The Religious Right Is Un-American

[Hardrock69]

The idea of America as a Christian nation was anathema to the Founding Fathers, as it should be to all Americans.


Many people associated with the Religious Right in America would have us believe that the United States was founded as a Christian nation. They foster this lie because they want to force their narrow-minded religious beliefs down our throats. They would like us to envision that Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, and James Madison are standing with them shoulder to shoulder when they spout their distorted views on abortion, contraception, gay marriage, school prayer, evolution, etc. But to assert that the U.S. is a Christian nation is clearly un-American, if we define "American" as holding dear the precepts and values handed down to us in the Constitution by the Founding Fathers. The framers of the Constitution had no intention of defining our country as Christian. On the contrary, they were deeply concerned about preventing any kind of religious tyranny.

On the Christian Coalition of America's website banner, the group proclaims that it is "America's leading grassroots organization defending our godly heritage." This statement begs the question, "Is our heritage a godly one?" The answer is a resounding "No." The United States of America was founded as a secular nation with a firm "wall of separation" between church and state. The Founding Fathers were against establishing a national religion because they were keenly aware of the results of such tyranny throughout history. This caution did not prevent them, however, from giving all American citizens the right to privately practice freedom of religion, even the freedom to have no religion at all. Everyone had the right to go to church, but the pew and the pulpit were not fit places for partisan politics, and vice versa.

James Madison, the Father of the Constitution, once wrote, "Ecclesiastical establishments tend to great ignorance and all of which facilitates the execution of mischievous projects. Religious bondage shackles and debilitates the mind and unfits it for every noble enterprise, every expanded project." Those are strong words that could justifiably be leveled at the Religious Right today.

Have you read the Constitution lately? The words "God," "Christ," "Christian," and "Jesus" do not appear even once. The word "religious" appears but a single time, in Article VI:

No religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States.

The word "religion" can be found only in the First Amendment:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.

When we see the words "religious" and "religion" in the Constitution, it is in the context of a warning against the use of religious pressure as a weapon of tyranny.

Thomas Jefferson, a leading voice behind including the Bill of Rights as an addendum to the Constitution, was adamant about building a "wall of separation" between church and state. In an 1802 letter to the Danbury Baptist Association, Jefferson wrote:

Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between man and his god, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legitimate powers of government reach actions only, and not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, thus building a wall of separation between church and state.

When Jefferson wrote the following words that are carved on his memorial in Washington, D.C., he was specifically referring to the tyranny of state-sponsored religion:

No man shall be compelled to frequent or support any religious worship or ministry or shall otherwise suffer on account of his religious opinions or belief, but all men shall be free to profess and by argument to maintain, their opinions in matters of religion.

In their book The Godless Constitution, Isaac Kramnick and R. Laurence Moore robustly point out Jefferson's attitudes toward religious tyranny. I think it will be clear that what Jefferson said about priests is applicable today to those of the Religious Right who proselytize that the only real American is a “Christian” American.

How shocking Jefferson's vitriolic attacks on ministers of God, especially those who meddled in politics, seem to late-twentieth-century sensibility. Christ saw no need for priests, Jefferson wrote. They were not necessary "for the salvation of souls." He suggested to John Adams, his friend after they had left politics, that "we should all, then, like the Quakers, live without an order of priests," and "moralize for ourselves, following the oracle of conscience." The … irritable tribe of priests had subverted the pure morality of primitive Christianity to serve their own selfish interests, according to Jefferson. They "perverted" Christianity "into an engine for enslaving mankind, a mere contrivance to filtch wealth and power to themselves." On another occasion he labeled this as the priestly quest for "pence and power," which "revolts those who think for themselves." The clergy stood condemned, along with monarchy and the nobility, as the people's enemies. Like kings and aristocrats "in every country and in every age," Jefferson wrote, "the priest has been hostile to liberty. He is always in alliance with the despot, abetting his abuses in return for protection to his own."

One can argue, of course, and use hundreds of quotations for support, that the Founding Fathers often thought and wrote about God and religion. But whether or not Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, and James Madison believed in a Christian God is not the issue. The important thing is that these Founders wanted to keep religion out of politics for the good of religion. They saw religion as a moral and ethical guide for the individual, not the state. Moral men should establish the state; the state should not dictate morality to men. That's why the Founders were so adamant about personal freedom of religion, no matter what that religion was. They indeed went even further and defended everyone's right to full freedom of thought, even atheistic thought. Jefferson wrote:

Because religious belief, or non-belief, is such an important part of every person's life, freedom of religion affects every individual. State churches that use government power to support themselves and force their views on persons of other faiths undermine all our civil rights.

The Founders also believed that if religion were a part of politics, religion would lose its value as a moral force. After all, politics is a rat's nest of deceit, backstabbing, and manipulation. Why soil religious thought by embroiling it in politics? Religious principles, the Founders held, were an antidote of sorts to the detrimental chimeras and that try to crawl their way into the political mind. This is Jefferson again:

State support of the church tends to make the clergy unresponsive to the people and leads to corruption within religion. Erecting the "wall of separation between church and state," therefore, is absolutely essential in a free society.

The idea of establishing a Christian nation was anathema to the Founding Fathers, as it should be to all thinking people. Jefferson wrote, "I am for freedom of religion, and against all maneuvers to bring about a legal ascendancy of one sect over another." So do not believe those proselytizers on the Religious Right who claim that they are true Americans, and that they uphold the true ideals of our Founding Fathers, when they make the specious claim that America is a Christian nation. They are spouting un-American nonsense.

http://interventionmag.com/cms/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1292

[BigBadBrian]

“The Founding Fathers & Deism”

I notice that your newspaper has an ongoing debate concerning the religious nature of the Founding Fathers. A recent letter claimed that most of the Founding Fathers were deists, and pointed to Washington, Jefferson, Franklin, Paine, Hamilton, and Madison as proof. After making this charge, the writer acknowledged the “voluminous writings”" of the Founders, but it appears that she has not read those writings herself. However, this is no surprise since the U. S. Department of Education claims that only 5 percent of high schools graduates know how to examine primary source documentation.

Interestingly, the claims in this recent letter to the editor are characteristic of similar claims appearing in hundreds of letters to the editor across the nation. The standard assertion is that the Founders were deists. Deists? What is a deist? In dictionaries like Websters, Funk & Wagnalls, Century, and others, the terms “deist,” “agnostic,” and “atheist” appear as synonyms. Therefore, the range of a deist spans from those who believe there is no God, to those who believe in a distant, impersonal creator of the universe, to those who believe there is no way to know if God exists. Do the Founders fit any of these definitions?

None of the notable Founders fit this description. Thomas Paine, in his discourse on “The Study of God,” forcefully asserts that it is “the error of schools” to teach sciences without “reference to the Being who is author of them: for all the principles of science are of Divine origin.” He laments that “the evil that has resulted from the error of the schools in teaching [science without God] has been that of generating in the pupils a species of atheism.” Paine not only believed in God, he believed in a reality beyond the visible world.

In Benjamin Franklin's 1749 plan of education for public schools in Pennsylvania, he insisted that schools teach “the necessity of a public religion . . . and the excellency of the Christian religion above all others, ancient or modern.” Consider also the fact that Franklin proposed a Biblical inscription for the Seal of the United States; that he chose a New Testament verse for the motto of the Philadelphia Hospital; that he was one of the chief voices behind the establishment of a paid chaplain in Congress; and that when in 1787 when Franklin helped found the college which bore his name, it was dedicated as “a nursery of religion and learning” built “on Christ, the Corner-Stone.” Franklin certainly doesn't fit the definition of a deist.

Nor does George Washington. He was an open promoter of Christianity. For example, in his speech on May 12, 1779, he claimed that what children needed to learn “above all” was the “religion of Jesus Christ,” and that to learn this would make them “greater and happier than they already are”; on May 2, 1778, he charged his soldiers at Valley Forge that “To the distinguished character of patriot, it should be our highest glory to add the more distinguished character of Christian”; and when he resigned his commission as commander-in-chief of the military on June 8, 1783, he reminded the nation that “without a humble imitation” of “the Divine Author of our blessed religion” we “can never hope to be a happy nation.” Washington's own adopted daughter declared of Washington that you might as well question his patriotism as to question his Christianity.

Alexander Hamilton was certainly no deist. For example, Hamilton began work with the Rev. James Bayard to form the Christian Constitutional Society to help spread over the world the two things which Hamilton said made America great: (1) Christianity, and (2) a Constitution formed under Christianity. Only Hamilton's death two months later thwarted his plan of starting a missionary society to promote Christian government. And at the time he did face his death in his duel with Aaron Burr, Hamilton met and prayed with the Rev. Mason and Bishop Moore, wherein he reaffirmed to him his readiness to face God should he die, having declared to them “a lively faith in God's mercy through Christ, with a thankful remembrance of the death of Christ.” At that time, he also partook of Holy Communion with Bishop Moore.

The reader, as do many others, claimed that Jefferson omitted all miraculous events of Jesus from his “Bible.” Rarely do those who make this claim let Jefferson speak for himself. Jefferson's own words explain that his intent for that book was not for it to be a “Bible,” but rather for it to be a primer for the Indians on the teachings of Christ (which is why Jefferson titled that work, “The Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth”). What Jefferson did was to take the “red letter” portions of the New Testament and publish these teachings in order to introduce the Indians to Christian morality. And as President of the United States, Jefferson signed a treaty with the Kaskaskia tribe wherein he provided—at the government's expense—Christian missionaries to the Indians. In fact, Jefferson himself declared, “I am a real Christian, that is to say, a disciple of the doctrines of Jesus.” While many might question this claim, the fact remains that Jefferson called himself a Christian, not a deist.

James Madison trained for ministry with the Rev. Dr. John Witherspoon, and Madison's writings are replete with declarations of his faith in God and in Christ. In fact, for proof of this, one only need read his letter to Attorney General Bradford wherein Madison laments that public officials are not bold enough about their Christian faith in public and that public officials should be “fervent advocates in the cause of Christ.” And while Madison did allude to a “wall of separation,” contemporary writers frequently refuse to allow Madison to provide his own definition of that “wall.” According to Madison, the purpose of that “wall” was only to prevent Congress from passing a national law to establish a national religion.

None of the Founders mentioned fit the definition of a deist. And as is typical with those who make this claim, they name only a handful of Founders and then generalize the rest. This in itself is a mistake, for there are over two hundred Founders (fifty-five at the Constitutional Convention, ninety who framed the First Amendment and the Bill of Rights, and fifty-six who signed the Declaration) and any generalization of the Founders as deists is completely inaccurate.

The reason that such critics never mention any other Founders is evident. For example, consider what must be explained away if the following signers of the Constitution were to be mentioned: Charles Pinckney and John Langdon—founders of the American Bible Society; James McHenry—founder of the Baltimore Bible Society; Rufus King—helped found a Bible society for Anglicans; Abraham Baldwin—a chaplain in the Revolution and considered the youngest theologian in America; Roger Sherman, William Samuel Johnson, John Dickinson, and Jacob Broom—also theological writers; James Wilson and William Patterson—placed on the Supreme Court by President George Washington, they had prayer over juries in the U. S. Supreme Court room; and the list could go on. And this does not even include the huge number of thoroughly evangelical Christians who signed the Declaration or who helped frame the Bill of Rights.

Any portrayal of any handful of Founders as deists is inaccurate. (If this group had really wanted some irreligious Founders, they should have chosen Henry Dearborne, Charles Lee, or Ethan Allen). Perhaps critics should spend more time reading the writings of the Founders to discover their religious beliefs for themselves rather than making such sweeping accusations which are so easily disproven.

(For more on this topic see: Thomas Paine Criticizes the Current Public School Science Curriculum, Franklin’s Appeal for Prayer at the Constitutional Convention, Was George Washington a Christian?, The Founders on Public Religious Expression, & James Madison and Religion in Public)



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“Thomas Jefferson & the 'wall of separation between church and state.'”

In a recent letter on religion, the writer put supporters of public religious expression on one side and Thomas Jefferson on the other. This is logical given what most know about Jefferson's “wall of separation between church and state.”

Jefferson penned that phrase to reassure the Danbury (CT) Baptist Association that because of separation of church and state, the government would never interfere with their public religious expressions. For the next 150 years, federal courts followed Jefferson's intent and attached his separation metaphor to the Free Expression Clause of the First Amendment, thus consistently upholding public religious expressions. However, in 1947, the Supreme Court reversed itself and began applying the phrase to the Establishment Clause instead, thus causing federal courts to remove rather than preserve public religious expressions.

The proof is abundant that this was not Jefferson's intent. For example, two days after Jefferson wrote his separation letter, he attended worship services in the U. S. Capitol where he heard the Rev. John Leland preach a sermon. (As President of the Senate, Jefferson had personally approved the use of the Capitol Building for Sunday worship services.) The many diaries of Members of Congress during that time confirm that during Jefferson's eight years, he faithfully attended church services in the Capitol. In fact, he even ordered the Marine Band to play the worship services there. Jefferson also authorized weekly worship services at the War Department and the Treasury Building.

And on December 23, 1803, Jefferson's administration negotiated - and the Senate ratified - a treaty with the Kaskaskia Indians that stated “the United States will give annually for seven years one hundred dollars for the support of a priest” to minister to the Indians (i.e., federal funds for Christian evangelism!) Jefferson also signed presidential documents, closing them with the appellation, “In the Year of our Lord Christ.” There are many similar surprising facts about Jefferson that are fully documented historically, but that have been ignored for the past 50 years.

So would religious conservatives and Thomas Jefferson really be on opposite sides of the church/state issue? Probably, for I doubt that conservatives would agree with using federal dollars for evangelization.

Link

[BigBadBrian]

A Few Letters from Thomas Jefferson to various individuals.

To Dr. Benjamin Rush
Monticello, Sep. 23, 1800
1800092
I promised you a letter on Christianity, which I have not forgotten. On the contrary, it is because I have reflected on it, that I find much more time necessary for it than I can at present dispose of. I have a view of the subject which ought to displease neither the rational Christian nor Deists, and would reconcile many to a character they have too hastily rejected. do not know that it would reconcile the genus irritabile vatum who are all in arms against me. Their hostility is on too interesting ground to be softened. The delusion into which the X. Y. Z. plot shewed it possible to push the people; the successful experiment made under the prevalence of that delusion on the clause of the constitution, which, while it secured the freedom of the press, covered also the freedom of religion, had given to the clergy a very favorite hope of obtaining an establishment of a particular form of Christianity thro' the U. S.; and as every sect believes its own form the true one, every one perhaps hoped for his own, but especially the Episcopalians & Congregationalists. The returning good sense of our country threatens abortion to their hopes, & they believe that any portion of power confided to me, will be exerted in opposition to their schemes. And they believe rightly; for I have sworn upon the altar of god, eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man. But this is all they have to fear from me: & enough too in their opinion, & this is the cause of their printing lying pamphlets against me, forging conversations for me with Mazzei, Bishop Madison, &c., which are absolute falsehoods without a circumstance of truth to rest on; falsehoods, too, of which I acquit Mazzei & Bishop Madison, for they are men of truth.

WISDOM AND PATRIOTISM
To Moses Robinson
Washington, March 23, 1801
1801032
DEAR SIR, -- I have to acknowledge the receipt of your favor of the 3rd instant, and to thank you for the friendly expressions it contains. I entertain real hope that the whole body of your fellow citizens (many of whom had been carried away by the X. Y. Z. business) will shortly be consolidated in the same sentiments. When they examine the real principles of both parties, I think they will find little to differ about. I know, indeed, that there are some of their leaders who have so committed themselves, that pride, if no other passion, will prevent their coalescing. We must be easy with them. The eastern States will be the last to come over, on account of the dominion of the clergy, who had got a smell of union between Church and State, and began to indulge reveries which can never be realised in the present state of science. If, indeed, they could have prevailed on us to view all advances in science as dangerous innovations, and to look back to the opinions and practices of our forefathers, instead of looking forward, for improvement, a promising groundwork would have been laid. But am in hopes their good sense will dictate to them, that since the mountain will not come to them, they had better go to the mountain: that they will find their interest in acquiescing in the liberty and science of their country, and that the Christian religion, when divested of the rags in which they have enveloped it, and brought to the original purity and simplicity of its benevolent institutor, is a religion of all others most friendly to liberty, science, and the freest expansion of the human mind.





"NEVER AN INFIDEL, IF NEVER A PRIEST"
To Mrs. Samuel H. Smith
Monticello, August 6, 1816
1816080
I have received, dear Madam, your very friendly letter of July 21st, and assure you that I feel with deep sensibility its kind expressions towards myself, and the more as from a person than whom no others could be more in sympathy with my own affections. I often call to mind the occasions of knowing your worth, which the societies of Washington furnished; and none more than those derived from your much valued visit to Monticello. recognize the same motives of goodness in the solicitude you express on the rumor supposed to proceed from a letter of mine to Charles Thomson, on the subject of the Christian religion. It is true that, in writing to the translator of the Bible and Testament, that subject was mentioned; but equally so that no adherence to any particular mode of Christianity was there expressed, nor any change of opinions suggested. A change from what? the priests indeed have heretofore thought proper to ascribe to me religious, or rather anti-religious sentiments, of their own fabric, but such as soothed their resentments against the act of Virginia for establishing religious freedom. They wished him to be thought atheist, deist, or devil, who could advocate freedom from their religious dictations. But I have ever thought religion a concern purely between our God and our consciences, for which we were accountable to him, and not to the priests. I never told my own religion, nor scrutinized that of another. I never attempted to make a convert, nor wished to change another's creed. I have ever judged of the religion of others by their lives, and by this test, my dear Madam, I have been satisfied yours must be an excellent one, to have produced a life of such exemplary virtue and correctness. For it is in our lives, and not from our words, that our religion must be read. By the same test the world must judge me. But this does not satisfy the priesthood. They must have a positive, a declared assent to all their interested absurdities. My opinion is that there would never have been an infidel, if there had never been a priest. The artificial structures they have built on the purest of all moral systems, for the purpose of deriving from it pence and power, revolts those who think for themselves, and who read in that system only what is really there. These, therefore, they brand with such nick-names as their enmity chooses gratuitously to impute. I have left the world, in silence, to judge of causes from their effects; and I am consoled in this course, my dear friend, when I perceive the candor with which I am judged by your justice and discernment; and that, notwithstanding the slanders of the saints, my fellow citizens have thought me worthy of trusts. The imputations of irreligion having spent their force; they think an imputation of change might now be turned to account as a holster for their duperies. I shall leave them, as heretofore, to grope on in the dark.


A UNITARIAN CREED
To Dr. Benjamin Waterhouse
Monticello, June 26, 1822
1822062
Now, which of these is the true and charitable Christian? He who believes and acts on the simple doctrines of Jesus? Or the impious dogmatists, as Athanasius and Calvin? Verily I say these are the false shepherds foretold as to enter not by the door into the sheepfold, but to climb up some other way. They are mere usurpers of the Christian name, teaching a counter-religion made up of the deliria of crazy imaginations, as foreign from Christianity as is that of Mahomet. Their blasphemies have driven thinking men into infidelity, who have too hastily rejected the supposed author himself, with the horrors so falsely imputed to him. Had the doctrines of Jesus been preached always as pure as they came from his lips, the whole civilized world would now have been Christian. I rejoice that in this blessed country of free inquiry and belief, which has surrendered its creed and conscience to neither kings nor priests, the genuine doctrine of one only God is reviving, and trust that there is not a young man now living in the United States who will not die an Unitarian.



Thanks to Mr. Jefferson's guidance, the Virginia Constitution, to this day, contains "Christian forbearance, love, and charity towards each other":

Section 16. Free exercise of religion; no establishment of religion - That religion or the duty which we owe to our Creator, and the manner of discharging it, can be directed only by reason and conviction, not by force or violence; and, therefore, all men are equally entitled to the free exercise of religion, according to the dictates of conscience; and that it is the mutual duty of all to practice Christian forbearance, love, and charity towards each other. No man shall be compelled to frequent or support any religious worship, place, or ministry whatsoever, nor shall be enforced, restrained, molested, or burthened in his body or goods, nor shall otherwise suffer on account of his religious opinions or belief; but all men shall be free to profess and by argument to maintain their opinions in matters of religion, and the same shall in nowise diminish, enlarge, or affect their civil capacities. And the General Assembly shall not prescribe any religious test whatever, or confer any peculiar privileges or advantages on any sect or denomination, or pass any law requiring or authorizing any religious society, or the people of any district with this Commonwealth, to levy on themselves or others, any tax for the erection or repair of any house of public worship, or for the support of any church or ministry; but it shall be left free to every person to select his religious instructor, and to make for his support such private contract as he shall please.Link

[BigBadBrian]

From actual letters (preserved) from Thomas Jefferson:

[Satan]

If America is a Christian nation, I'm the Pope!

[ELVIS]

Re: The Religious Right Is Un-American

Originally posted by Hardrock69
When we see the words "religious" and "religion" in the Constitution, it is in the context of a warning against the use of religious pressure as a weapon of tyranny.

Hmmm...

[Nitro Express]

What ever happened to states rights? The founding fathers gave most of the power to the states themselves. Do we need a federal ban on gay marriage? Hell no! Gay marriage may be accepted in certain states but deffinately not in others. Fine. The founding fathers knew each state was different and needed breathing room.

The problem now is the fedral govt. has gotten too strong. Hey, our local govts. have gotten too dependant on federal grants. If you don't like the federal govt. dictating what the local elections should decide, then don't take federal money.

We are addicted to federal money. The proffessor who's pro gay marriage but lives off of federal govt. grants is a hypocrite.

It's time for the states to tell Washington DC to fuck off. Just like the Confederacy did over taxation and tarrif issues. Walk the talk instead of complaining while living on federal funding. That's the real problem.

[Nitro Express]

Funny. The state of California wants it's freedom but it's $50 billlion in the hole and begs constatnly for federal help. Since, most people in the US are anti-gay marriage, San Fransisco will never get gay marriage until they buy their own freedom to do so. As long as conservative tax dollars bail out the gay communities they have no say.

[ELVIS]

Originally posted by Nitro Express
Gay marriage may be accepted in certain states but deffinately not in others. Fine.

So what then if two faggot queer degenerates are married in one state and move to a state that doesn't accept it ??

[Nitro Express]

In other words, the gays are owned and out numbered. Now the conservatives are trying to use federal legislation to push their morality on the rest of us. I don't dig it. What's next? A state religion? I thought that is why our puritan ancestors came here to get away from.

[Satan]

Originally posted by ELVIS
So what then if two faggot queer degenerates are married in one state and move to a state that doesn't accept it ??

And how many gays would want to live in states where they were called "faggot queer degenerates"?

[Satan]

Originally posted by Nitro Express
Funny. The state of California wants it's freedom but it's $50 billlion in the hole and begs constatnly for federal help. Since, most people in the US are anti-gay marriage, San Fransisco will never get gay marriage until they buy their own freedom to do so. As long as conservative tax dollars bail out the gay communities they have no say.

Conservative tax dollars....... ?

Might want to check your facts on that one.

For all the "red states" bitch and whine about paying taxes, the fact is that the blue states PAY more taxes, while the red states DRAIN more taxes from the system.

So any tax dollars being used in San Francisco probably came from California in the first place. And so did the tax dollars used in Wyoming, most likely.

It there ever is another civil war in your country between the red & blue states, the red states are going to be more financially fucked after that than they were in 1865.

[ELVIS]

Originally posted by Satan
And how many gays would want to live in states where they were called "faggot queer degenerates"?

That would make them want to live there more...

[binnie]

Thou shalt not kill

don't some states have the death penalty?


Also I think invading another country may be deemed un-Chrisitan too....

[Satan]

Really, Mr. Presley......

How in Hell's name does it affect YOUR life one way or another, if two guys or two girls, or a guy and a girl for that matter, who love each other get married.

The religious reich likes to float that hysteria, but they never can make the case for exactly HOW gay marriage would affect anyone else.