Sweet land of piety [book review of "Americanism: The Fourth Great Western Religion"]

The Boston Globe ^ | July 15, 2007 | Katherine A. Powers

[Alex Murphy]

Are we good people? In the past, Christianity, the dominant religion of the West, tended to emphasize our badness. But the history of Christianity since the Renaissance has, with some detours, been the history of our extricating ourselves from the notion that we are fallen creatures. The Calvinist idea of an Elect represents the big breakthrough, and nowhere has its effect been more evident than in America. The rationale of the Revolution and the development of our constitutional government have been traced many times from the (Calvinist) Puritans . Some Americans of increasing vociferousness argue that because religion was an element in the European settlement and in the development of our government, and because God has been continually appealed to in political and civic matters, we are, in essence, a religious nation. Others argue against this , pointing out that the 17th-century religious understanding of America developed into a secular understanding of the nation and state.

In "Americanism: The Fourth Great Western Religion" (Doubleday, $24.95), David Gelernter condemns the secular view and comes up with some tumescent ideas about the religious and, indeed, mystical nature of the United States. For him, we Americans inhabit a religious narrative no less real than that of the Puritans. The nation is a "biblical republic" where the very idea of America itself is a religious one "of enormous, transporting power." The result is "Americanism," an actual religion possessed of a specific doctrine that he identifies as "American Zionism," with a "Creed" that says " America is a new promised land." What's more is that the salutary message and transforming power of Americanism are not confined to our happy land, but are global. All this is "supported by a mountain of evidence."

Let's see what we've got . While Gelernter warns that understanding the Puritans....

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As Gelernter notes, we see those duties discharged today by George W. Bush, "a chivalrous American who believes in liberty, equality, and democracy not just for France and Denmark but for Arab nations...."

Well, it’s easy to see why the reviewer dismissed the book.

It’s also pretty easy to see why that leftist hero, The Unabomber, decided Gelernter was somebody who needed to be blown up.