Nationalism as a Religion, V
Hayes, Carlton J. H.
262 THE COMMONWEAL January 13, 1926 NATIONALISM AS A RELIGION V. A TRIBAL CREED By CARLTON J. H. HAYES THE most impressive fact about the present age is the universality of the religious...
...So does Christianity—Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant...
...In France, the sacred remains of Napoleon Bonaparte lie close to a Catholic altar, and the magnificent Christian church of Sainte Genevieve has been transformed into the National Pantheon...
...Although it is likely to be a long time before the new religion completely ousts the old, the syncretism now proceeding is far more favorable, in my opinion, to nationalism than to Christianity, Mohammedanism, or any other supernatural world-religion...
...Christianity has more nominal followers today than ever before in its history, and possibly there are more sincere and devout Christians—Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant—in the twentieth century than in any earlier century...
...It repudiates the revolutionary message of St...
...All this promotes the religion of Americanism, not quite as a substitute for Christianity, but rather as a most impressive supplement to it...
...Paul and proclaims anew the primitive doctrine that there shall be Jew and Greek, only that now there shall be Jew and Greek more quintessentially than ever...
...Buddhism gave rise to a common type of constructive civilization among the teeming millions of Burma, Siam, China, and Japan...
...Despite the universality of the general concept of nationalism, its cult is based on a tribal idea and is, therefore, in its practical manifestations, peculiar to circumscribed areas and to persons of the same language...
...Buddhism and Hinduism still exist...
...Christianity in the United States is becoming more and more nationalist—and naturally so...
...The Catholic minority, not to be outdone by such an attractive plea, is bent on "Americanizing" itself and its immigrants...
...Mohammedanism is still a great and aggressive religion, with far-flung missionary enterprises in the East Indies and in central Africa, but the followers of Mustapha Kemal Pasha have proved themselves Turkish nationalists first and Moslems afterwards, and Mohammedan Arabs are fraternizing with Christian Arabs in a common supreme devotion to Airab nationalism against the threats of established Zionism...
...From the newspapers we learn that at the Protestant Episcopal church of Saint Mark's-in-the-Bouwerie, in February, 1924, a sermon by Dr...
...Ancient Judaism was a religion which centered the hopes and aspirations of a "chosen people" upon a supernatural god, the god Yahweh, and anyone who believed in Yahweh and abided by his commandments was "chosen...
...The Protestant majority, in holding its own and seeking the conversion of divers immigrants, constantly affirms that America is Protestant and that Protestantism is American...
...Protestantism of the sixteenth-century Lutheran or Calvinistic type may be decaying—I don't know and I am reluctant to guess— but Protestantism as a vehement protest against historic Catholic Christianity and as an important element in the contemporary syncretic religion of nationalism is certainly alive and thriving...
...Buddhism is still a powerful factor in the lives of myriad Orientals, and in the quaint forms of theosophy it is exerting a little direct influence upon the Occident, but in Japan, at any rate, it latterly has been subordinated to nationalist Shinto, and in China certain intellectuals are attempting an amalgam of it with Confucianism and Christianity in order to produce a Chinese national religion...
...I would suggest, however, that there are many, many ways in which man may express his religious sense, and that religious emotion, like any other instinctive emotion, always is susceptible and often needful of conscious direction and control...
...Is there not some justification for the prophecy of Mr...
...A good deal has been said and written of late by agnostically inclined gentlemen, about the decay of Protestantism in America, and it has been pointed out that only about 30 percent of the American people attend church...
...Judaism is still a potent force in the lives of many Jews, but there can be little doubt that in recent times, with the development of scepticism about the divine inspiration of the Hebrew scriptures and the rise of "reform movements" and the consequently less strict observance of the Mosaic law and of the ceremonial of the orthodox synagogue, an ever augmenting number of Jews are expressing their religious sense in nationalism, either in devotion to the nationalism of the people among whom they live or in service and sacrifice in behalf of their own peculiar Zionism...
...Not only in the United States does the religious sense of the whole people find expression in nationalism, but also, in slightly different form, but perhaps to an even greater degree, in France, England, Italy, Germany, Belgium, Holland, Russia, the Scandinavian and Baltic countries, Poland, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Spain, Portugal, Ireland, the Balkans, Greece, and the Latin-American republics...
...Some devotees of other religions criticize and condemn nationalism...
...In India both Mohammedanism and Hinduism are ebbing before a rising Indian nationalism...
...I would not have anyone gather from what I have said that I condemn nationalism because it is an expression of man's "religious sense...
...But it is manifest to us who live in the West that Christianity for enormous numbers of people has become an adjunct to nationalism...
...Israel Zangwill that "America doubtless will be the first to fuse its 186 denominations and its crank creeds into a single American religion...
...Stuart L. Tyson, vice-president of the Modern Churchman's Union, in which he denied the divinity of Christ, and a ritual service devoted to the American flag, "engaged the attention of large congregation morning and afternoon...
...No Protestant January 13,1926 THE COMMONWEAL 263 sect is strong enough—and certainly the Catholic Church (even if it were so minded) is not strong enough—to establish itself as the official church of the United States...
...The process is fostered, moreover, by the very fact that American Protestantism is divided into numerous sects and denominations...
...I am too convinced a believer in the inherently religious character of man to make light of religion...
...Modern nationalism, while evolving customs and ceremonies which externally are very reminiscent of rites and practices of Christianity, has developed quite a different spirit and set itself quite a different goal...
...In this sense far more than 30 percent of the American people are Protestants—and Nationalists...
...and to condemn nationalism because it depends on religious emotion would seem to me as futile as to condemn vegetation because it thrives on sunlight...
...And especially in the case of Christianity, the forms and ceremonies which attended the expression of man's religious sense were constant symbols of a universal striving for a kingdom that was not of this world— for the sacrifice of self and the assurance of peace on earth to men of good will...
...the thoughtful modern Christian may be pardoned for being a bit pessimistic about a world devoid of a Roman empire and replete with dozens of chosen peoples...
...Most great religious systems of the past have been unifying, rather than disintegrating, forces in the history of the human race...
...it re-enshrines the earlier tribal mission of a chosen people...
...So does Mohammedanism...
...Nor does the religion of nationalism thrive only on traditional Christian soil...
...And undoubtedly it is true that many Catholic Americans would resent any imputation that they are less devout in the worship of nationalism than are their Protestant countrymen, "Modernists" seem to thicken Americanism in measure as they dilute Christianity...
...The good at which it aims is a good for one's own nation only, not for all mankind* Nationalism as a religion represents a reaction against historic Christianity, against the universal mission of Christ...
...In most Protestant churches in the United States, a big American flag hangs resplendent over the pulpit or communion-table, and in most localities Protestant clergy and their faithful hold "union services" at least on Thanksgiving day, on Decoration day, on Washington's birthday, and on the Fourth of July...
...Nationalism's kingdom is frankly of this world, and its attainment involves tribal selfishness and vainglory, a particularly ignorant and tyrannical intolerance—and war...
...But the bulk of nationalists, and a growing number of Christians, Mohammedans, and Buddhists, proceed unreflectively to effect a compromise, increasingly favorable to nationalism, between the old faith and the new...
...Christianity bound together in a cultural community all kinds of European peoples, regardless of their habitat, breed, and native language...
...What actually is occurring is a new religious syncretism, by virtue of which very many persons continue nominally to adhere to the faith of their ancestors and even to practise its cult, whilst they adapt it to the exigencies of nationalist worship and discipline...
...Nationalism has a large number of quarrelsome sects, but it is the nearest approach to a world-religion...
...Nationalism as a religion inculcates neither charity nor justice—it is proud, not humble—and it signally fails to universalize human aims...
...The Orthodox churches of the East, the Armenian church, the Coptic church, the remnant of the Nestorian church, are auxiliaries to nationalist fervor and nationalist endeavor...
...Westminster Abbey is a holy fane of the Church of England and, much more so, of British nationalism—and the Protestant cathedrals of England and Scotland and Ireland, and of Prussia too, are adorned not so plentifully nor so conspicuously with statues and relics of Christian saints as with images of national heroes, military or naval, and with national battle-flags...
...American Protestants may differ about the literal interpretation of the first chapter of the Book of Genesis or about the manner of administering baptism, or about the orders of the ministry and the number of sacraments, but they do not differ essentially in their homage to the national state...
...The ancient reflective Roman imagined that one chosen people—the Hebrew nation —was one too many for general comfort and safety...
...Some extreme (and, let us grant, logical) nationalists abandon and assail other religions...
...Mohammedanism drew together in a common bond and inspired with a common zeal the most diverse tribesmen of Arabia, India, Persia, Turkey, the Malay archipelago, and Africa...
...This, in my opinion, is a most superficial estimate of the situation...
...Hence, there can be in a common Christianity, no oneness of faith and worship for the whole American people...
...262 THE COMMONWEAL January 13, 1926 NATIONALISM AS A RELIGION V. A TRIBAL CREED By CARLTON J. H. HAYES THE most impressive fact about the present age is the universality of the religious aspects of nationalism...
...Some forms of religion are superior to others, and when we recognize the religious nature of modern nationalism we still have to ask ourselves whether it is the best form of religion for human betterment...
...However, this is not to say that older religions have been obliterated by nationalism...
...it now flourishes in Japan, Turkey, Egypt, India, Korea, and is rearing its altars in China...
...Modern Zionism is a religion which transfers the object of worship from Yahweh to the chosen people, and none is chosen who is wilfully ignorant of the Hebrew language...
...Consequently, the spiritual unity, which almost everyone deems desirable, must be sought in nationalism...
Vol. 3 • January 1926 • No. 10
