quote:

Originally posted by NYGblue A good portion of the Founding Father's were either Atheist, agnostic or other...

LOL

But the majority certainly were Masonic.

quote:

Originally posted by Trancer-X LOL But the majority certainly were Masonic.

lol... ooooooogily boooooogily the Free Masons are going to take over the world!

___________________
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Originally posted by NYGblue lol... ooooooogily boooooogily the Free Masons are going to take over the world!

Haha

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Originally posted by Trancer-X I fail to see how any of that makes my statement hypocritical. Among other things, our country was founded upon the basic principles of freedom and liberty. (the same principles in which Bush so eloquently, but rather hypocritically referred to in his recent State of the Union address)

...freedom, liberty and God...
I know the "G" word is hard for you liberals to say though...that's ok...
How can Bush be hyprocitical when he's actually practising what he's preaching?

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The government's imposition of directives that intrude into our personal and private lives is (in my humble opinion) the antithesis of freedom and liberty.

And I totally agree.
Government is meant as a thumbnail guideline for the people, not hold our hands every min. of every second.

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I take it that you have never read Thomas Paine's The Rights of Man

Nope. Why should I? Seems like a nice piece of Americana history...

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Originally posted by NYGblue A good portion of the Founding Father's were either Atheist, agnostic or other...

5 of the 8 founding fathers were Chrisitan or a Christian derivative (Franklin was a Quaker). Washington was a Mason. Jefferson was a Deist. Payne was an Atheist.
It appears that ONE was atheist...

___________________
"...End? No, the journey doesn't end here. Death is just another path...one that we all must take.
The grey rain-curtain of this world rolls back, and all change to silver glass...and then you see it...
...white shores...and beyond...the far green country under a swift sunrise."

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Originally posted by Fir3start3r ...freedom, liberty and God... I know the "G" word is hard for you liberals to say though...that's ok... How can Bush be hyprocitical when he's actually practising what he's preaching?

I think that when they said "God," they meant whatever "God" it is that you may or may not personally subscribe to. It's called religious freedom. Anyway, I think that you're confused because what they had actually emphasized was, "Life, liberty and the the pursuit of happiness."

Yeah, Bush talks a good talk, but actions speak louder than words. He's complicit in numerous Constitutionally subversive acts such as the Patriot Act, which shows me that he has no idea what a Patriot really is. To him it's just another crafty label which they used to gather American support. He's probably much like yourself - from your own admission of not wanting to bother to understand my country's Founding Father's mindsets via our "Americana history." Please give me a break and try to refrain from further indulging me with your sophomoric and hubristic blather. It's just tiresome.

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Originally posted by Fir3start3r 5 of the 8 founding fathers were Chrisitan or a Christian derivative (Franklin was a Quaker). Washington was a Mason. Jefferson was a Deist. Payne was an Atheist. It appears that ONE was atheist...

Jefferson may have been a deist, but that wasn't the extent of his religious views. He was actually, especially for someone at that time, decidedly anti-Christian:

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"There is not one redeeming feature in our superstition of Christianity. It has made one half the world fools, and the other half hypocrites."

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"In every country and every age, 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. It is easier to acquire wealth and power by this combination than by deserving them, and to effect this, they have perverted the purest religion ever preached to man into mystery and jargon, unintelligible to all mankind, and therefore the safer for their purposes."

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" "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 legislative 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."

Does this sound like a man who would want the Bible in every classroom? Then consider Washington:

http://www.infidels.org/library/his.../chapter_3.html

Although he wasn't as polemically anti-Christian as Jefferson or Paine, he was a deist and - based on these accounts - I'm pretty sure that we can count him as someone who could quite comfortably envision "not having bibles in schools [and] the 10 commandments missing from our courts".

Then take Madison, who I suppose you include as one of the 5 "Christians" who would approve of the lines currently being blurred between Chruch and state:

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"What influence, in fact, have ecclesiastical establishments had on society? In some instances they have been seen to erect a spiritual tyranny on the ruins of the civil authority; on many instances they have been seen upholding the thrones of political tyranny; in no instance have they been the guardians of the liberties of the people. Rulers who wish to subvert the public liberty may have found an established clergy convenient auxiliaries. A just government, instituted to secure and perpetuate it, needs them not."

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""Experience witnesseth that ecclesiastical establishments, instead of maintaining the purity and efficacy of religion, have had a contrary operation. During almost fifteen centuries has the legal establishment of Christianity been on trial. What has been its fruits? More or less, in all places, pride and indolence in the clergy; ignorance and servility in the laity; in both, superstition, bigotry and persecution."

Noticing a theme yet? Many of the founding fathers were schooled in Europe - or at least in European ideas - and so were privy to both the ideals of the emerging enlightenment and the dangers posed by a fusion of church and state (Europe, remember, was at this stage only just emerging from centuries of tyranny at the hands of the Catholic church). Given this, they understood why their democracy would need to impose borders between the politicians and the clergy. Ben Franklin sure knew it:

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"If we look back into history for the character of the present sects in Christianity, we shall find few that have not in their turns been persecutors, and complainers of persecution. The primitive Christians thought persecution extremely wrong in the Pagans, but practiced it on one another. The first Protestants of the Church of England blamed persecution in the Romish Church, but practiced it upon the Puritans. They found it wrong in Bishops, but fell into the practice themselves both here (England) and in New England."

So did Adams:

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"I almost shudder at the thought of alluding to the most fatal example of the abuses of grief which the history of mankind has preserved--the Cross. Consider what calamities that engine of grief has produced!"

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[i]"The priesthood have, in all ancient nations, nearly monopolized learning. And ever since the Reformation, when or where has existed a Protestant or dissenting sect who would tolerate A FREE INQUIRY? The blackest billingsgate, the most ungentlemanly insolence, the most yahooish brutality, is patiently endured, countenanced, propagated, and applauded. But touch a solemn truth in collision with a dogma of a sect, though capable of the clearest proof, and you will find you have disturbed a nest, and the hornets will swarm about your eyes and hand, and fly into your face and eyes."

So some of these men may have certainly been Christian (some in a far looser sense of the word than others) but they understood that no good will ever come from merging the government with a specific form of religious ideology - hence, the "freedom of religion" part of the constitution. This means that the government cannot propogate or support a specific religion to the exclusion of all others. So can children pray in the classroom? Absolutely, the teacher just has no right to lead them in a specific form of prayer. Can children still read the Bible at school? Absolutely, but the teaching staff just can't promote this work of fiction as religious fact to the students.

So do you know what you have here already? Complete freedom of religion, just as the founding fathers envisioned. You can believe what you want and you can pray to whoever you want, you just can't use the public schools to propogate a specific religious dogma or to proselytise - now what, exactly, is wrong with that? You may argue that the founding fathers built the nation within the context of Judeo-Christian values, but this is ostensibly wrong - these men saw the blackest, most vile aspects of the Christian faith and understood that enforcing such a dogmatic religious orthodoxy would not be in the best interests of the nation, hence the wall separating church and state - starting to get it now?

You are free to believe whatever fairy tales you want and are free to adorn your walls and shelves with any religious literature or artefacts you wish. When you start declaring that others should adhere to these beliefs, however, or that the government should start promoting these beliefs then your stepping over a line and this is why the courts need to step in from time and time and enforce the vision the founding fathers actually did have for the US. You can try to rationalise it however you like, but that's the way it is and that's the way it has to be.

___________________
http://eschatonnow.blogspot.com/

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Originally posted by Trancer-X LOL But the majority certainly were Masonic.

i thought only George Washington was a mason.

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Originally posted by shaolin_Z i thought only George Washington was a mason.

http://www.calodges.org/no406/FAMASONS.HTM

http://www.srmason-sj.org/council/j...harrington.html

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Originally posted by Fir3start3r Payne was an Atheist.

Quite the opposite, Paine was a Theist.

"I do not believe in the creed professed by the Jewish church, by the Roman church, by the Greek church, by the Turkish church, by the Protestant church, nor by any church that I know of. My own mind is my own church.”

- Thomas Paine

quote:

Originally posted by Renegade Jefferson may have been a deist, but that wasn't the extent of his religious views. He was actually, especially for someone at that time, decidedly anti-Christian: Does this sound like a man who would want the Bible in every classroom? Then consider Washington: http://www.infidels.org/library/his.../chapter_3.html Although he wasn't as polemically anti-Christian as Jefferson or Paine, he was a deist and - based on these accounts - I'm pretty sure that we can count him as someone who could quite comfortably envision "not having bibles in schools [and] the 10 commandments missing from our courts". Then take Madison, who I suppose you include as one of the 5 "Christians" who would approve of the lines currently being blurred between Chruch and state: Noticing a theme yet? Many of the founding fathers were schooled in Europe - or at least in European ideas - and so were privy to both the ideals of the emerging enlightenment and the dangers posed by a fusion of church and state (Europe, remember, was at this stage only just emerging from centuries of tyranny at the hands of the Catholic church). Given this, they understood why their democracy would need to impose borders between the politicians and the clergy. Ben Franklin sure knew it: So did Adams: So some of these men may have certainly been Christian (some in a far looser sense of the word than others) but they understood that no good will ever come from merging the government with a specific form of religious ideology - hence, the "freedom of religion" part of the constitution. This means that the government cannot propogate or support a specific religion to the exclusion of all others. So can children pray in the classroom? Absolutely, the teacher just has no right to lead them in a specific form of prayer. Can children still read the Bible at school? Absolutely, but the teaching staff just can't promote this work of fiction as religious fact to the students. So do you know what you have here already? Complete freedom of religion, just as the founding fathers envisioned. You can believe what you want and you can pray to whoever you want, you just can't use the public schools to propogate a specific religious dogma or to proselytise - now what, exactly, is wrong with that? You may argue that the founding fathers built the nation within the context of Judeo-Christian values, but this is ostensibly wrong - these men saw the blackest, most vile aspects of the Christian faith and understood that enforcing such a dogmatic religious orthodoxy would not be in the best interests of the nation, hence the wall separating church and state - starting to get it now? You are free to believe whatever fairy tales you want and are free to adorn your walls and shelves with any religious literature or artefacts you wish. When you start declaring that others should adhere to these beliefs, however, or that the government should start promoting these beliefs then your stepping over a line and this is why the courts need to step in from time and time and enforce the vision the founding fathers actually did have for the US. You can try to rationalise it however you like, but that's the way it is and that's the way it has to be.

Very, very well said, Renegade.

___________________
Whence September dusk grows crisper still,
with leaves all crimson conquered,
I yearn to shout,
and dance about,
and stick pickles in my honker...

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Originally posted by MisterOpus1 Very, very well said, Renegade.

I concur!