Was America created to be an explicitly Christian nation? Messiah College professor John Fea closely examines both sides of this question — frequently debated by politicians, evangelicals, and historians — in Was America Founded as a Christian Nation? A Historical Introduction.

“We live in a sound-bite culture that makes it difficult to have any sustained dialogue on these historical issues,” Fea writes in his preface. “It is easy for those who argue that America is a Christian nation (and those who do not) to appear on radio or television programs, quote from one of the founders or one of the nation’s founding documents, and sway people to their positions. These kinds of arguments, which can often be contentious, do nothing to help us unravel a very complicated historical puzzle about the relationship between Christianity and America’s founding.”

Fea further discusses the issue and his new book during an interview on WJK's free monthly podcast, WJK Radio with Dan and Jana.

John Fea is Associate Professor of American History and Chair of the History Department at Messiah College in Grantham, Pennsylvania. He is the author of The Way of Improvement Leads Home: Philip Vickers Fithian and the Rural Enlightenment in Early America and coeditor of Confessing History: Explorations in Christian Faith and the Historian's Vocation. Visit his website for more information.