Religious Plurality in the United States
C. Saunders
December 14, 2008
Religious Plurality in the United States
The United States has not always been a religiously plural country, considering many immigrants assembled their own churches and religions once settled in the US. Regrettably, there has and always will be religious controversy in the United States creating a rigidity toward other cultural heritages. On the contrary, over the past few centuries the acceptance of other culture’s religions has forced a revolutionary movement of religious pluralism in the United States.
European colonist fled Europe to escape “religious persecution” (Sullivan, 2007, p. 345); however, they came to America to worship God and practice their religion freely, yet they re-created “communities of religious intolerance” (Sullivan, 2007, p. 345); therefore, not tolerating opposing religious beliefs from their own. The Puritans also immigrated to America to practice their religion freely but established a multi-state religion as the Church of England, and by “1776, nine of the thirteen colonies had officially established religions” (Sullivan, 2007, p. 436). From this evidence, I infer that all the early immigrants escaping religious conformity came to America to form a specific religion in their society, the same as what their country was trying to do. The only difference is that they were trying to spread the religion that that they “believed to be correct” (Religion and the Founding of the American Republic, 2007, Crossing the Ocean to Keep the Faith: The Puritans section).
The United States continuous growth in population of immigrants, accompanied by a variety of cultures and religions, established a religiously diverse America. Henceforth, this led to the first Constitutional Amendment in 1789 which states that the United States of America amends to “guarantee freedom of religion” (Sullivan, 2007, p. 346). This acknowledgment supported religious pluralism in the...