During the 18th and 19th centuries, it was the Christian worldview that dominated every cultural institution - every aspect of culture in America was influenced by Christianity and largely led by Christians due in large part to the educational systems of their day, which were profoundly Christian in their worldview. Every university established within the first century of American independence was done so by the various Protestant denominations or the Catholic Church. The Congregational Church founded Yale in 1701 and Harvard as far back as 1636. The Baptists founded Colgate, George Washington University and Wake Forest, to name a few. This commitment to intellectualism, scholarship, and academia was a fundamental part of the Church and central to the religious culture. The fact is, "in the 18th and 19th centuries, religious thought and institutions in America were dominated by an austere, learned, and intellectual form of discourse that is largely absent from religious life today." Simply contrast the theological arguments and representation of the Christian faith by men such as Jonathan Edwards with some of the more prominent television evangelists and preachers today.

In New England in the 17th century, the literacy rate was between 89 and 95 percent, while in England it was only 40 percent. Laws were passed in almost every town requiring the maintenance of a reading and writing school which was almost always operated by the local church. "In all such laws, reference was made to Satan, whose evil designs, it was supposed could be thwarted at every turn by education." This commitment to education in colonial America was driven largely by the Church, being regarded as one of its principal ministries.

This was not an unintentional act by a culture that happened to be religious. This generation of believers understood and fulfilled their biblical mandate to exercise dominion and they did so with determined effort. They understood that Christians had a duty in a literate world to be among the intellectual elite and that by being educated they would shape the culture. However, when we as Christians cease to integrate this commitment to communicate and advance the biblical perspective in an intelligent, reasonable and persuasive way relative to every area of life and culture, we inevitably surrender dominion. This is exactly what has taken place over the last century in America.