Bush Brings Faith Into Full View; A new book traces the evolution of George W. Bush's faith and illuminates the role that religion plays in the president's life, both as a politician and a private person

0 Comments | Insight on the News, May 11, 2004

It was Washington's equanimity, forbearance and fortitude, for example, that helped him to be ultimately successful both as head of America's forces in the Revolution and then as the man who presided over the convention that drew up the Constitution. And it was his humility and self-denial that led him to shun all considerations of kingship, or the presidency for life, and retire to his farm at Mount Vernon as a citizen like any other in the new republic.

Whence came these great virtues? Connell argues that they sprang from an active Christian faith. "Young George learned from the cradle that the Bible was the source for his spiritual, political and financial life," she writes about the influence that Washington's very Christian stepmother, Mary Ball Washington, had on the boy. This deep and traditional Christian faith never left him, in Connell's opinion. "Moderns rarely understand the depth of Washington's religious conviction" that God would hold him accountable for what became of America, she concludes near the end of her small book.

That is undoubtedly true, but how Christian was Washington's piety? According to the testimony of the priest at the Episcopal church where Washington attended, he did not receive Communion, but his wife, Martha, did. And when that priest, the Rev. Doctor James Abercrombie, rebuked him for his failure to take the Eucharist, Washington stopped coming to church on sacrament Sundays.

Many historians trace the origins of Washington's extraordinary character to his early familiarity with Plutarch's classic The Parallel Lives of illustrious ancient Greeks and Romans, Seneca's Dialogues and Joseph Addison's play Cato. Seneca, Plutarch and Cato were pagans, and these works teach the Stoic virtues of courage, perseverance, selflessness and silent piety, each of which Washington eloquently displayed. Whatever their source, however, integrity and strength of character found fertile ground in Washington, and it may be accurate, finally, to conclude that they came from Christianity as well as Stoicism and melded together to form a most unusual man.

Connell lists "The Rules of Civility" that the 13-year-old Washington copied into his school workbook in 1745. They were taught to him by the Rev. James Marye, a former Jesuit who became the Anglican priest at the young Washington's Virginia parish, and they came ultimately from St. Ignatius of Loyola's Spiritual Exercises.

These include useful keys to good behavior such as: "Let all actions performed in public show some sign of respectful sentiment to the entire company" and "Superfluous compliments and all affectation of ceremony are to be avoided; where due, they are not to be neglected."

Stephen Goode is a senior writer for Insight.