President George W. Bush's religious beliefs and their influence on his presidency were evident again in his recent visit to Britain and are to the forefront as he battles to row back legislation on late-term abortion, writes Paul Anderson
A born-again Christian, Bush is identified with the Christian right, which is principally associated with immoderate and evangelical forms of Protestantism, though some Catholics and even Jews make common cause with this sector of US opinion.
These people's beliefs are founded in pre-millenarianism - a doctrine which suggests certain events, usually of a global nature, are evidence of God's pre-determined plan to bring about the second coming of Christ.
The doctrine has in recent times been spread, principally in the US, by the likes of Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell and in more moderate form by institutions such as the National Prayer Breakfast - which Mr Bush endorses. But it first began to take hold in late-19th-century America due in large part to the obsessive efforts of a Co Wicklow deacon.
John Nelson Darby was born into a wealthy family in London in 1800. He moved to Dublin as a youth, by which time evidence of his scholarly intensity had emerged. He entered Trinity College, studying law at the age of 15, graduated at 19 and by 22 had been called to the bar. Dissatisfied by the profession and the vacuity of polite society in Dublin, he entered the ministry and took his first position in Co Wicklow in 1826.
He lived an ascetic life, applying his considerable energy and intellect to his ministry. Despite his growing fundamentalism, reflected in his stern sermons, his compassion at an individual level made him popular throughout the county. By day, he covered the glens on horseback, tending his flock and spreading his message. He claimed to be gaining converts at a rate of 600 to 800 per week. (Wicklow to this day has, per capita, the highest Protestant population in the 26 counties.) When the day was done, Darby would work long into the night on what, by his death at the age of 81, became an enormous body of work that would stretch to 53 volumes, including several reference Bibles.
Distressed by growing liberalism within the Anglican church, Darby took the opportunity to develop his theories after a fall from a horse forced him into a lengthy period of convalescence. He undertook a rigorous reading of the Bible and became involved with a study group of like-minded people which first began meeting at the Dublin home of the Archdeacon of Killala's son, Francis Hutchinson, and later in Fitzwilliam Square, in the winter of 1827.
By 1830, Darby had decamped to Britain, taking up with other hard-line thinkers - many of whom he would later fall out with. Over the next 15 years the group's number swelled to well over a thousand and Darby had become the spiritual figurehead. He returned to Ireland regularly and between 1831 and 1833 organised a series of conferences in Powerscourt House in Enniskerry, Co Wicklow. There, a clear theology began to emerge which was to become known as Dispensationalism.
Throughout this period, assemblies had formed in cities such as London, Oxford and Bristol, but the group found a spiritual home - and a name - on the British south coast. Darby preferred the simple name Brethren but to most people, particularly Americans, the Co Wicklow deacon was to become the intellectual driving force of the Plymouth Brethren.
Despite his patience with his flock, Darby's ferocious contempt for intellectuals who disagreed with his teachings led him into regular conflict. One of his contemporaries is said to have described him as writing "with a pen in one hand and a thunderbolt in the other". Having regularly attracted the ire of Anglican authorities (including Archbishop William Magee), Darby left the Church in 1834. But even among fellow Brethren, Darby's conviction was such that rows were so common that a split developed.
Undeterred, Darby's evangelical zeal led him to embark on several tours of Europe preaching his word in Germany and Switzerland among other countries. But it was his tours of the United States and Canada that were to have the most profound influence on history.
Basing much of his pre-millennial theories on the Book of Daniel and Revelations, Darby believed that, despite the Jews' rejection of Jesus, they had a dispensation from God separate from Christians. Prophetically, he believed the countdown to the second coming could only begin when the Jews had returned to their homeland. At this point, the millennium clock would start ticking and signs indicating the great tribulation ahead would be revealed. Again prophetically, Darby also said a sign that God's plan was in operation would come through the rebuilding of the Temple on the Mount.
These and many other propositions were picked up by a variety of evangelical zealots in the US, but one in particular, Cyrus I. Scofield, published a reference Bible in 1909 that today is a primary reference for the Christian right. Coincidentally, like President Bush, Scofield was not a Texan but is strongly associated with the state and was an alcoholic who was born again.
Bush saw the light with the help of the celebrity evangelist, Billy Graham in 1985. By 2000 his political career began to take off, as did the coverage of his religious utterings. He would describe his political mission as "doing his master's will", and would say the greatest support he could receive was for people to pray for him.
Bush's apparent moral absolutism, his evident belief that the Christian way is under attack from both outside forces and liberals, and his sense of Israel's special place in the Christian tradition are all characteristic of the Christian right. They are also all characteristic of John Nelson Darby.
The journalist and historian Michael Lind says in his book Made in Texas: George W. Bush and the Southern Takeover of American Politics that Bush is greatly influenced by the teachings of Darby - but probably doesn't know it.