The Influence of Religion on the Colonization of North America

Factors Contributing to the Colonization of North America

There are varied factors which contributed to the colonization of North America including, economic, social and religious factors. Many people believe that Christianity had a little contribution in the conquest of North America. For a better understanding of how North America currently balances national laws, freedom of worship and local community practices, its significantly essential to understand the experiences the country went through between 1600 and 1700 during the colonial culture (Sperry, 2014).

Enforced Rules and Conflicts

Some of the colonists enforced strict rules which offended most of North America citizens in many ways. The laws forced every citizen to attend to a particular religion and pay a specific amount of money as tax. Such rules denied the people their rights and in some cases caused conflict and war between the different Christian bodies (Rudolph, 2018).

Key Colonists and their Religious Backgrounds

Different colonists took part in North America colonization, but four key ones had different religious backgrounds and various reasons for the conquest. France and Spain were some of the leading colonists, but for them, they had the same motive for conquest. Both France and Spain missionaries colonized North America with the core intention of converting all Indians to Christians (Cipriani, 2017). There were other colonists from England; the Puritans who were escaping the experiences they were going through in England. For them, they settled in New England and created their religion based on their faith.

Tolerance and Diversity in Dutch Colonization

The other significant group was the Dutch from the Netherlands who were Christians. With the Dutch, they were very tolerant in their religion, and that was the unique character for the community (Cipriani, 2017). In New York, Amsterdam town, there were Jews Christians, Catholics, and Protestants and later people from different denominations occupied the City. All those different religions contributed differently in the colonization of North America.

References

Cipriani, R. (2017). Religion and Values. In Diffused Religion (pp. 165-194). Palgrave            Macmillan, Cham.

Rudolph, S. H. (2018). Introduction: Religion, states, and transnational civil society. In            Transnational religion and fading states (pp. 1-24). Routledge.

Sperry, W. L. (2014). Religion in America (Vol. 1). Cambridge University Press.