Charles C. Haynes: Surprising support for separating church from state

  It’s been a good month for the much-maligned, often misunderstood principle of church-state separation.

  A whopping 67% of the American people agree that the First Amendment “requires a clear separation of church and state,” according to the 2011 State of the First Amendment survey released July 12 by the First Amendment Center.

  This is somewhat surprising given the decades-old culture-war fight over the meaning and scope of separation.

  For decades now, Christian-nation advocates have tried to convince Americans that “separation of church and state isn’t in the First Amendment.” They have peddled a revisionist account of a “Christian America” that should (at best) tolerate other faiths to reside here.