Knowledge is Power

Submitted by Dennis Middlebrooks (United States), Feb 20, 2008 at 10:12

Mitch,

Your last paragraph is very telling. Your claim that much of the South was not fighting to protect slavery but to oppose federal interference in state affairs is the type of neo-Confederate nonsense advanced by the League of the South and the Sons of Confederate Veterans. The only "state affair" the South was fighting for was the right to hold four million men, women and children in chains in the name of Christianity. This was made clear by the arguments made by the seccsionists in newspapars, periodicals, speeches, letters, diaries, etc. There was never any mention made of tariffs or national banks. And the South had no problem with enforcement of the Fugitive Slave Law, which outrageously interfered in the internal affairs of the free states.

Your claim that 52 of the 55 signers of the Declaraion was Orthodox Christians and the remaining three believers in the divine truth of the Bible is a piece of Religious Right propaganda that supports Goebbels' cobservation that a lie repeated often enough becomes a truth. The fact that Jefferson, who wrote and signed the Declaration, fell into neither camp gives the lie to the claim. How would anyone be able to verify the private religious views of all 55 signers, or be able to refute this claim? Many deists and Unitarians were formal members of the Anglican Church, including Jefferson. You had to be, to hold public office and This does not prove they were "orthodox". This bilge was pulled out of thin air, like most of the phony Founding Father quotes cuirculating on the iternet.

I am astounded that you believe contemporary churches do not stress dogma to justify your claim that Jefferson was a Christian because he said so. Really? Ever hear of the Christian Coalition and the evangelical movement? Does Mike Huckabee share Jefferson's views about Jesus? Does Pat Robertson? Did Jerry Falwell? Why was Mitt Romney's Mormonism a factor is his campaign's collapse if nobody cares about dogma anymore? How many Christian leaders of whatever denomination would agree that someone who rejects the miracles of the bible, including the Trinity and Resurrection, can be considered "Christian" merely because he admires some of the gospel teachings?

Mitch, there is a big difference between a secular, democratic nation with a majority Christian population of various denominations on the one hand and a government founded on Christianity on the other. The USA falls into the first category, not the second, despite the claims of the Religious Right to the contrary. I have no problem with historical fact, and most Americans have been, or are, of Christian background. This, however, is meaningless. Most Germans, Italians and Spaniards were of Christian background, a fact that failed to prevent Hitler, Mussolini and Franco.

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