I have been around the internets and found quite a few disturbing lies and distortions of history. Only looking at comments around the internet one would conclude that the founders of the USA were a bunch of secular, rabid atheists. Once again if you look into it, you know it is hogwash.
The one I will address now is that Benjamin Franklin was an atheist. Benjamin Franklin’s parents were Puritans and he was baptized as a youngster. He later associated with the Presbyterian Church for a short time. In 1725 he stated that he didn’t believe Christian teachings and became a Deist with a distaste for “organized religion”. He later came to be embarrassed by a pamphlet he wrote putting organized religion down. He found that he and some of his friends that he had converted to Deism had a decay in moral standards. After that he returned to endorsing “organized religion” without really ever joining one. Clearly he was not an atheist though.
Franklin even set forth what many founders called the “Religion of America” that was taught to children in school. From a letter to then Yale President Ezra Stiles he said:
“Here is my creed: I believe in one God, the Creator of the universe. That He governs it by His providence. That He ought to be worshiped. That the most acceptable service we render to Him is in doing good to His other children. That the soul of man is immortal, and will be treated with justice in another life respecting it’s conduct in this. These I take to be the fundamental points in all sound religion.”
Here is a video that sums up nicely, in a hilarious way, what the founders believed.
This is why I’m pushing for a theocracy for America. Until we get someone’s sky worshipee on our money, I will not rest!
Wait… What’s that you say? During the McCarthy era that already happened? You mean they put a legendary figure on our money and into our Pledge of Allegiance? Well, I’ll be damned 😉
If you want the name of the person you worship on your currency just use your debit card…….. zingaaaa!!!! 🙂
I bet you are very happy that the original seal for the United States was too complex to put on money. “Rebellion to Tyrants is Obedience to God.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Seal_of_the_United_States#First_committee
Besides, we already have a theocracy with one belief system set above all others.
Well, we can certainly say that they were Biblical laureates (speaking of Franklin, Jefferson, et al.).
I remember reading how some of the Framers and Founders thought that the U.S. would quickly become Unitarian Universalist in the early 1800s. Not having a reference for that last statement, please take it with one or more grains of salt.
Hmmmm, well I’m a hard core Conservative who has no wish to turn religious people onto Atheism, yet I am an Atheist (don’t even start…it’s possible, I am living proof). I am not unhappy, and my existence is in no way meaningless (commenting on the video).
I hate it when religious people do the same things that non-religious people do and call names, assume, and belittle those who don’t believe the way they do.
Do I think there are a LOT of Atheists who this description might resemble? Oh sure. But only the loud, obnoxious ones…kinda like how loud, obnoxious religious people are probably engaging in calling the pot black when they act the same way.
Besides the video, I like the post and have linked it in my FB fan page http://www.facebook.com/#!/pages/Madashecc/126364357414990
@Jen – Personally, I have much more respect for agnostic views than straight up atheism declaring that there is no god. The view that one just doesn’t know is much more honest to me than claiming to know for sure that there is no god. Just as I find someone claiming, 3,000 years ago, that there are no invisible types of light and no sounds that are beyond humans’ ability to hear, to be problematic. That said I also personally believe that it is completely possible to live a happy, meaningful and non-obnoxious life as a non-believer. (S.E. Cupp rules btw) I am a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints so believe me when I say I know about name calling, assumptions and belittling.
As for the video, many people find Klavan’s brand of sarcasm very off-putting. He himself used to be either an atheist or agnostic. I see the video as really focusing on the evangelical atheists and large movements known for enforcing atheism (USSR, China etc.). The freedom of an individual to believe as they will is sacrosanct of course, but it has been demonstrated time and again that when atheism is more prevalent societies and/or aspects of them just “kind of suck”.
“More nachos for me” 🙂
Another post I have that touches on what religious principles have brought to our society without most of us even knowing it is here: http://everydaynormal.com/ignorant-videos/