Founding Faith: Providence, Politics, and the Birth of Religious Freedom in AmericaThe culture wars have distorted the dramatic story of how Americans came to worship freely. Many activists on the right maintain that the United States was founded as a “Christian nation.” Many on the left contend that the Founders were secular or Deist and that the First Amendment was designed to boldly separate church and state throughout the land. None of these claims are true, argues Beliefnet.com editor in chief Steven Waldman. With refreshing objectivity, Waldman narrates the real story of how our nation’s Founders forged a new approach to religious liberty, a revolutionary formula that promoted faith . . . by leaving it alone. |
From inside the book
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... Founding Fathers were very religious , they thereby also prove that the Founders abhorred separation of church and state . " Any diligent student of American history finds that our great nation was founded by godly men upon godly ...
... Founding Fathers were mostly rebelling against the religious tyranny . in Europe . Actually , they were rebelling as much against the religious tyranny they saw among their colonial neighbors . The Founding Fathers wanted religious ...
... Founders went straight from these local battles into the writing of the US Constitution and the Bill of Rights ... Founding Fathers " as if they were a unitary bloc . They , too , struggled to figure out some of the Constitution's ...
... Founding Fathers , it's impossible to understand why they behaved the way they did without also understanding their own spiritual journeys . In chapters 3 , 5 , 7 , 9 , and 11 , I break from the chronological narrative to probe their ...
... Founding Fathers contemplated the approach taken by their grandfathers for more than at century - and rejected it . Through a variety of battles - some local , some national , some born of enlightenment and some of parochialism - these ...
Contents
18 | |
John Adams | 33 |
George Washington | 56 |
The pious infidel | 72 |
Natures God Meets the Supreme Judge | 86 |
James Madison | 93 |
A Diabolical Persecution | 100 |
The Mighty Current of Freedom | 107 |
Forgetting the Powerful Friend | 127 |
The First Amendment Compromise | 141 |
They Were Right | 188 |
Index | 209 |
207 | 243 |
Other editions - View all
Founding Faith: How Our Founding Fathers Forged a Radical New Approach to ... Steven Waldman No preview available - 2009 |