Reinhold Niebuhr called him “the most original of American religious thinkers,” this self-taught, backwoods boy who eventually became known as “Father Abraham” for freeing the nation’s slaves — and leading the North in the Civil War. Feb. 12, 2009, marks the bicentennial of Abraham Lincoln’s birth (he was born the same day as Charles Darwin, who is also the subject of a ReligionLink edition) and provides an opportunity for journalists to explore Lincoln’s foundational legacy.

The time is also right for reasons beyond the bicentennial: Lincoln is a favorite subject of Barack Obama, who took the oath of office on Jan. 20 using the same Bible that Lincoln did, and whose election as the nation’s first black president in many respects completes a vital part of the work Lincoln began.

This edition of ReligionLink provides background and resources for reporters to delve into the thoughts and impact of the nation’s 16th president.

Why it’s important

Lincoln’s speeches — the Gettysburg Address and his second inaugural, for example — are virtually sacred texts in the nation’s civil religion, and Lincoln’s use of biblical imagery was powerful and deliberate.

Yet for all his impact on the national soul, Lincoln’s personal faith remains something of a mystery. Statements he made about God and religion throughout his life are sometimes contradictory, and today he is claimed as a fellow thinker by both Christians and atheists.

What were Lincoln’s real religious beliefs? He contributed to our country’s practice of our civil religion — identified by sociologist Robert Bellah as the reverence Americans have for their country’s mythology, holidays, leaders and political rituals. But how? And what values is President Obama trying to communicate that Lincoln would have recognized?

Resources

• The Abraham Lincoln Association’s AL Online is a virtual library of all things Lincoln – biographies, news, events and the 16th president’s own writings and speeches, including a collection of his statements on religion.
• The Library of Congress maintains a searchable online collection of Lincoln’s papers.
• Lincoln/Net is a project of Northern Illinois University to put all of Lincoln’s political and personal materials online. A section on historical themes includes information on the religion and culture of Lincoln’s times.
• The Abraham Lincoln Institute is an organization based in Washington, D.C., that provides free informational resources about the life and work of Lincoln. Lucas E. Morel is the vice president. Contact 540-458-8161, morel@wlu.edu.
• The Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum is in Springfield, Ill. Jennifer Tirey is deputy director. Contact 217-558-8971, jennifer.tirey@illinois.gov.
• The Lincoln Studies Center is at Knox College in Galesburg, Ill. Douglas Wilson and Rodney O. Davis are co-directors. Contact Wilson at 309-341-7173, dwilson@knox.edu, and Davis at 309-341-7158, rdavis@knox.edu.

Special events

• The Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission is the U.S. government’s official commission to honor the life of Lincoln in conjunction with the bicentennial. The site maintains a calendar marking all known Lincoln bicentennial events around the country. Harold Holzer is one of three co-chairs. Contact him at 212-570-3951.
• The Abraham Lincoln Association is based in Lincoln’s hometown of Springfield, Ill., and observes the anniversary of his birth each year with special events, including scholarly symposia. Richard E. Hart is president. Contact 866-865-8500.
• The Matthew J. Ryan Center for the Study of Free Institutions and the Public Good at Villanova University will host two days of talks titled “The Better Angels of Our Nature: The Legacy of Abraham Lincoln” on Feb. 12-13, 2009. Speakers will include Allen Guelzo. Contact 610-519-7421.
• The Lincoln Forum is a national organization of people interested in preserving the memory of Lincoln’s life and work and the Civil War Era. The forum is a co-sponsor of the Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Symposium to be held in April in Boston. Harold Holzer is vice chairman. Contact 212-570-3951.
• “With Malice Toward None: The Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Exhibit” will open at the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C., on Feb 12, 2009, and travel through mid-2011. Stops include Sacramento, Calif.; Chicago; Indianapolis, Ind.; Atlanta; and Omaha, Neb. Contact Matt Raymond, 202-707-0020.
• The Lincoln Group of New York is a historical society dedicated to the life and times of Lincoln. The society hosts Lincoln-related events four times a year. Joseph Garrera is president. Contact 973-383-9304.

Other resources

• Read a June 2006 ReligionLink edition, “Divining intentions: What did America’s founders really mean?”
• A January 2009 ReligionLink edition, “‘So help me God’: The piety and politics of the presidential inauguration,” also has useful information on presidents and civil religion.
• See a Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life resource page on “Religion and the Presidency” that shows the religious affiliation of all 44 presidents. As the authors note: “Only three U.S. presidents — Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln and Andrew Johnson — have been unaffiliated with a specific religious tradition.”
• Surveys of both scholars and the general population consistently rank Lincoln as the first or second most popular and effective president. See a Wikipedia roundup of some of the major polls of presidents in the last half-century. As with any open-source resource like Wikipedia, journalists should verify citations.   
• Read a Jan. 28, 2009, Religion News Service story, “200 years later, Lincoln’s faith remains an enigma.”
• Read a Jan. 28, 2009, Religion News Service interview with Robert Bellah, the sociologist of religion who wrote a famous 1967 essay, “Civil Religion in America.”
• Read Richard Wightman Fox’s Jan. 18, 2006, article that appeared on Slate.com about Lincoln’s faith and the culture wars.
• Read an excerpt of Mark Noll’s book A History of Christianity in the United States and Canada. The section is titled “The Ambiguous Religion of President Abraham Lincoln” and is reprinted on the Web site Adherents.com.
• Read an article by Mark Noll that appeared in a winter 1992 issue of Christian History magazine about religion and the Civil War. The article is reprinted on the Web site of Christianity Today magazine.

National sources

• Gabor Boritt is a professor of Civil War studies and director of the Civil War Institute at Gettysburg College in Gettysburg, Pa. He is the author of The Gettysburg Gospel: The Lincoln Speech That Nobody Knows. Contact 717-337-6594, gboritt@gettysburg.edu.
• Michael Burlingame is a history professor emeritus at Connecticut College in New London. He wrote the 1995 book The Inner World of Abraham Lincoln and the 2008 book Abraham Lincoln: A Life. Contact Burlingame@snet.net.
• Rodney Davis is co-director of the Lincoln Studies Center at Knox College in Galesburg, Ill. Contact 309-341-7158, rdavis@knox.edu.
• David Herbert Donald is professor emeritus of American history and American civilization at Harvard University and a Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer. His 1995 book Lincoln examined the president’s secularism and its relation to the broader public’s religious outlook at the time. Donald served as a historical consultant for the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Museum. Contact via the Harvard University press publicity office, hup_publicity@calists.harvard.edu.
• Eric Foner is a history professor at Columbia University in New York City and author of A House Divided: America in the Age of Lincoln. Contact 212-854-5253, ef17@columbia.edu.
• Doris Kearns Goodwin is one of America’s most popular historians and the best-selling author of Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln. Contact via her agent, Theresa Brown, at the Washington Speakers Bureau, 703-684-0555 ext. 1027.
• David Grubin is producer and director of the PBS television special Abraham and Mary Lincoln: A House Divided, which aired as part of American Experience and included discussions of Lincoln’s faith. Contact info@grubin.com.
• Allen Guelzo wrote Abraham Lincoln: Redeemer President, a 1999 book that challenged the reigning thought about Lincoln’s faith – basically, that he had little, if any. Contact 717-337-6569, aguelzo@gettysburg.edu.
• Harold Holzer is co-chairman of the Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission and a member of its speakers bureau. Among the lectures he offers is “Lincoln and the Jews.” He has written several books on Lincoln. Contact 212-570-3951.
• Gordon Leidner is a Lincoln scholar and former president of the Lincoln Group of the District of Columbia. He maintains the Web site Great American History, on which he has written about Lincoln’s religious faith. He says Lincoln’s legacy in American civil religion is that he never doubted the existence and sovereignty of God or that God had a purpose for America – and that it was our duty to determine what that will was and follow it. Leidner is in Annapolis, Md. Contact gordonleidner@yahoo.com.
• Martin E. Marty is a professor at the University of Chicago, where he has taught American religious history in its divinity school and history department. He is a winner of the National Book Award and the National Humanities Medal. He has frequently lectured on Lincoln and religious themes and is scheduled to give a lecture titled “Abraham Lincoln as Theologian of America’s Public Religion” as part of the Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission’s celebration. Contact memarty@aol.com.
• Lucas Morel is an associate professor of politics at Washington and Lee University in Lexington, Va. He is the author of Lincoln’s Sacred Effort: Defining Religion’s Role in American Self-Government. Contact 540-458-8161, morel@wlu.edu.
• Mark Noll is a history professor at the University of Notre Dame in Notre Dame, Ind. He is an expert on American Christianity and is the author of America’s God: From Jonathan Edwards to Abraham Lincoln. In 2006, he gave a lecture at the University of Illinois at Springfield titled “Lincoln, Providence and the Bible.” Contact 574-631-7574, mnoll@nd.edu.
• Ronald D. Rietveld is professor of history emeritus at California State University at Fullerton. He has written extensively on Lincoln, the antebellum period, the Civil War and Reconstruction, and the history of religion in America. He was a historical consultant for the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Museum and is known as the only person who found a photo of Lincoln taken in death. As a part of the Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission’s celebration, he will offer lectures on Lincoln’s faith and his search for God. Contact 714-278-3862.
• Joshua Wolf Shenk is the author of 2005’s Lincoln’s Melancholy: How Depression Challenged a President and Fueled His Greatness and can discuss the 16th president’s possible depression and how it may have fed his spirituality. He lives in Brooklyn, N.Y. Contact 718-243-9484.
• Ronald C. White Jr. is the author of two best-selling books on Lincoln, Lincoln’s Greatest Speech and The Eloquent President. White’s newest, A. Lincoln: A Biography, has been published to coincide with the bicentennial. In 2006, White gave a sermon at the National Presbyterian Church in Washington, D.C., titled “Abraham Lincoln’s Sermon on the Mount.” Contact ron.white@mindspring.com.
• Douglas Wilson is a co-director of the Lincoln Studies Center at Knox College in Galesburg, Ill. Contact 309-341-7173, dwilson@knox.edu.
• Gary Zola is an associate professor of the American Jewish experience at Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion in Cincinnati. As part of the Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission’s celebration, Zola offers a lecture on Lincoln and the Jews that examines how he helped expand their civil rights. Contact 513-221-1875 ext. 3303.

Regional sources

IN THE NORTHEAST

• Michael Chesson is a history professor at the University of Massachusetts in Boston. He is the author of numerous books on the Civil War era and wrote an afterword for The Intimate World of Abraham Lincoln by C.A. Tripp. Contact 617-287-6887, michael.chesson@umb.edu.
• Mike Kiernan is an actor who portrays Lincoln in a one-person show titled Lincoln. Kiernan lives in Sharon, Mass. Contact 781-784-5666.
• Marshall Linden is an ordained minister of the United Church of Christ in the Connecticut Conference. He has given a sermon titled “Learning Spirituality From Abraham Lincoln.” He says Lincoln made many contributions to our civil religion, and traces his spiritual journey from young skeptic to mature seeker. Contact 203-755-4236, melinden@att.net.

IN THE EAST

• The Lincoln Group of the District of Columbia is a historical society dedicated to the study of Lincoln. Edgar F. Russell III is president. Contact edgar_f_russell_iii@hotmail.com.
• Julie Roy Jeffrey is a history professor at Goucher College in Baltimore. She has written about the religious landscape of the mid-19th century in relation to Lincoln’s presidency. Contact 410-337-6253, jjeffrey@goucher.edu.
• Robert Kraynak is a political science professor at Colgate University in Hamilton, N.Y. He is the author of Christian Faith and Modern Democracy: God and Politics in the Fallen World, which examines America’s civil religion and its government. Contact 315-228-7525, rkraynak@mail.colgate.edu.
• Jon Pahl is a professor of the history of Christianity in North America at the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia. Contact jpahl@ltsp.edu.

IN THE SOUTHEAST

• Allen McSween Jr. is senior pastor of the Fourth Presbyterian Church in Greenville, S.C. He has given two sermons on the subject of the 16th president and religion, including one titled “Abraham Lincoln: The Politics of Grace.” He says Lincoln was able to interpret the events of his day in light of the great biblical themes of God’s judgment and mercy without falling into arrogance or self-righteousness. Similarly, he did not demonize those who disagreed with him. McSween can forward any interested reporter PDF files of these sermons. Contact 864-232-8123, allenmcsween@4thpres-grvl.com.
• William Lee Miller is author of 2002’s Lincoln’s Virtues: An Ethical Biography. He is a scholar at the Miller Center of Public Affairs at the University of Virginia. Contact 434-924-7383, wlm5w@virginia.edu.

IN THE SOUTH

• James Byrd is an assistant professor of American religious history at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tenn., where he has taught a class in religion and war in American history. Contact james.p.byrd@vanderbilt.edu.
• Charles Hubbard is director of the Abraham Lincoln Library and Museum at Lincoln Memorial University in Harrogate, Tenn. Contact 423-869-6354.
• Richard Latner is a history professor at Tulane University in New Orleans. He specializes in the history of the Civil War. Contact 504-862-8606, latner@tulane.edu.
• Chuck Queen is senior pastor of Immanuel Baptist Church in Frankfort, Ky. In 2008, he gave a sermon about the Christian directive to love one’s enemies, in which he used Lincoln’s choice of his Cabinet as a major example. Contact 502-223-7601, cqueen@fewpb.com.
• John Turner teaches American history at the University of South Alabama in Mobile. He specializes in 19th-century American civil religion. Contact 251-460-7373, jturner@jaguar1.usouthal.edu

IN THE MIDWEST

• Robert Bray is a professor of English literature at Illinois Wesleyan University and the author of Peter Cartwright: Legendary Frontier Preacher. Cartwright was a contemporary of Lincoln’s and opposed him in the race for the U.S. House of Representatives in 1846, a race in which he used Lincoln’s supposed lack of religion against him. Contact 309-556-3247, bbray@iwu.edu.
• Brooks Davis is an instructor in American history at Northwestern University in Evanston, Ill. He is a part of the speakers pool for the Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission and can discuss Lincoln as a man of faith. Contact 312-654-0614.
• Mel Maurer is a Lincoln scholar and past president of the Cleveland Civil War Roundtable, for which he frequently speaks about Lincoln at Gettysburg. Maurer lives in Westlake, Ohio. Contact MelMaurer@aol.com.
• Walter Reed is director of Iowa Lincoln 200, a nonprofit that will organize the Buckeye State’s multiple celebrations of Lincoln’s bicentennial. Contact 515-242-5655, walter.reed@iowa.gov.
• Jennifer Weber is an assistant professor of history at the University of Kansas in Lawrence, where she specializes in the Civil War. She is part of the Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission’s speakers bureau and offers a lecture titled “Lincoln and Religion.” Contact 785-864-3569, jlweber@ku.edu.
• Stewart Winger is an assistant professor of history at Illinois State University in Normal. His dissertation, written under Martin Marty at the University of Chicago, was titled Lincoln’s Religious Rhetoric: American Romanticism and the Antislavery Impulse. It was published as the 2003 book Lincoln, Religion and Romantic Cultural Politics. Contact 309-438-2348, swinger@ilstu.edu.

IN THE SOUTHWEST

• Richard E. Wentz is a professor of religious studies at Arizona State University in Tempe. He specializes in 19th-century American religious history, including American civil religion. Contact 480-965-4689.
• Joe Wheeler is the author of 2008’s Abraham Lincoln: A Man of Faith and Courage and a general editor for Focus on the Family. He lives in Conifer, Colo. Contact via his agent, Greg Johnson, at 303-471-6675, greg@wordserveliterary.com.

IN THE WEST/NORTHWEST

• Richard E. Wentz is a professor of religious studies at Arizona State University in Tempe. He specializes in 19th-century American religious history, including American civil religion. Contact 480-965-4689.
• Joe Wheeler is the author of 2008’s Abraham Lincoln: A Man of Faith and Courage and a general editor for Focus on the Family. He lives in Conifer, Colo. Contact via his agent, Greg Johnson, at 303-471-6675, greg@wordserveliterary.com.