January 6, 2021 & the History of Religion and Politics in the United States

Welcome! I’m your host Chris Stevenson, of The National Museum of American Religion, which is dedicated to telling the profound story of what religion has done to America and what America has done to religion.

From what I saw on TV as it was happening and what I have read in the newspapers in the days afterwards, “religion” was very present at the storming of the Capitol on January 6, 2021. “Jesus Saves” signs; prayer groups; a large wooden cross on the east plaza; and from an article in the paper the next morning “beneath streaming flags … people loudly exhorted Jesus and chanted ‘USA’!”

We are here this morning to learn the lessons of history, specifically the history of religion and politics in the United States, from a panel of leading American scholars, and offer these lessons to the public so we can all better understand and react to, the violent occupation of the United States Capitol in Washington, D.C.

Our panel consists of (and panelists, please raise your hand when your name is read):

• Marie Griffith, Director of The John C. Danforth Center on Religion and Politics at Washington University in St. Louis
• Jamil Drake, Assistant Professor in the Department of Religion at Florida State University
• Lerone A. Martin, Associate Professor of Religion and Politics, also at the John C. Danforth Center on Religion and Politics 
• Hasia Diner, Director, Goldstein-Goren Center for American Jewish History at New York University
• Amy Black, Professor of Political Science at Wheaton College

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