Belief in God as Contractual Arrangement

First, I would like to thank Allen T. Lake for the promotion [The Colonel and the Kid, July 19]. But I am not sure that his attack on my article "Tolerance and Intolerance" [July 5], about the court ruling that invalidated "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance, made any point or succeeded in destroying my argument. His little colloquy between "the Colonel" (me?) and "the kid" was cute, but I am afraid he does not really understand my views as a libertarian and constitutional conservative.

Mr. Lake's portrayal of Hitler as a good Catholic and the Nazis as God-fearing is ludicrous. Nazism, of course, was a corruption of Christianity, and played upon an anti-Semitism that was rampant in the Christian world. But this does not mean that the rich Republican who would not allow a Jew to join his country club, or the ward-healing Irish Democrat who described Jews as "Christ-killers," did not fight the Nazis with sincerity in World War II. Nazism was a basically pagan philosophy, with Wagner's operas as its marching music. Maybe the Nazis weren't atheists, but they worshipped false gods. And apparently my support of the State of Israel has escaped Mr. Lake's notice.

Yes, Dr. Michael Nemrow, who brought the "under God" challenge to the federal court, is intolerant of people who believe in God and who want to express their beliefs in public. His case is a sham, because the daughter he claimed to be protecting from "an infusion of religion" has no problem with saying the Pledge of Allegiance with the "under God" phrase. With the reciting of the Pledge in the classroom, the "government" is no more demanding an allegiance to God than it would be if the teacher led the class in singing "God Bless America" or in reading the Declaration of Independence, which mentions God four times.

But let's suppose that Dr. Nemrow’s daughter is indeed an atheist and does not want to say the Pledge. She could still say the Pledge and not say "under God." She could refuse to say the Pledge at all. Her father could instruct her that most people in America believe in God and that "we atheists" simply have to tolerate it.

There is a story that William F. Buckley, Jr. likes to tell, which shows how holding a minority view does not necessarily make somebody an outsider looking in. Mr. Buckley, a devout Catholic, went to the thoroughly Protestant Hotchkiss School in Lakeville. He loved the Holy Days of Obligation, when Catholics are required to attend Mass. He and the few other Catholic students, along with the one Catholic teacher, used to get into a car and go into Lakeville to attend Mass. This made him feel special. He also liked to refuse to eat meat on Fridays. He wore his religion as a badge of honor, not something that other people had to bow to. Unfortunately in this country, the secularist ritual has required everyone to accommodate the atheists or end up as defendants in court.

Mr. Lake discounts the religious influence in the anti-slavery movement by pointing out that slaveholders also believed in God. Yes they did, and many used the Bible to justify slavery. But deep down, many Southerners knew slavery was wrong. And I'm pretty sure their religion had something to do with that. I don't think there were many Quakers or Northern Puritans who believed that slavery was right.

Mr. Lake ends his letter with the typical atheist reaction to September 11: Where was God? It seems that many atheists have a view of God similar to that of the ancient Romans—if God does not respond to my prayers the way I want, then the bargain is off. If Apollo does not give me what I want, then I'll go to Pallas Athena. The tragedy of September 11 was not caused by God. It was caused by human action. And the reaction was human action. Both evil and God work on earth through humans. God was not about to stop the planes from flying into the World Trade Center any more than God would have stopped the Holocaust or guided the Titanic away from the iceberg.

People are free to believe what they want. The government has no business enforcing beliefs. But at the same time, people are free to say the Pledge of Allegiance if they want. I have heard that Dr. Nemrow is filing a suit against President Bush to stop any mention of God in presidential inaugurations. Maybe Dr. Nemrow should read the First Amendment more carefully. It says, "Congress shall make no law …" It does not prescribe what the President may say or not say. The purpose of the First Amendment is not to protect the government from religion but to protect religion from the government. And it does this by both preventing the establishment of one church and allowing people to express their religious beliefs both inside and outside of government. It also protects the freedom of people not to believe in anything or to believe only in themselves. But Mr. Lake should heed this: in a society of atheists, the good atheists are always outnumbered.