Dr. Bill Evans

Erskine Professor Speaks On "Civil Religion in Transition"

Erskine College professor Dr. William B. Evans, head of the Department of Bible, Religion and Philosophy, spoke on "Rendering to Caesar: Civil Religion in Transition" at convocation today. Evans replaced scheduled speaker Gen. David H. Hicks, Deputy Chief of Chaplains in the U.S. Army and a highly decorated brigadier general, who was called away.

"The events of the last two and a half weeks have seared the collective soul of our nation," Evans said. "Images of jet airliners packed with civilian passengers crashing into two of our nation's best known architectural landmarks, symbols of America's economic and military power, flash in our heads."

As Americans have tried to make sense of the terrorist attack, they have turned to religion in various forms, including candlelight vigils and church prayer services. Evans cited the Sept. 14 service at the National Cathedral in Washington, D.C., and last weekend's prayer service at Yankee Stadium as examples of the changing nature of civil religion in the United States. Both events were characterized by Christian, Jewish and Muslim participation, and the Yankee Stadium service included a Buddhist monk.

"Something religious was going on at these events," Evans said. "But it was not, strictly speaking, the religion of the church, nor of the synagogue, nor of the mosque, nor of the Buddhist temple. It was something else."

Evans traced the history of civil religion, beginning with the Roman Empire, which began honoring living emperors as gods at the end of the first century A.D.–and requiring that obeisance be paid to such "gods" as a mark of good citizenship.

"Such citizenship requirements posed obvious problems for Christians, who regarded sacrifices to the emperor as idolatry," Evans said. A similar problem in the 20th century was faced by Christians in Nazi Germany, where "a religion of the state effectively sought to subvert and then to replace traditional churchly religion."

Civil religion in the United States has moved through a number of stages, Evans said. "When we talk about civil religion, we're dealing with a moving target."

From "the robust monotheism of the Puritans" to today's public celebrations of "theistic, polytheistic, and non-theistic religions," demonstrated in the recent National Cathedral and Yankee Stadium services, American civil religion is an evolving phenomenon, and, Evans said, an inevitable one in a pluralistic society.

Civil religion "is something that we must come to terms with," he said. And although "historically Americans found it plausible to believe – rightly or wrongly – that most of us were praying to the same God," evangelical Christians may have to face the question of the extent to which they may participate in the new emerging civil religion.

"Let us never make the mistake of confusing civil religion, valuable though it may be in some forms and circumstances, with the fullness of God's revelation of scripture and in Jesus Christ."