In Bethel, Connecticut, atheists are especially interested this year in ridding the town’s P. T. Barnum Square of its nativity scene. For the benefit of those atheists who do not always follow the niceties of Christianity, it should be noted that the bones of Barnum’s family are buried in the quiet graveyard abutting the Congressional church not a stone’s throw from Barnum Square., and the name "Bethel" means "the house of God." The atheists have not yet been so bold as to petition the town to change its name.
Barnum himself subscribed to the Universalist Church. He told a New
York Sun reporter in an 1864 interview, “I believe there is a great
Creator, infinite in his attributes of wisdom, power, and mercy: that His name
is Love. I believe He is a God of all justice, and that He will chasten every
person whom He ever created sufficiently to reform him, in this world, or some
other." Barnum was not an atheist.
For two years, Barnum edited his own newspaper in Danbury,
the Herald of Freedom, and combatted what he viewed as sectarian
attempts to bring about a union of church and state.
Barnum’s views on a national or state church mirrored those
of the founders and the First Amendment to the U. S. Constitution, which
states, “Congress shall make no law
respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise
thereof, or abridging the freedom of speech or of the press, or the right
of the people peaceably to assemble and to petition the government for a
redress of grievances.”
It should be noted that the strictures of the First
Amendment are satisfied when the law-making body of the federal government
refrains from making laws that a) establish a state supported church, and b)
prohibit the free exercise of religion. The two clauses are joined together in
the amendment. And in matters of constitutional interpretation, courts
especially should be mindful that what the Constitution has joined together no
judge should “therefore put asunder.” Both clauses should have equal weight in
every judicial finding on the great question of state-religious relations. Indeed, the clauses “inform” each other: A judicial ruling
concerning the meaning of the “establishment clause” cannot, under a just
interpretation, effectively repeal the “free exercise” clause. And the balance
established between the two clauses is best achieved when the law-making body
refrains from producing enactments affecting either the establishment of a
state church or the free exercise of religion.
It is very clear that the amendment opens a wide door to
religious liberty, even as the same amendment opens a wide door of liberty to a
free press and the expression of political opinion. Church and state are effectively
“separated,” in the true Jeffersonian sense, when the state refrains from
making laws or edicts that prohibit the free exercise of religion or constitutionally
abuses its secular power for the purpose of establishing a national or state
church.
The town’s name, incidentally, has a biblical meaning.
Bethel is called “the house of God” because it was in Bethel where “God talked
with him” (Hosea 12:4 Hosea
12:5 ), after which Jacob built an altar, calling the place El-beth-el.
In times of trouble the Jewish people traveled to Bethel to take council with
God. The Ark of the Covenant was kept there for a long time under the care of
Phineas, the grandson of Aaron (20:26-28 ). Barnum’s first name, also incidentally, is
Phineas.
It is not possible for atheists to drive Christians back to
the catacombs, where once they gathered to worship the lord of their hearts far
from the murderous glances of pagan emperors. There is no national church in the United
States. Under the aegis of the Constitution, the Congregational Church of our
forefathers -- in essence a national church -- has been effectively
disestablished. Connecticut disestablished the Congregational church in 1818. We are left with a potpourri of religious establishments. Barnum himself drifted
from Congregationalism to the Universalist Church.
On a Christmas morning, bells sound from Christian churches,
wounding the ears no doubt of Scrooge-like atheists shouting their humbug in
the public square. Firm in their unbelief, we must not suppose atheist demands can
be easily accommodated.
But really, the sectarian and constitutional difficulties in
“the House of God” will be settled when the good people of Bethel make a distinction
between a religious establishment, governed by the First Amendment, and a self-professed
irreligious establishment, atheism, that seeks to cover religious displays with
atheist graffiti.
One must suppose that Barnum, an avid trickster like his father, might
have provided room in his circus for this amusing display of historical
revisionism.
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