants' "appearance and their expressions made them immediately recognizable, an alien element in the midst or on the edges of the American mass," led to a groundswell of support for immigration restriction. The result was the Johnson Act of 1921, which established the "national origins" system, followed closely by the Johnson-Reed Act of 1924, which favored Anglo and Northern European immigrants.
Immigration restriction was a reasonable response to the cultural and political transformation that was occurring in the early decades of the 20th century. And this response gives the lie to the idea that America has been, since the Declaration of Independence (or even since Lincoln's nationalist reinterpretation of it), a "credal nation." The 1921 and 1924 acts make no sense in the context of credal nationhood. They were, instead, concrete responses to the growing realization that Anglo-America was fading away.
Combined with the natural propensity of immigrants to form their own communities (or, in cities, their own neighborhoods), immigration restriction might well have led over time to the coalescence of a different, but still recognizably American, national identity, based on a broader European cultural identity.
But that was not to be. Instead, the federal government, in the 1920's and 30's, launched a crusade to "Americanize" the new immigrants, to try to create a credal nation by crushing the immigrants' lingering European national identities. Nationality—an historic identity tied to a particular people and a particular place—became identified with citizenship, a political identity. (Even for some time after the Civil War, naturalized citizenship was granted through the states; now, it was entirely a federal concern.)
The public schools played a primary role, which is one reason why Catholic schools came under such bitter attack. Citizenship manuals such as Howard C. Hill's The Life and Work of the Citizen (1935) encouraged the use of English, membership in such civic organizations as Rotary, and participation in wholesome American sports like baseball. To be a good American meant abandoning one's history and traditions (and please, no more incense in church or garlic in your food!) and pledging fealty to the federal government. Hill's book is festooned throughout with fasces, symbolizing the attempt to bind the diverse European national identities into a common American one and to create a uniform citizen-worker. (Even more ominously, the title page features four hands of different shades—symbolizing Law, Science, Order, and Trades)—grasping each other in the form of a swastika.)
Compared with the songs and stories, faith and food, language and kinship that compose a true national identity, it was all very thin gruel. And yet it triumphed, becoming the basis of post-World War II American nationalism. Small wonder that, when Lyndon Johnson signed the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965, opening the floodgates of immigration once again (and this time, to the entire world), that credal nationhood quickly crumbled.
And yet the idea lives on, both among the proponents of credal nationhood and among those who claim to oppose it. The problem with the writings of such Catholic critics of credal nationhood as John Rao and David Schindler is that they anachronistically project a largely 20th-century phenomenon back on the earliest days of America. They and others argue, essentially, that no true patriotism can exist in the United States, because credal nationalism is our Original Sin, and the only kind of baptism that could remove it is a baptism by fire, in which the United States itself would be consumed.
This, though, is really only the flip-side of what Barack Obama believes when he claims that "patriotism is always more than just loyalty to a place on a map or a certain kind of people. Instead, it is also loyalty to America’s ideals—ideals for which anyone can sacrifice, or defend, or give their last full measure of devotion." Those who oppose credal nationalism but who argue (against the record of history) that it is the only possible American national identity do as much as Obama to empower the federal state that imposed this abstraction on us.
(Here I have to register a minor note of disagreement with my colleague Dr. Trifkovic. On this question of credal nationhood, Obama does not represent a "massive, revolutionary shift"; if anything, this is just one more area in which Obama has proved that he is not really an agent of "change" but merely a defender of the liberal and neoconservative status quo. It's hard to see, for instance, why any FOX News commentator would object to Obama's speech, except for the fact that Obama delivered it.)
The problem for those of us who understand that a credal nation is no nation at all is that, like everyone else, we are fixated on centralized government and centralized culture. We're too focused on the forest to see the trees. Yet nations, like trees, are not imposed from the top down, but grow from the bottom up.
You say you want a revolution? Put down roots. Drop a few acorns. Grow your own forest.
And start studying American history, so that you can quit making yourself the prisoner of the ideological constructs that your opponents have imposed on your people and your native land.
Previous Installments in "Church and Nation":
Entries(RSS)
"The underlying problem, it seems to me, is that America was never a nation, much less a credal nation, and the series of revolutions that transformed the government–1776, 1787, 1860, 1932, 1968, etc–have left us nothing but a brightly painted shell covering something very distasteful–imagine an M&M filled with excrement."
So would our best bet be to rejoin the British Empire after all? It does seem interesting that the 1921 and 1924 Immigration Acts were based upon ethno-cultural national concerns but the attempt to assimilate the new immigrants was basically credal and not ethnic. Was this inevitable without the monarch?
"I have a short explanation as to why Mass. Catholics are loathe to attend church"
The situation you describe is more or less the same as the situation in France, where liberal Gallican-inspired clergy have become effectively agents of the godless state and the Lefebvrite wing is fast becoming the only piece of the Church that attracts any attendance. There's just no point in swallowing a leftist toxin pointlessly seasoned with holy oil when it goes down just fine on its own.
"And, I would add, anyone who says, “But that policy might have excluded my ancestors,” is still unassimilated. I am speaking now as a hybrid who has ancestors of both types. The Romans faced a similar problem, but their empire claimed universality, based on Hellenic culture, Rome’s legal system, the Roman duty missionize the world, and, later, Christianity. We have the opposite: cultural institutions rooted in divisivenenss and self-hate."
Is there ANY positive solution? Catholicise the country? Restore the monarchy? Break the place into a federation of crown colonies and Imperial Free Cities? All of the above? Or should we just throw in the towel, stop eating Italian food, stop attending Mass, quit loving brownstone architecture, quit speaking French, above all hate Catholic ideals of community and paternalism and embrace McDonald's, Britney Spears, McMansions, the megachurch and radical individualism and feminism as the hallmark of my culture?
The time for a "highly restrictionist policy" to conserve any sort of cultural unity has LONG past. I'm not saying we have to believe it can or will happen, but if we're going to denounce the current institutions we've got to propose a positive alternative or we risk falling into nihilistic despair.
Isn't America a bit .... *large* to expect it to have a single, monolithic culture? Rather like expecting Europe to have a single, monolithic culture?
If Mr. Duck wants this country "to be based on Anglo-Saxon Protestantism", then I suppose we can start by ethnically purging Louisiana, and eradicate the Scotch-Irish elements from Appalachia.
We can also ban bluegrass music, given that the banjo is an innovation given us by the negroe.
The treatment of religion here is a little weird, too. If Mr. Duck were to tell my preacher-uncle that his Free-Will Baptist Church can be tolerated because it is compatible "with the survival of the American nation-state," -- well, I'm not sure what kind of a response that would draw, but probably not the one Mr. Duck desires.
Oddly enough I think some Protestants may think their manner of worship preferable because it is the way to Heaven, not because it keeps out furriners.
That is, if somebody mistrusts and dislikes the Vatican -- OK, fine, I can certainly understand that.
But we're drawing dangerously close to the position that a person must have NO allegiances prior to those for nation, kin, family, culture, etc.
I'm no theologian, but I'm pretty sure that ANY serious reading of Christianity would rule that out. The Catholic position is that loyalty to nation, kin, and family is valid, but that it exists on a hierarchy of loyalties and is by no means the very apex.
If Mr. Duck dissents from this he does not set himself against Catholicism alone but against Christ, Who has some fairly explicit comments on the subject.
Yes, the particular meaning and application can be debated -- but I think it is pretty evident to anybody who takes His words seriously that He did *not* mean to market the Gospel as a form of nativist ancestor-worship.
Christ is an end, the Omega -- not a means or tool by which to buttress "the American nation-state".
It is an insult to every early Christian convert -- who was forced to painfully move away from the paganism or Judaism of their fathers -- to suggest otherwise.
By Mr. Duck's reasoning the Roman emperors and Japanese shoguns who mercilessly tortured and murdered Christians were quite right to do so; since they were protecting the traditional native faith from change.
In other words, the problem with universalist ideology of any flavor is not, as some posters with nationalist leanings seem to think, that it's "foreign" or "by-golly-un-American".
The problem with universalist ideology is that it is UNTRUE.
NGPM:
"The time for a 'highly restrictionist policy' to conserve any sort of cultural unity has LONG past."
I'm not sure if I understand what you're driving at, but I'd point out that a redemptive view of the world suggests that we seek to transform a people, rather than see them displaced and eventually swept away by another people (Mexicans, or whoever) that are more in line with Catholic ideals of paternalism & community.
I.e., when St. X arrived in Japan, his aim was to convert the pagan peoples (whom he greatly loved, for all their faults) -- not conquer and replace them with already-Christianized Spanish colonists.
I apologise for being unclear.
My point was that if there was a distinct Anglo-American civilisation to preserve with restrictionist immigration policies, there no longer is. It may or may not have been too late in 1924, but in the forty-three years following Johnson's disastrous signature it has certainly degenerated to that point, and not JUST becuase of immigration.
My point was that if there was a distinct Anglo-American civilisation to preserve with restrictionist immigration policies
I think Southerners would claim that while it is fading, it still has some presence in the South. Hence I sympathize with their desire to preserve their culture.
52NGPM wrote:
The situation you describe is more or less the same as the situation in France, where liberal Gallican-inspired clergy have become effectively agents of the godless state...
If you read this article you will find that the bishops in France are nominated by the Vatican after negotiation with the French state:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Briand-Ceretti_Agreement
Since so many of Europe's churches are liberal and state run good nationalists retreat into atheism as a way of fighting off the fecay of their country. I believe, but do not have a link to prove it, that the anti-immigrant Swiss People's Party is dominated by secular Germans.
I meant decay, not fecay.
53NGPM
Is there ANY positive solution?
As far as I see it we have three options for the future:
1. Flight
In this scenario the White population flees the US for somewhere else, leaving the territory behind. Of course where would 200 million people find refuge? This also ignores that since the problem is with us, we may well end up taking it with us. To put it another way, you can't run from yourself. If we flee we may repeat the past, with a successful America swamped with waves of people from the third world claiming they are refugees from our actions or from some suffering that they did not bring on themselves.
This option may also come about after a loss in civil war 2.
2. Fight
If we do this we need to name the forces in the US body politic that are retarding our efforts to fence our southern border and who are promoting bilingual education. In order to kill bilingual ed we may have to end foreign language education in the public schools. Instead of ending second language instruction we could replace it with an inoffensive language such as Latin that has no ethnic constituency to back it.
Also, we would have to confront the liberalism in the Roman church head on, since it is the source of so much trouble to the US. This may require the laity to ask the Vatican to fire those bishops who are playing politician instead of bishop. A simple project to get this rolling would be to list the American bishops and next to their names note whether they are liberal or conservative.
Above all we need the will to confront this, instead of putting it off.
3. Failure
In this scenario the historic American nation passes into history and our traditions of free speech, property and the common law become footnotes to history. We go on to become an English speaking minority among poor Spanish speaking peasants who despise us. In failure we would be like the Jews of Western Europe, a people without a home who must wander with only their language and a record of the laws they once had.
It is worth noting that the illegals are entering through a hole in our heads not a hole in our fence. And that hole in our heads just happens to be shaped like a communion wafer.
"I think Southerners would claim that while it is fading, it still has some presence in the South. Hence I sympathize with their desire to preserve their culture."
And a perfectly legitimate desire it would be, but even Dr. Wilson believes that "a genuine American nationality was in the process of forming in the WW II era, but the imperialists destroyed that when they fostered the 60s social revolution." The preceding decades precipitated that social revolution: the Depression, the FDR courts, the wars themselves, suburbanisation, and so forth.
Another problem: most Americans are *not* Southerners and there are a few scattered decent people outside that region. So even if we do imagine that a separated South would successfully fend off McWorld-Coca-Colonisation (which I doubt), we've still got a bit of work ahead of us.
"If you read this article you will find that the bishops in France are nominated by the Vatican after negotiation with the French state"
The key here: "after negotiation with the French state." Anyone familiar with the history of France would not be surprised. The whole modus operandi of the Enlightenment was the destruction of the Catholic Church, and this was best done by removing or reducing the influence of the Pope, seizing Church property and so forth.
Thus we should not be surprised that when a solid cleric like Marcel Lefebvre (who, FYI, is said to have expressed off-the-cuff support for J.M. Le Pen) does make it through he is relegated to a less significant bishopric. The atheist French state and the liberal clergy it creates will not stand for anything more.
What to make of this? I conclude that the Republic of France is complicit in the destruction of the French people, and not merely in the nature of its particular politicians but in the very existance of laws like this designed to asphyxiate the traditional institutions that define the nation.
"Since so many of Europe’s churches are liberal and state run good nationalists retreat into atheism as a way of fighting off the fecay of their country. I believe, but do not have a link to prove it, that the anti-immigrant Swiss People’s Party is dominated by secular Germans."
You'll get no argument from me that the post-conciliar Church is philosophically indistinguishable from soft-core atheism. Where we disagree is on the point that religion should be subordinate to "good nationalism." That thinking, in its most benign form, leads to Maurrasianism, or in its worst, Naziism.
@62NGPM
Even if the clergy in France is an arm of the state, that doesn't explain how the clergy in so many other countries ends up being so liberal. The state of Massachusetts doesn't negotiate with the Vatican over who will be bishop. I was watching TV and on a PBS show they stated that the majority of Hugo Chavez's support comes from areas where the Catholic church is active. I believe that the Catholic church is a major promoter of social liberalism and it is wrong on the National Question, that doesn't make me a Nazi.
If you go to this page it shows the percentage of each states population that is Catholic and summarizes the results in a map.
You will have to scroll down to the section marked 'Catholicism by state.'
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_Catholicism_in_the_United_States
Looking at the map Dixie stands out as the only major region where the largest denomination isn't Catholic, with South Carolina and Mississippi being the two least Catholic in the region. It should be obvious that the only region where the Catholic church does not have a plurality is the most conservative.
To put it more directly Catholicism is Liberalism, and this liberalism leads to support for immigration, both legal and illegal.
Clyde Wilson's point at #12 is the ne plus ultra.
@Ronduck: Look up "Lefebvre," "Lefebvrism," "FSSPX," "SSPX," "Jansenism," "Gallicanism," "Ultramontanism," "Enlightenment," "Joseph de Maistre," "Counter-Enlightenment," "Syllabus of Errors," "Vatican I," "Vatican II" and "Unitarianism."
Until then I have absolutely nothing to discuss vis-à-vis the preposterous claim that "Catholicism is liberalism."
Amen, Nicholas! After that I might suggest he ponder people such as : Chris Check, Thomas Fleming, R. Cort Kirkwood, Nicholas Moses, Fr. Hugh Barbour, Scott Richert; Fr. Joseph Fessio; Pope Benedict XVI; Bishop Doran; Cardinal Egan; Dale Vree; Chilton Williamson; Tom Piatak; Fr. Ian Boyd; Christopher Dawson; Hilaire Belloc; GK Chesterton; JRR Tolkien; John Blewett; Fr. McLucas; Joseph Pearce; Thomas Woods; Michael Rose; Fr. Gruner; Thomas Storck; E. Michael Jones; Steve O'Brien; Edwin Faust; Cardinal Stickler; Diane Moczar; Alice von Hildebrand; Dietrich von Hildebrand; Dale Ahlquist; Sean Dailey; Chris Ferrara; Eric Scheske; Michael Davies (RIP); Brent Bozell (RIP); Thomas Molnar; John Lukacs; Pat Buchanan; Jim Holman; (and I'll even through in some neo-conservatives if you want, since they at least consider themselves conservative : Deal Hudson; George Weigel; William Donohue; Fr. Richard Neuhaus). MOst of the above are writers and/or scholars, with published works, of more than a small amount of influence.