Editing Blog/2024-06-27/Is America Christian

The USA has a lot of things it considers sacred. A big one is the establishment clause that expresses [[wikipedia:separation of church and state|separation of church and state]]. So most Americans will tell you there is no state religion. However, as a foreigner moving to this country, it's pretty apparent that the USA today elevates Christianity over other religions.

I'm not religious, so my personal interest is in this being true. But I think anyone neutral would have to conclude that it is not.

# At the national level (Federal here), there is a single religious holiday: Christmas
# The Pledge of Allegiance marks the US as "One Nation Under God"
# Cities and states frequently make laws specifically favouring a single religion

As an example of the last, [https://www.sfmta.com/projects/dolores-street-median-parking San Francisco allows median parking on Dolores St when there is mass at a nearby church]. If the US had any other religious holiday at the national level or if it didn't have laws favouring Christianity, one could conclude that Separation of Church and State is real, but it's obviously not.

Perhaps the true tenet of the American Civil Religion is to claim that there is separation of church and state.

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