There always was a US flag and the Vatican flag in my childhood Catholic church. I don’t really see the confusion – there’s a hierarchy to the Catholic church - Pope, cardinals, bishop, priest, schoolteacher nun, parents, and then, little old me. The hierarchy is to be followed, blindly, without question. How is that incompatible with patriotism? They most definitely equated duty to the nation, obiedience to your parents, and to the Church with each other when I was in parochial school. Do other religions not include such indoctrin … er… brain wa… umm… education?
The hymnal also contained patriotic songs, words and music, to sing on US holidays. I always did like the Battle Hymn of the Republic when sung in church. As I recall, the organist really liked to pound those keys for that song. She wasn’t a Marine, so far as I know, I guess it was easy, or fun to play.
As others have mentioned, most Catholic churches will have the U.S. and Vatican flags on display.
And in a lot of Hispanic parishes I’ve been in they’ll also have the flag of Mexico or whatever country most of the congregation hails from.
Our church used to include the flag in the precession, with a crucifer bearing it. It was then displayed up by the alter. That stuck me as odd. That was one of the many, many strikes I had against this church.
With the new priest, the the US flag and the Episcopal Church flag are in the corner.
American Jews, like American Catholics, have historically felt pressure to prove their American-ness, and placing the American flag on the *bimah *is one way to do that. The significance of the Israeli flag is obvious, as well.
My congregation (Reconstructionist Jewish) used to have flags on the bimah. We removed the flags a few years ago on the grounds that a religious organization ought to be completely separate from civil government and vice versa.
Because wrapping yourself and beliefs in the flag shows that you are a true American and that God is on your side; everyone that dosen’t do so isn’t a true American patriot. The pressure comes from a portion of sociaity that values these things, not an overtly organized manifest from a controlling body.
At Bible camp we had too flag poles (of equal height); one had the US flag, the other had the Christian US flag. Every morning we gathered around them to say the Pledge of Allegiance to the US flag, the Pledge of Allegiance to the Christian flag, and the last summer I went they added a Pledge of Allegiance to the Bible.
For what it’s worth, the other flag mentioned in the OP was probably the Christian flag (pretty good summary in the Wikipedia article, though the author does do some editorializing).
The Episcopal Church’s flag is simply the church’s arms (and most common symbol) displayed in flag form.
I also have experienced this in all of the churches that I have been at. Also, at the small Bible college that I attended some years ago, we had two flags in the classroom: the US flag, and the Christian flag (White, with blue square in the upper left corner, with a red cross in the middle of the blue.) We never pledged allegience, or anything, but I rather wondered if it was a sort of message to any government officials that may happen in that we weren’t any Jim Jones group, or anybody interested in overthrowing the government. The Jim Jones thing happened while I was at the college, and it made us all wary, since, allegedly, some congressperson wanted to regulate churches with a ‘different’ viewpoint.
In perspective, that is what a flag is for. Let everybody know where we stand.
Also, it never hurts for a tax-exempt institution to have a flag, IMHO.
FWIW, Canadian here, our (Protestant, “Evangelical Free Church of Canada” denomination)church has the Canadian and “Christian flag” (above) in the church, on the stage. I only seem to recall this since about 2001 (nothing to do with 9/11, that’s when we moved into our larger building).
Also, during missions week, the sanctuary (well, gym, sanctuary hasn’t been built yet) has flags from where we have missionaries.
In other churches, I’ve seen one Protestant (don’t know denomination beyond that) church, with flags from all the countries that their adherents hail from, some rather interesting ones in there (and, being the amateur vexillologist that I am, I counted how many were upside down and/or erroneous and/or outdated). I’ve also been in a Catholic church where I recall seeing the Vatican flag, but not the Canadian flag nearby, but this wasn’t in the sanctuary, but the basement auditorium.
Thanks to everyone for their anecdotes about customs of displaying the national flag inside places of worship for various religions and countries.
We still do not have any historical evidence of when, where and why this custom originated.
So I’m bumping this one time in case there are any historians out there who have an inkling…
Also if there are any more anecdotes about non-Judeo-Christian religions doing this, or it being done in non-European cultures, that would also be interesting.
At my (Catholic) church, the flag is on a pole in the back lounge area, where they sell Scrip of have drop offs for food drives, etc. They bring it out and put it on the floor before the altar for the Fourth of July and next to the casket for some funerals (mostly for servicemen, but I saw it once for a serviceman’s widow).
Certainly the Nazis made cynical use of Christianity when it suited them (while also oppressing many Christians), but I don’t see any photos in either link showing the Nazi flag actually inside a church. I don’t doubt it happened somewhere in Germany from 1933-45, though.
Our Episcopalian church has no flags permanently displayed, either inside or out. The acolytes process with the American flag on the Sunday closest to July 4th, however, and on Mission Sunday once a year, along with the flags of those countries in which our parishioners do mission work.
