Transcript for Lecture on Tocqueville's Religious Views

A lecture celebrating America's 250th anniversary

0. Introduction

Americans don’t take their religion seriously. They are rejecting Jesus when they choose peace over the sword. What the hell do you mean you’re going to raise your son half Jewish and half Christian? Who do you tell your son who Jesus of Nazareth is? Is he the one true God? Or is he a great deceiver? All the religions basically teach the same morality. Love and kindness. Really? Yahweh commands genocide against women and children. The Quran put polytheists to the sword. In Odinism, you have to die in combat to end up in Valhalla. The leading progressive feminists actively campaigned against the women’s right to vote. Why are so many of the great technologists homosexuals?

1. Why Democracy Is Hostile to Religion

1.1 The First Force: Toleration

It’s obvious to foreigners like myself and Tocqueville how strange American religious tolerance is and how corrosive it is to your religious life. But not to Americans. So let me tease this out with a story. So, when I just arrived in…