A Radiant Cage Of Thunder

The Founder Fathers Were Liberals

I am having a lively debate with my life long friend (who is now an Army Chopper pilot serving in Afghanistan) on whether or not the Founding Fathers were Christian or not. Here's my take - I just wanted to share it with you and to get your opinions on this subject.

Of course, I've read much of their writings on the subject and from those studies I already know the Founding Fathers DEFINITELY were NOT CHRISTIANS by any means... It's almost humorous how GEORGE WASHINGTON privately DESPISED Christianity and was all but a closeted atheist.

Thomas Jefferson - being the founder of American liberal philosophy could barely stand to be in the same room with it.

And Benjamin Franklin doesn't know what to say about it. He doesn't want to offend anybody - but he certainly doesn't see that Christianity should have any bearing on American politics. THESE TWO THINGS DO NOT MIX! Is his strong admonition.

It's all VERY interesting....

___________________________________________________________

I think the game being played is far more complex than we care to
realize. I just don't trust the news media whatsoever and I
certainly don't trust my own Government because there are too many
classified agendas and behind the scenes players and events which
really determine the outcomes of major decisions.

Democracy CAN ONLY thrive WITH OPENNESS - not SECRECY.

Our GOVERNMENT has become FAR TOO SECRET - FAR TOO CONSERVATIVE with it's information and knowledge.

I
only know that I want a future in which ALL nations are allied together
in peace - and I think going out to explore the galaxy around us is
exactly the objective we need to focus on to make this happen.

We
should not be making stands and wasting time and mental energy about
trivial issues like abortion rights for women, gay and lesbian marriage
rights - who cares? Each to to his own... it's not our obligation or
duty to legislate or enforce some kind of religious morality...

I
could care less if a man wants to marry another man or a woman wants to
marry another woman - it's not my concern... I'm more concerned about
how are we going to get to the STARS? Who has the political vision to
take us (humanity) to the nearest stars in our LIFETIME?

Why
should we fight over this tiny little planet when there are thousands
of similar possibly uninhabited planets out there just waiting for us
to explore and colonize?

Liberalism is about PROGRESS... moving forward...

Conservatism is about keeping our ideas small and limiting our imagination... I hate to be the one to break this to you if you still believe this nation was founded by Christians - but our Founding Fathers were not pro-Christian as the very vocal Conservative pundits would have you believe.

They actually wanted a SECULAR nation where all religions could be recognized as
EQUAL - ISLAM - CHRISTIANITY - JUDAISM - HINDUISM - GNOSTICISM - all equal and protected under law. No religion was to be respected or given more authority and credence over any other in America.

The ONE THING they did NOT want to see established was a STATE RELIGION like the Roman Empire had with Christianity which turned it into the Holy Roman Empire and made it the most criminal, most corrupt, most diabolical theocracy on the planet.

Yet this is what CONSERVATIVES want - a STATE RELIGION - America as a
Christian Nation - which would make the Founding Father spin in their
graves.

The FOUNDING FATHERS - noble libertines who were also FREEMASONS - which is a philosophy of LIBERALISM - meaning ALL religions would receive EQUAL STATUS in AMERICA. No ONE religion would be held above any other - and the GOVERNMENT ITSELF would remain SECULAR, not favoring one religion over another....

And it MUST BE THIS WAY for AMERICA to continue to PROGRESS AND INSPIRE THE WORLD
to honor LIBERTY, independence and freedom as our guiding principles....

CONSERVATIVES want to establish a new CHRISTIAN EMPIRE - a resurrection of the HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE which is exactly what America was FOUNDED ON to RESISTS
AGAINST and TRANSCEND!!!

Don't believe for a minute if someone tells you that the Founding Fathers were Christians and weren't liberals!

Just listen to some of their own words!

THOMAS JEFFERSON:

History, I believe, furnishes no example of a priest-ridden
people maintaining a free civil government. This marks the lowest
grade of ignorance of which their civil as well as religious
leaders will always avail themselves for their own purposes.

-Thomas Jefferson to Alexander von Humboldt, Dec. 6, 1813.

Millions of innocent men, women and children, since the introduction
of Christianity, have been burnt, tortured, fined and imprisoned;
yet we have not advanced one inch towards uniformity.But it does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods or no God. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg.

-Thomas Jefferson, Notes on Virginia, 1782

The whole history of these books [the Gospels] is so defective
and doubtful that it seems vain to attempt minute enquiry into
it: and such tricks have been played with their text, and with
the texts of other books relating to them, that we have a right,
from that cause, to entertain much doubt what parts of them are
genuine. In the New Testament there is internal evidence that
parts of it have proceeded from an extraordinary man; and that
other parts are of the fabric of very inferior minds. It is as
easy to separate those parts, as to pick out diamonds from dunghills.
-Thomas Jefferson, letter to John Adams, January 24, 1814

Christianity neither is, nor ever was a part of the common
law.
-Thomas Jefferson, letter to Dr. Thomas Cooper, February 10,
1814

And the day will come when the mystical generation of Jesus,
by the supreme being as his father in the womb of a virgin will
be classed with the fable of the generation of Minerva in the
brain of Jupiter. But may we hope that the dawn of reason and
freedom of thought in these United States will do away with this
artificial scaffolding, and restore to us the primitive and genuine
doctrines of this most venerated reformer of human errors.
-Thomas Jefferson, Letter to John Adams, April 11, 1823

BENJAMIN FRANKLIN:

"I have found Christian dogma unintelligible. Early in life I absented myself from Christian assemblies."
[Benjamin Franklin, in _Toward The Mystery_]

"Revealed religion has no weight with me."
[Benjamin Franklin]

GEORGE WASHINGTON: (Who was likely the first Atheist pretending to be a Deist politician in America)

Of all the animosities which have existed among mankind, those which are caused by a difference of sentiments in religion appear to be the most inveterate
and distressing, and ought to be deprecated. I was in hopes that the
enlightened and liberal policy, which has marked the present age, would
at least have reconciled Christians of every denomination so far that
we should never again see the religious disputes carried to such a
pitch as to endanger the peace of society.

-- George Washington, letter to Edward Newenham, October 20, 1792, quoted from Albert J Menendez and Edd Doerr, The Great Quotations on Religious Freedom, also James A Haught, 2000 Years of Disbelief

"Dr.Rush told me (he had it from Asa Green) that when the clergy addressed
General Washington, on his departure from the government, it was
observed in their consultation that he had never, on any occasion, said
a word to the public which showed a belief in the Christian religion,
and they thought they should so pen their address as to force him at
length to disclose publicly whether he was a Christian or not. However,
he observed, the old fox was too cunning for them. He answered every
article of their address particularly, except that, which he passed
over without notice."

-- Thomas Jefferson, quoted from Jefferson's Works,
Vol. iv., p. 572. (Asa Green "was probably the Reverend Ashbel Green,
who was chaplain to congress during Washington's administration." --
Farrell Till in "The Christian Nation Myth.")

"Unlike Thomas Jefferson -- and Thomas Paine, for that matter -- Washington
never even got around to recording his belief that Christ was a great
ethical teacher. His reticence on the subject was truly remarkable.
Washington frequently alluded to Providence in his private
correspondence. But the name of Christ, in any correspondence
whatsoever, does not appear anywhere in his many letters to friends and
associates throughout his life."

-- Paul F Boller, George Washington & Religion (1963) pp. 74-75, quoted from Ed and Michael Buckner, "Quotations that Support the Separation of State and Church." Had Washington been a pious Christian, he would have at least mentioned the name of Christ!

Posted at 07:41PM Aug 31, 2008 by Douglas Lee Bryenldson in General  |  Comments[0]