Apologize to who, and for what?
If you go to a food blog to find a recipe for, say, Fettuccine Alfredo, you'll notice that the actual recipe tends to be waaaay down on the bottom, underneath pages of personal stories, pictures, and ads. That's because whoever's writing that blog wants to keep you on their website for as long as possible. At the risk of breaking this time-honored tradition, I'll save you some time, and put the answer to my own question right here at the top of my post: no, no one should apologize for American history. If you want to know why, keep reading. If not, have a great day and good luck with the Fettuccine .
The question of apologizing for America came to my attention a few months ago while I was evaluating a new curriculum in American Literature, to be used for 10th grade this year. That's not to say anything against my own homebrewed, totally epic curriculum (which I still plan to use for 9th grade), but I needed something new to really focus on American Literature specifically. And this one looked pretty good. I liked the literature selections, and the questions required careful reading to answer. The only problem was the introduction.
In the opening pages of the textbook, before introducing any actual literature, the authors of this Christian curriculum apologized for America's past evils, especially concerning slavery. They specifically harped on the hypocrisy of the line "all men are created equal" in the Declaration of Independence, which they found unconscionable in a nation which included slaveholders. The general attitude of this introduction was "America is cool and all, buuuut it still kind of sucks because of slavery. Sorry about that." For perspective's sake, I should point out that this introduction is VERY tame compared to the absolute vitriol that the American left pours out against my country on a daily basis. When I consider that Howard Zinn's "A People's History of the United States," is still used in many public schools today despite being thinly-veiled communist propaganda, I could count my blessings if I were forced to use this new literature curriculum.
Still, the question remains, should we apologize, even in a tame and civil way, for American History? For slavery, the Trail of Tears, or the Japanese interment? I've already said the short answer is no, but the long answer will require some unpacking.
What Warrants an Apology?
When should someone say "I'm ashamed to be an American"? The relevant question here is not, "did American laws ever endorse anything evil?" The obvious answer to that question is yes, as past laws about slavery, not to mention present laws about abortion and homosexuality, make clear. But if that is the criteria we will use, then any resident of ANY country should be ashamed and apologetic, for there is no country on earth whose laws have ever been perfectly just.
No, if anyone says that Americans should be ashamed of their history, then there must be something uniquely evil about that history. There must be something in America's past that could make someone say "I'm ashamed to be an American" in a way that someone else would NOT say "I'm ashamed to be Chinese" or "I'm ashamed to be Egyptian." But what exactly is that thing supposed to be?
A Realistic Perspective on Slavery
The go-to example is typically slavery. Those with an "America sucks" mindset will usually point to the evil of slavery, which existed within American borders in some form or another for about 100 years after the nation's founding. But as evil as slavery was, it needs to be understood with the right perspective. The sad truth is that people have been enslaving one another for thousands of years, and indeed, they are still doing so today. Slavery did exist in America, as it did everywhere else in the world. The difference was that America condemned the practice, abolished it, and fought a bloody civil war to free those who were trapped in it. Every nation under heaven has had slaves and tyrants. Many hypocrites have proclaimed equality for all, when in reality they meant equality for the rich and powerful. But America was founded on the promise that "all men are created equal" and though it took a hundred years and much bloodshed, it has fulfilled that promise in a way no other nation has.
America is NOT Uniquely Evil
Like slavery, every other evil attributed to America is one that is common to mankind as a whole. This does not excuse these evils. The Trail of Tears is still a stain on our nation's history, and the Japanese interment was still an exercise in unjust and racially charged paranoia. Nevertheless, if we maintain an objective perspective on these incidents, it is clear that the Trail of Tears (in which 4,000 Cherokee died while being forcibly relocated) is not comparable the Armenian Genocide (in which 1.2 million Armenian Christians died while being intentionally exterminated). Nor is it accurate to call the Japanese Interment camps "concentration camps," as though they were part of an Asian holocaust.
America IS Uniquely Awesome
While America's sins are shared with the rest of the world, its moral achievements are unparalleled. Beyond simply abolishing slavery, America can boast of literally saving the world twice, defeating the forces of tyranny in both world wars. It can boast of a multi-ethnic, merit based society which immigrants flock to (including, by the way, immigrants from African nations. Ask the "America is racist" crowd to explain that one). America is the most generous society in the world, and its capitalistic economy has allowed its citizens to enjoy material prosperity never before seen in human history.
A Better Country
Having said all this, there IS a reason for Americans to apologize for their history. It's the same reason that Frenchmen, or Indonesians, or Australians should apologize for their own countries. For the fact is that everyone, no matter his nationality, is a sinner, and needs to repent before the Holy God who made him. If anyone says, in so many words, "America sucks," my question for him would be "compared to what other nation?" But there is in fact another nation, compared to which America is a wretched place indeed: the Kingdom of God. To say that America is less than other earthly nations would be an untrue exercise in self-loathing. But to say it is on par with God's own Kingdom would be an idolatrous patriotism. There is indeed one better country, and we should all apologize that our conduct has not been worthy of it. What's more -and I cannot stress this enough- we do not need to repent of our nation's sins nearly as much as we need to repent of our own individual sins. For it is individuals, not nations, who sin, and it is individuals who can be justified through the death and resurrection of Jesus.
6 Comments