Text taken from the Library of Congress's INFORMATION BULLETIN, August 1998

The role of religious thought and practice during the 17th and 18th centuries is often underestimated and sometimes misunderstood by today's Americans, speakers concluded during a special Library symposium on June 18-19, 1998, complementing the LC exhibition "Religion and the Founding of the American Republic.". . .

Mark A. Noll, from Wheaton College in Wheaton, Ill., spoke first at the June 19 morning session. Mr. Noll illustrated how strikingly unusual it was for Americans to link republicanism and traditional religion.

"The two ideals remained more or less alien to each other in the other English-speaking North Atlantic societies," he said. "Republicanism in the sense of a system at odds with monarchy and the ancient church-state establishment was a new coinage at the end of the 17th century."

Mr. Noll explained that Americans have become so accustomed to think of the values of religion and republicanism as supporting each other that it is difficult for them to understand why defenders of traditional religion once looked with such suspicion on republican convictions. He noted that the religious republicanism of the United States was possible because of the ideological flexibility and the absence of a vigorous church establishment.