National Sunday Law: Fact or Fiction? 2nd EditionChapter 4What are the Odds of a National Sunday Law?By Dirk Anderson, 2022
The world of the 21st century is far different than the world of the late 1800s. Over the last 130 years the demographics in the nation that is said to play the center stage in the National Sunday Law drama—the United States—have shifted dramatically. In the late 1880s, the United States was a nation of church-going Protestants. Not so today. The nation is much more diverse today. According to the 2020 Census, only 70% of Americans identify as Christians, and the number has been steadily decreasing for decades. Unlike the nineteenth century, there are now other religions with significant memberships in the United States. To determine whether or not a National Sunday Law is even feasible, one must consider these other religions and the power and influence they wield in the United States.
The JewsThe most significant example of the changing demographics of the United States is the Jews. Over the last century many Jews have immigrated to the United States. According to the Pew Research Center, in 2021 there were 7.8 million Jews in the United States.1 Many of these either keep the Sabbath themselves or are sympathetic with those who observe the Sabbath. Any Sunday law would have to be passed over the objections of these eight million Jews. That is highly unlikely. The Jewish lobby is incredibly influential in the United States' legal and political arenas. In 2021, there were 27 Jewish congressmen, and 10 Jewish Senators in the United States Congress. In 2022, the Secretary of State, Treasury Secretary, Secretary of Homeland Security, and Chief of Staff were all Jewish. Three of the nine Supreme Court justices are Jewish. Thus, it is evident that Jews hold an inordinate amount of political power in the United States. It is impossible to believe these Jewish powerbrokers would permit a Sunday Law that would condemn their own people to persecution and death. In addition to their political muscle, it is widely recognized that the United States' media is largely owned and controlled by Jews. Jews control virtually all major television news outlets and newspapers in the United States. They also control most of the U.S. entertainment industry (movies, television, music, publishing, and gaming) and the massive pornographic business. Jews also dominate the financial industry in the United States. These positions of power give them an inordinate amount of influence over the destiny of the nation. To imagine the Jews would allow any type of law mandating Sunday observance to even advance to the stage of serious consideration is utterly ludicrous.
The MuslimsThe next significant minority to consider is the Muslim community. Islam is the fastest growing religion and the second largest religion in the world. There are approximately 1.9 billion adherents to Islam in 2021, including 3.5 million in the United States.2 Muslims are beginning to flex their political muscle in the United States, and there are now four Muslim congressmen. The weekly holy day of Islam is Friday. This large community of believers will not allow anyone to push them around. They would be outraged should Christians attempt to force them to observe Sunday as a day of worship. There is no doubt they would use their growing political muscle and any other means at their disposal to furiously stifle such an attempt.
SecularismOne community that must be considered is the secular community. Unlike the 1880s when this community was quite small, today this community is massive and growing rapidly. According to the Pew Research Center, in 2021, 29% of Americans were secular, up from 19% a decade earlier.3 That is 97 million Americans. This community includes agnostics, secular humanists, and millions of atheists. Over the last sixty years this group has been incredibly successful in removing religion from the American public arena. They have succeeded in removing the Ten Commandments and prayer from all public schools. They have won success after success over the opposition of Christian groups. The Christians have been on the run from this group for decades. It is preposterous to suppose that this huge, highly educated, and politically powerful group of secularists is going to allow Christians one inch of ground in returning religion into public life. This group will most certainly oppose any religious legislation. Based on historical precedent, it is probable they will have the same success against Sunday laws that they have had against every other religious institution in the United States that they have demolished. There is no way that this huge community will ever permit a Sunday law.
The HomosexualsAnother group to consider is the homosexual community. In 2017, a Gallup poll reported that 4.5% of Americans identify themselves as part of the LGBT community.4 As of 2021, the size of this community is estimated to be well over 15 million, and growing rapidly. Because of the resistance of Evangelical Christianity to homosexuality, this community is vigorously opposed to Catholics and Evangelicals—the two groups that would be most likely to favor a Sunday law. Homosexuals have tremendous financial and political clout in the United States. There is little doubt they would use their influence to oppose any proposed Sunday legislation.
Sabbath KeepersAnother increasingly powerful group is the Sabbath-keeping community itself. Sabbath-keeping has become an increasingly popular practice in the United States and through-out the world. This is shown by the Seventh-day Adventist church's rising political influence and its rising world membership. Despite a massive apostacy rate, there are still over 21 million SDA members worldwide in 2021.5 With approximately a million members in the U.S., Seventh-day Adventists are far from being a poor, impotent minority susceptible to the tyranny of the "power structure." On the contrary, they are very much imbedded within the power structure of the United States. Two members of Congress were Seventh-day Adventists in 2022, and SDA Ben Carson was recently the 17th United States Secretary of Housing and Urban Development. Seventh-day Adventists comprise a relatively affluent, well-positioned, politically conservative and widely accepted segment of American society. In all ways other than their quirky beliefs, they are virtually indistinguishable from the great mass of well-off, materialistic, middle-to-upper-middle-class Americans. Unlike the 1800s, when Seventh-day Adventists were an isolated group harboring bitter animosity towards other Christian churches, Seventh-day Adventists today are more accepted than ever. Seventh-day Adventism has moved a long way towards the mainstream of Evangelical Christianity. The SDA church has softened some of its harsher aspects, and buried some of the fierce rhetoric of the nineteenth century. As it has toned down, the Christian community has become more accepting of the sect, even to the point of dropping the dreaded "cult" label that was so widely used in reference to SDAs in the mid-1900s. In recent decades, the SDA Corporation has been displaying a more tolerant face to the world by placing more emphasis on mainstream religious ideals, and downplaying many of the odd and distinctive doctrines that formerly caused many to regard the sect as peculiar group. As a result of this "face-lift" Seventh-day Adventism has achieved an unprecedented level of acceptance in the United States. In addition to the SDA sect, there have never been more citizens of the United States worshipping on Saturday than there are today. There are reportedly over 500 different denominations and groups that now worship on Saturday. This includes various Church of God groups, Seventh Day Baptists, Messianic Jews, some Pentecostal churches, some Apostolic churches, and a whole host of others. Some of these groups have experienced near record rates of growth over the last century. Sabbatarianism has never been more popular and more accepted than it is today. There is no doubt that any Sunday legislation would be bitterly opposed by these groups.
Eastern ReligionsAnother large group that would likely oppose Sunday legislation includes eastern religions, such as Hinduism and Buddhism. In 2021, the Pew Research Center estimated there were nearly five million members of these religions living in the United States.6 These religions have absolutely nothing to gain by legislation enforcing the observance of a Christian holy day, and there is little doubt they would energetically oppose it.
New-Age ReligionsThere is a plethora of New Age, pagan, Wiccan, Native American, and tribal religions in the United States. Their adherents now number in the millions. These religions are experiencing a tremendous resurgence in recent years. For example, the Wiccan Church (witchcraft) is now the fastest growing church in the United States. These groups have no interest in any law enforcing a Christian day of worship and would almost assuredly fight against it.
Other Christian GroupsIn addition to all of these groups, there are a number of Christian churches which would be very unlikely to support any legislation enforcing religious observances. First, consider the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (Mormons). In 2021, over 6.6 million of their sixteen million members were residing in the United States.7 This religion, widely recognized as a cult, shares many similarities with the SDA sect. Although they worship on Sunday, their distrust of government power would make them unlikely to support any Sunday law. Likewise, the Jehovah's Witness sect, with over a million of their eight million members living in the U.S., would also be unlikely to support it. The Baha'i Faith would probably not support it either. Scientology, which claims well over three million members in the U.S., would most likely have no interest in a Sunday law. Neither would some Baptist groups which have a centuries-old tradition of championing religious liberty and the separation of church and state. Neither would the nearly two million members of the Church of Christ. It is a fundamental doctrine of this church, maintained for many years, that neither Sunday nor Sabbath should be considered a holy day of worship. It is impossible to believe this group would support any type of Sunday legislation. They teach that no part of the Old Testament law is binding upon Christians. On the liberal side of the religious spectrum, the post-Christian Unitarian church would also be unlikely to push for laws enforcing religious observances. One of the fastest-growing segments of Christianity in America is non-denominational. People attending these churches are looking for a positive spiritual experience untainted with the old vestiges of legalism. In general, they have no interest in enforcing their beliefs on others, especially through legislation.
Is There Anyone Left to Push for Sunday laws?So, who is left? The mainstream Catholic and Protestant churches. These are the same groups whose membership and attendance have been plummeting for decades. In 2016, only 62% of these Christians say that Sunday observance is important for society. This is down from 78% in 1978.8 While the dwindling majority of this group still regard Sunday observance as important to society, they have shown very little interest in pursuing Sunday legislation in the past century. The legislation that these groups have pursued, such as returning prayer to public schools and banning abortion, have been repeatedly thwarted over the years. Various political action groups have arisen over the years, such as the "Moral Majority" and the "Christian Coalition," but they have met with only limited success on the political battleground. While keeping the Sabbath has been made into a gargantuan issue by Seventh-day Adventists, non-Sabbatarians view it differently. It is a meaningless, non-issue, and they give the whole subject no more attention than did Jesus Himself. Non-Adventists are certainly not threatened by Sabbath-keeping. If anything, they look upon Sabbatarians with pity—as being ignorant, spiritually blinded, self-deluded legalists. They do not see them as posing any great threat to themselves or to their belief systems. Therefore, it is certainly doubtful that even Evangelical Christians would make any effort at all to enforce Sunday observance on Sabbatarians.
Native Americans Successfully Resist U.S. GovernmentJust to show how little political power is needed to resist governmental legislation in the United States, consider the tiny group of Native American Indians who who, in their religious services, smoke peyote—a mind-altering illegal drug. The United States government attempted and failed to ban the use of an illegal drug by this tiny Native American religious group. If they could not even stop the use of illegal drugs in a religion, how are they possibly going to force a hundred and fifty million non-Sunday-keepers to worship on Sunday? Think about it.
A Universal Sunday Law? Is it Feasible?What about the rest of the world? Christians account for less than one third of the global population. Who is going to enforce Sunday worship on the two billion Friday-worshipping Moslems? What about the three billion Hindus, Buddhists, and other eastern religions? Who is going to make them start observing Sunday? What about the billion secularists, agnostics, and atheists? Who is going to make them worship anything at all? Is one to believe that the United States is strong enough to not only force its own people to worship on Sunday, but also force the entire world to do likewise? The entire world witnessed the great difficulty the United States had in trying to control the tiny nation of Afghanistan from 2001 to 2021. After futilely attempting to maintain control over that nation, the United States left in defeat. If the United States cannot even maintain order in this one small nation, then how is it going to control the entire world? Communist China is now a full-fledged super-power with its rapidly expanding nuclear missile capability, including unstoppable hypersonic missiles. Atheistic China is rapidly expanding its navy and now boasts the largest military machine on the planet, replete with state-of-the-art jets loaded with high-tech weaponry. This nation now has the muscle to seriously challenge the United States. There is no possibility China is going to allow the United States to decide what day its people worship on. Hindu India, Muslim Pakistan, atheist North Korea, and Jewish Israel all have super-powerful nuclear weapons. The United States cannot dictate anything to these nations. The reality of the world has changed drastically since 1900. There is simply no possibility the United States can force the whole world to worship on Sunday and kill Sabbath-keepers.
A Far-Fetched End-Time ScenarioSeventh-day Adventists are not unaware of the impossibility of their end-time scenario. In order to extricate themselves from this predicament, they have invented a far-fetched solution to this problem. The scenario they now propose is not even remotely found anywhere in the Bible. According to the sect, Satan is going to appear on this earth and masquerade as Jesus, in order to convince the world to pass Sunday laws. Satan is going to mimic Jesus in certain places of the earth and somehow convince the entire world to start worshipping on Sunday and kill those keeping the Sabbath. Stop for a moment and consider how ludicrous this truly is. We ask, what Christian is going to believe a Christ who wants to kill people for going to church on Saturday? Christ Himself said, "For the Son of man is not come to destroy men's lives, but to save them." (Luke 9:56) Who is going to believe a fake Christ that directly contradicts the words the real Christ spoke in the Bible? Christ would not even allow Peter to use his sword in self-defense! Can you imagine Christ ordering people to be murdered for worshipping Him on the Sabbath? We ask: What Christian is going to be foolish enough to believe a Christ who wants to kill people for no better reason than that they go to church on Saturday? The Bible clearly says Satan is a murderer (see John 8:44). Who is going to believe a Christ that wants to murder certain Christians? One would have to look far and wide to find a single Christian that is asinine enough to believe Christ is a murderer! If Satan made an appearance touting a "murder the Sabbath-keepers" plan, and tried to implement it world-wide, the entire world would rise up against him and crucify him! Why would Satan attempt something so self-defeating as passing a Sunday law? He is doing just fine now! The world is rapidly becoming post-Christian. Some claim that Australia and Europe have already entered a post-Christian era and the United States and Canada are not far behind. Pagan, New Age, and occult religions are experiencing a tremendous surge in popularity. Secularism, materialism, and sensualism are eating out the heart of Christianity. Over recent decades, in most Western nations, Christianity has been losing members in droves. Why are Seventh-day Adventists looking into the future for persecution? Christians are already suffering record numbers of persecutions throughout the world. With all the success Satan is currently enjoying, persecuting Christians and leading people away from Christianity, why would he want to establish laws enforcing a traditional Christian practice upon the world? If he did so, he would be turning people's attention back towards Christianity, forcing people to spend time contemplating God and His law. He would be fighting his own best interests! The SDA end-time scenario simply makes no sense.
Citations1. "Jewish Americans in 2020," Pew Research Center, May 11, 2021. The study identified 5.8 million Jewish adults, and 1.8 million children being raised as Jews. https://www.pewforum.org/2021/05/11/the-size-of-the-u-s-jewish-population/. 2. https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/muslim-population-by-country. 3. "About Three-in-Ten U.S. Adults Are Now Religiously Unaffiliated," Pew Research Center, Dec. 8, 2021. https://www.pewforum.org/2021/12/14/about-three-in-ten-u-s-adults-are-now-religiously-unaffiliated/pf_12-14-21_npors_0_0/. 4. "In U.S., Estimate of LGBT Population Rises to 4.5%," Gallup, May 22, 2018. https://news.gallup.com/poll/234863/estimate-lgbt-population-rises.aspx. 5. https://www.adventist.org/statistics/seventh-day-adventist-world-church-statistics-2020/. 6. https://www.pewforum.org/religious-landscape-study/, extracted Jan. 14, 2022. 7. https://www.worldatlas.com/articles/mormon-population-by-state.html. 8. Kelsey Dallas, "New Poll Finds Americans Less Likely to Keep Sabbath than in 1978, but Majority Still Say it's Important to Society," Deseret News, Apr. 27, 2016. https://www.deseret.com/2016/4/27/20587346/new-poll-finds-americans-less-likely-to-keep-sabbath-than-in-1978-but-majority-still-say-it-s-import#a-new-deseret-news-survey-about-the-sabbath-explores-how-modern-americans-approach-their-observance-of-the-holy-day.
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