The American Myth of Religious Freedom [Hardcover]

Kenneth R Craycraft Jr. (Author)

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

Theologian Craycraft argues that "there is no such thing as religious freedom. The reason that such an assertion sounds so shocking to us is that we have been so completely formed by the American myth." As a secular political culture, America embraces religious freedom only within certain boundariesAreligious orthodoxy is not allowed to threaten the secular basis of government, and therefore orthodox practitioners do not enjoy the same degree of religious freedom as more secular citizens. The Catholic church, for example, is a patently undemocratic institution and therefore fundamentally at odds with U.S. political and legal rhetoric. Craycraft examines the logic of the Constitution, court struggles, published public opinion, and the work of other scholars to support his thesis. A careful reading of this work will aid in understanding the debate, but it will not resolve the tension arising from this conflict of belief. Recommended for academic collections and all libraries in communities where this is a current issue.AGeorge Westerlund, Providence P.L., Palmyra, VA
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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"Recommended for academic collections and all libraries in communities where this is a current issue." -- Library Journal

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 226 pages
• Publisher: Spence Publishing Company; 2 edition (December 30, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1890626139
• ISBN-13: 978-1890626136
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.3 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,231,664 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Tyranny of the Majority Won't let you Read this, December 31, 2004

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M. Kerezman "philipmarlowe4" (macomb, ok United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The American Myth of Religious Freedom (Hardcover)

A very insightful book if one is is willing to read it on its own merits. The vast majority will have condemned without ever hearing the evidence. I have neither the time nor inclination to respond to those who have their minds made up before they progressed pass the table of contents page. However, I would like to respond to a few criticisms. First, while reviwers such as "Frankus" make elaborate appeals to emotion, they fail to even grapple with the core agrument of this book that the first amendment is designed more for security of liberal regime than religious freedom . Second, the fact that Mr. Craycraft "published" his book does not prove anything. Publishing has nothing to do with religious freedom or the lack of it.

There are two key chapters in this book. One is on John Locke and Letter Concerning Toleration. The other key chapter is on Jefferson and Madision and how they applied Locke's ideas. The key idea is Locke's conception of the individual conscience as supreme end in itself even if committing grave moral error. That even when a conscience of a individual joins a church he remains supreme. This ironically is why Locke, and then Madison conceptualize a church as purely an association of like minded consciences, but the association would have no corporate existence and thereby no authority over individual members. The liberal democratic state is nothing more than a collection of conscience based anarchists that decide things based majority vote. What some may fail to realize is this leads directly to the denial of the existence of objective truth in any form. A throrough reading and re-reading of chapter on Locke leads one to realize that the seeds of modern day excessive secularism are not result of the progressive incrementalism of liberal supreme court justices of the last 60 years, but are present at the outset in Locke's philosophy only to be watered and nurtured further by Jefferson and Madison...What the previous reviewers fail to see, is it that Lock'e model is just as much a threat to evangelicals. Francis Schaefer in A CHRISTIAN MANFESTO proposed using the Bible as a guide to objective truth. The problem is for Madison, the individual conscience is still suprmeme even if he voluntarily joins a denomination of like minded bible readers. Locke,Madison, and Jefferson would deny religious toleration the minute a single bible reader conceives of his biblical interpreation as more than mere pluralist opinion equal valid with satan worship. The ramfications of Lock'e thought are there if one takes the time to really moll it over. The problem for the evangelical mind it to accept the pluralist presumptions of lockean democracy and still maintain the desire for objective truth.

It must be also pointed out that Madison's views on denying churches the ability to "incorporate themselves" as legal entity and thereby own property perpetually as denominations is very radical idea which has been behind some of the bloodiest persecution's of christianity by so-called "liberal regimes". Countries like anticlerical mexico (1917-1990s) put religious liberty on paper and yet denied churchs the most basic of civil rights. The 1917 Mexican consitution while acknowledging "religious liberty" in the traditional "Enlightenment" fashion, crafted mechanisms deliberately designed to inhibit church growth and thereby religious liberty. The devil can be found in the details. One only needs to compare Madison's initial proposals for the first amendment free exercise/establishment clauses and see how similar they are to the French Revolution's DECLARTIONS ON THE RIGHTS OF MAN and the actual text of 1917 Consitution of Mexico where religious liberty is qualified by "subject to security of public good" or something similar. These qualification clauses have been used by regimes to erect all sorts of barriers to religious liberty in practice. Finally, It cannot be denied that the books central point that religious liberty is subordinate to security of the state. One needs only look at the fact that U.S Supreme court always has Jursidiction to decided whether it has jurisdiction to rule on the internal affairs of a church. One need look no further than the Peyote case mentioned in the book or recent attempts by by PEOPLE FOR THE AMERICAN WAY and assorted legislation to deny the Catholic Church the use of its missions in california by declaring them National Historic Sites.

A Reader writes "Of all the political experiments in the history of the world, the American experiment in religious freedom has been the most unequivocally successful. Extremists like Fish and Craycraft should not be working to destroy it." This is strangley repremisicent of tyranny in the name of freedom. Alexis De Tocqueville wrote in DEMOCRACY IN AMERICA that:

"In America the majority has enclosed thought within a formiable fence.A writer is free inside it, but woe to the man who goes beyond it...Formerly tyranny used the clumsy weapons of chains and hangmen; nowdays even despotism though it seemed to have nothing more to learn, has been perfected by civilization."

8 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A superb and excellent book., November 6, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: The American Myth of Religious Freedom (Hardcover)

I just loved this work. I found it to be compelling, engaging, and very satisfying. All interested in this subject should read it. I have read other work by this author, and this is by far the best.

4 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Not So Strange Bedfellows, July 11, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: The American Myth of Religious Freedom (Hardcover)

What this book brings out is the interesting way in which the extremists of the Left and Right suffer from the same totalitarianism. For both of them, political "freedom" is not satisfying unless it includes the "freedom" to force you, against your will, to actively support their religious view: the Right by theocracy, and the Left by forcing Christians to pay (in taxes) for anti-Christian art, abortions, and secularist education.

What both seem unable to grasp is, that "Government," as George Washington put it: "is force." "Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master." Nor can democratic majority rule alter this fundamental reality, since "an elective despotism is not the government we fought for." (Jefferson) The moderate, conservative, classical, laissez-faire liberalism of the American founders knew the only hope for social peace lay in the principle of "live and let live," the idea that the purpose of government must first and foremost be to prevent anyone from using force or the threat of violence to compel others, whether it be to force them at gunpoint to be baptized or to buy Robert Mapplethorpe a new car. When government undertakes to do all and to be all, it creates strife. Whether the State undertakes to erect crosses on public land, or to submerge them in jars of urine, the principle is the same: social peace is violated. Of all the political experiments in the history of the world, the American experiment in religious freedom has been the most unequivocally successful. Extremists like Fish and Craycraft should not be working to destroy it.

On a deeper level, the existence of this book, like others such as Euben's "Enemy in the Mirror," represents the logical, inevitable fruition of a poisoned seed planted by the anti-Enlightenment reaction that now calls itself "postmodernism," but which itself has roots that reach back to Hume, Rousseau, Marx, and even to Carneades. See "Enemy in the Mirror" for an interesting comparison.