Infidel and the Influence of Politics on United States Religious Background

Religion is one of the most sensitive matters in the United States over the past few years due to the differences that have been seen within the country in relation to the people's beliefs. Political involvement in religions is also evident in multiple states with the different use of religious beliefs and ideologies to fund or support different political agendas within the United States. With all this reference to religious believes and understanding within the country, Doctorow addresses the issue on infidel and the constant reference of Infidels and the United States. This sounds ironical since the clear definition of an infidel is a person who has no religious ties to anything and for a country to be referred to as an infidel nation religion is not a constant figure of reference within the country.

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From the article, it is evident that the country stands to be one of the most prayerful nation in the world and leading nation in religious worship pieces such as religious music among other aspects related to religion. But the diverse level of religions within the country would it be a contributor to the current reference to the United States as infidels? This is a thought Doctorow draws in our minds. This brings in the concept of what truly makes up an infidel, it is not necessarily a non-believer, but a person whose beliefs are channeled in the wrong directions according to Doctorow. Could this be the position our country is headed or is it the main reason the United States has been seen as infidels (Schlereth, 160).

The embrace of modernization has had a huge impact on the United States society, and the impact of free democracy has been felt all over the country. Freedom of expression has moved beyond the lines of politics to the lines of everyone's day today day life. The freedom of expression has broken the boundaries of what one is in a position of doing and can clearly state that it's his or her freedom or right of expression. This has been absorbed within the religious backgrounds of many and has resulted in the current position the country is standing. This has seen the country to an era of divers' religions including, Christianity, Islamic religion, Judaism, and Buddhism (Wald, 322). All these have grown widely all over the country due to the free nature of the country's views on freedom of worship.

The multiple beliefs based on these religions have clouded the country's stand, and definition on what is the difference between cults and religious believes since all the current believe have a strong stand on what they are practicing to be according to their particular religion. From the review of Doctorow, article topologists have had numerous debates on the difference between cults and religions; this is due to the deep acceptance of both within the modern American society (Doctorow). The modern society is based on secular humanism which clearly advocates for the inner hearts desires expression.

Less attention is being paid to what this religious freedom is doing to the country, some of the religious beliefs have turned out to be unexplainable, the death of thousands of Americans, for instance, was associated with the religious grounds of the States, a fundamentalist religion which is an absolutist intolerant of all forms of believes but their own saw this as a punishment from God due to the religious decay in the country (Doctorow). One is left wondering how the loss of thousands of Americans become acceptable by any religious belief.

The declaration by Jefferson that a person's civil rights have no dependence on their religious opinion and that the opinion is more of a private life matter opened doors to the current world religion situation in the United States. The existence of a governing body for different arms within the country in matters such as the education sector, medical sector or the security sector manages to keep the sectors in check from becoming independent bodies within the country. This is the current position that the religion stands in the United States, religion is an untamed section with no governing rule book to show the right path since it has been categorized as a private matter which is protected by the law. This has resulted in the manipulation of the sector by the political body such as the use of religion by the politicians to gain more support on different matters. For instance, in the south during the slavery era, the southerners used religion and the bible to justify their actions (Doctorow). The unquestionable nature of religion gave room for such atrocities to be conducted freely despite the fact that human lives were endangered by these actions. Such situations leave our minds thinking of the term infidel and do such actions justify its use on the Americans.

The Civil disobedience by Martin Luther King Jr.'s civil rights movement, on the other hand, justified their actions with prayers, they drew their strength from prayers, the oppression of the weak by the evil and the use of strength and all means to overcome this evil. This direct translation of religion resulting in multiple unjustifiable actions by political movements clearly shows the relationship between the use of religion by political bodies to achieve particular goals (Schlereth 59). Religion has been reduced to a stepping stone of different actions by the political parties which have in return compromised the value associated with it. Matters such as legalization of abortion, this is a political agenda which has been politically placed in relation to the bill of right by clearly stating the essence of making the right decision as a human being (Wald, 254). Christianity advocates for free will to think and the use of such mentality has been turned around politically and the application of freedom of expression has seen to it that such matters have been comfortably addressed and accepted within the society. On the other hand, the fundamentalism religion which does not even compromise with democracy is seen to deny all these actions but due to the freedom of expression entitled to every person, it is completely allowed. The multiple religions within the United States make it hard to have a governing body for the religious bodies since almost every religion has its own believes and doctrines (Wald, 348). As compared to other countries which experience a single religion practice, the religious issues hardly become an issue of debate within the country.

The most recent case within the United States was the issue on racism and the white supremacist, the use of Jesus as a sponsor of the cults believes, and ideologies also paints a clear picture of the harmful application of religious beliefs and facts to carry out different atrocities and agendas. From Doctorow articles, Americans establish their own consanguinity with different religious backgrounds and in the name of all what is holy and with the backing of the government and the articles within the country's constitution justify actions such as use of God for their secularism, gay and lesbian state within the country, where the passing of policies such as the legalization of marriages between gay and lesbian community (Lambert, 195). The society alienates those that find it hard to incorporate these new evolvements within the United States and are seen as individuals' resistance of change and embrace to the secularism that has already been adopted by the government. We see the huge role played by the political bodies to alter the different religious norms within the country. The entertainment world also has a huge play in the influence of what religion has become today in the United States; it is in order to acknowledge the effort Doctorow undergoes so as to analyze all these issues for most of us to see (Wald, 231). The issue on religion and politics is one of the most sensitive matters to address in the United States since one is not certain of which religion stands for what and how to avoid conflicting with different religious believes.

This finally brings us back to what it means to be an infidel, from the analysis of the current religious state within the united states, it is evident that different factors are in play on which direction religious matters are headed especially the government. This leaves most of us in a confused state of mind whether we have a particular religion at hand or are we infidels as most of the world has learned to address us as. But it all goes back to the point that religion is an individual matter.

Works Cited

Lambert, Frank. Religion in American politics: A short history. Princeton University Press, 2010.

San Miguel, Maria Ferrandez. "No Redress but Memory": Holocaust Representation and Memorialization in EL Doctorow's City of God." Memory Frictions in Contemporary Literature. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham, 2017. 187-205.

Schlereth, Eric R. An Age of Infidels: The Politics of Religious Controversy in the Early United States. University of Pennsylvania Press, 2013.

Wald, Kenneth D., and Allison Calhoun-Brown. Religion and politics in the United States. Rowman & Littlefield, 2014.