United States Not Founded on Christian Principles

Often fundamentalist Christians will assert that this country, the United States, should be considered a Christian country and adopt laws based on the Bible. They say this is true because the founders of this nation were Christians and they founded it on Christian principles. In fact this is far from the truth.

The truth is that, while many of the founders were outwardly Christian, and some were tru believers, several of the really influential ones, including Thomas Jefferson, were not Christians at all; they were Deists and, in private at least, strongly opposed to Christianity and other revealed religions. But what did they believe?

They believed that it was the "perfection" of the physical laws of the universe and the "evidence" of design in nature that proved that there must be a perfect creator, whom they referred to as Deity. They further believed that "His" will was revealed through his "providence" of man's needs as being for the good of his creatures. Man was obliged to act according to his creator's will and also work for the good of his fellow men.

They believed this should be obvious to rational men-- at least those whose minds were unfettered with superstition.  It is clearly stated in Jefferson's Declaration of Independence:

 "We hold these truths to be self evident , that all men are created equal and endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights..."

Note that if he had been a Christian,  he would have written that these truths were revealed through scripture. Instead he claimed that they were "self evident".

Furthermore the Deists vehemently opposed the idea that the Bible or any other book was divine revelation. Thomas Paine was the most up front and prolific of them in anti Christian writing. He found so many holes in the Bible (perhaps it should be called holey scripture) and Christian dogma that it is a wonder that anyone can take it seriously to this day.

Deists also believed that the Creator governed the world through the immutable laws of nature and either could not, or chose not to intervene in them. They therefore discounted the possibility of miracles.

Surely minds such as the ones these men possessed must have realised the weakness of the argument from design. They must have entertained doubts about the truth of Deism--Jefferson certainly did in his personal correspondences. Nevertheless, publicly at least, they maintained profession of this faith. I think it is likely that they believed, whether it was true or not, that it was a belief system that would bring out the best in them and their fellow men. I believe that they saw it as the future faith of the new man that their revolution had brought into the world.

They certainly did not want this to be a Christian nation in the way the Christian right would have it now.

For more information go to http://www.deism.com