Role of Religion in International Affairs
Kevin Archer
5 November 2012
Will religion play a major role in International Relations in the coming decades, why or why not?
The fist Amendment to the United States Constitution expresses the importance of religious freedom. It reads, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;” The men who made this idea the law in 1791 came from families that had fled from England and Europe because of many generations of religious intolerance. It was not at all an abstract idea for the Founding Fathers. They could name members of their families who had been sent to the gallows or the guillotine for supporting a religion different than the monarch’s religion.
American leaders have worked hard to uphold Freedom of Religion because it is better for all of the people. In his last column as Editor of Newsweek magazine, Jon Meacham reported:
In 1957, President and Mrs. Eisenhower attended the opening of the Islamic Center on Massachusetts Avenue in Washington. (They doffed their shoes; the first lady padded about in her nylons.) “And I should like to assure you, my Islamic friends,” the president said, “that under the American Constitution, under American tradition, and in American hearts, this Center, this place of worship, is just as welcome as could be a similar edifice of any other religion. Indeed, America would fight with her whole strength for your right to have here your own church and worship according to your own conscience. This concept is indeed a part of America, and without that concept we would be something else than what we are.”
As the Supreme Commander of the Allied Forces in Europe, Dwight D. Eisenhower designed the D-Day invasion and lead troops across France and Germany in 1944 and 1945. Then General Eisenhower managed the documentation of the horrors of the Nazi death camps. He ordered filmmakers to collect