The Separation of Church and State
The Founding Fathers codified the separation of Church and State. Project 2025 would erase that protection.
Image: Mary Dyer being led. Source: Wikimedia Commons
The early history of the Colonies reveals a predisposition to Christian theocracy in a majority of the individual governing bodies. This was an early precursor of the idea of Christian Nationalism. The Puritans, who had fled England and the European Continent to escape persecution became anything but tolerant of religious diversity. On June 1, 1660, Mary Dyer became the third of the four Boston Martyrs to be hanged, Quakers who ignored their banishment and returned in protest of the religious intolerance of the Massachusetts Bay Colony.
Obadiah Holmes was flogged. His friends would have raised the money to pay his fine for being a Baptist and teaching his beliefs, but he refused, opting for the flogging.
In 1647 laws were enacted in the Massachusetts Bay Colony that barred any teaching of Catholicism. This was typical of the attitude of most of the Colonial governments. The exceptions were New York, Pennsylvania and Maryland. But even in these three states the history of tolerance toward Catholics was broken by periods of persecution.
From the very early years of the colony of Virginia, the Anglican Church was supported by the civil government. Taxes were levied to support the Church. Attendance on a regular basis was required. Any teaching of a different sect was not tolerated. The emotional sermons delivered by Baptist and Methodist preachers would prove intolerable by staid Anglican clergymen.
Thus it became commonplace in Virginia of the 1760s and 1770s for Baptist preachers to be thrown in jail. It was not uncommon for a preacher to be dragged from his sermon and horsewhipped. Such was the experience of Swearing Jack Waller. This was the temper of the times that influenced Thomas Jefferson and James Madison.
Madison would later write in 1803, "The purpose of separation of church and state is to keep forever from these shores the ceaseless strife that has soaked the soil of Europe in blood for centuries."
This is the lived experience that produced the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom in 1786 and the First Amendment to the Constitution which was ratified in 1791. Madison and Jefferson saw firsthand the pain and the misery caused by misguided attempts to force a singular vision of God on all people.
Among the devoutly religious people who supported separation of church and state were Isaac Backus and John Leland, Baptist ministers who had experienced the heavy hand of state supported churches. They felt that Christianity would best flourish without interference from government. Having seen or experienced persecution, they agreed with the intent of the First Amendment to protect differing religious beliefs from the state.
Article 11 of the Treaty of Tripoli states: “As the government of the United States of America is not in any sense founded on the Christian Religion, as it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religious or tranquility of Musselmen, and as the said States never have entered into any war or act of hostility against any Mehomitan nation, it is declared by the parties that no pretext arising from religious opinions shall ever produce an interruption of the harmony existing between the two countries."
Although there has been some debate about whether the Arabic version is consistent with the English language version, it was the English version that was ratified by the Senate in 1797.
It has been the policy of the United States since it's inception that we do not fight wars for religious reasons and that we do not persecute individuals for their beliefs. Christian Nationalism seeks to change that. Project 2025 is the engine designed to begin that change.
Here is something to consider:
1 "And I, the Lord God, spake unto Moses, saying: That Satan, whom thou hast commanded in the name of mine Only Begotten is the same which was from the beginning, and he came before me, saying-Behold, here am I, send me, I will be thy son, and I will redeem all mankind, that one soul shall not be lost, and surely I will do it; wherefore give me thine honor.
2 But, behold, my Beloved Son, which was my Beloved and Chosen from the beginning, said unto me-Father, thy will be done, and the glory be thine forever.
3 Wherefore, because that Satan rebelled against me, and sought to destroy the agency of man, which I, the Lord God, had given him, and also, that I should give unto him mine own power; by the power of mine Only Begotten, I caused that he should be cast down;"
This is the first three verses of the Book of Moses, Chapter 4, from the Book of Mormon. This is about free agency, the ability of each of us to choose what he or she believes. These verses were brought to my attention by a good friend who was Mormon. I also had a good friend who was a Jehovah's Witness. There are friends with other beliefs. While I may not agree with everything they believe they are still my friends.
To those who would say that this is not what you believe to be Biblical, because of the First Amendment, you don't have to believe it. However, those who do believe these verses are equally protected. The early proponents of the First Amendment knew that it protected the right to hold their beliefs. Do away with the separation of church and state, and eventually, at some time in the near or distant future, a dystopian government will come for your beliefs.
Notes:
https://www.loebvisitors.org/heretics-to-heroes/
https://virginiahistory.org/learn/thomas-jefferson-and-virginia-statute-religious-freedom#:~:text=The%20Virginia%20Statute%20for%20Religious%20Freedom%20is%20a%20statement%20about,amendment%20protections%20for%20religious%20freedom.
http://baptisthistoryhomepage.com/ny.early.history.armitage.html
https://www.traditioninaction.org/History/B_001_Colonies.html
https://homepages.rootsweb.com/~sam/obadiah.html
http://www.virginiaplaces.org/religion/religionfreebefore.html
https://www.racc.edu/sites/default/files/imported/StudentLife/Clubs/Legacy/vol_1/Quakers.html#:~:text=The%20rigid%2C%20sterile%20Puritans%20of,arriving%20in%20their%20Puritan%20colony.
https://press-pubs.uchicago.edu/founders/documents/amendI_religions16.html
https://www.loc.gov/exhibits/religion/rel01.html
https://bycommonconsent.com/2022/07/28/christian-nationalist-is-incompatible-with-mormonism/