Republican Religious Right - building the ideal country

[Godboy]

But God supports murders of women and children as in Iraq?

Is it worse to kill someone who has tasted life or one who has not known life?

Anyone that committed murder in Iraq should be thrown in jail. If however, you are suggesting any loss of civilian life in a war zone should be considered murder, then i guess both Bush AND your beloved Obama are going to be put on trial.

Is there no limit to the amount of nonsense you spew on a daily basis? Just shut your mouth fucktard and let the intelligent people decide whats best for this country. If we want to know what Elmers glue tastes like, THEN we will call on you.

 

[antagon]

we are engaged in a fool's game.

eh... politics anyone? i think conservatism's been marginalized to one of your petty issues in practice, man. im convinced that it is the least obtainable trait of our government, rather than an easy task at all.

 

[rdean]

This is not a put-down.

One of the problems I have with many conservatives is that they seem to paint with really broad strokes.
Let's end abortion.
Let's teach the controversy.
We want small government.
Marriage has always been between a man and a woman.

Just for a second, I'll talk about "small government".

When you start getting into a conversation with a conservative and bring up such things as the DMV, the post office, the military, maintaining the infrastructure, regulations on business - the environment , maintaining the law, then it suddenly becomes not so small.

The post was about the perfect world. Well, if everyone could live in a nice house with a large yard and there was plenty of good food and TV's and Computers and cars were just "available" and we all had satisfying jobs and no kids ever got pregnant until they were married.

Conservatives have a longing to return to some past time where "race" wasn't an issue. Where the US reigned "supreme". Where everyone followed the law. Where people were "happy". The problem is those times never really existed except for maybe a few.

It's all about "consequences". Making laws are OK, but what are the unintended consequences?

 

[Immanuel]

This is not a put-down.

One of the problems I have with many conservatives is that they seem to paint with really broad strokes.
Let's end abortion.
Let's teach the controversy.
We want small government.
Marriage has always been between a man and a woman.

Just for a second, I'll talk about "small government".

When you start getting into a conversation with a conservative and bring up such things as the DMV, the post office, the military, maintaining the infrastructure, regulations on business - the environment , maintaining the law, then it suddenly becomes not so small.

The post was about the perfect world. Well, if everyone could live in a nice house with a large yard and there was plenty of good food and TV's and Computers and cars were just "available" and we all had satisfying jobs and no kids ever got pregnant until they were married.

Conservatives have a longing to return to some past time where "race" wasn't an issue. Where the US reigned "supreme". Where everyone followed the law. Where people were "happy". The problem is those times never really existed except for maybe a few.

It's all about "consequences". Making laws are OK, but what are the unintended consequences?

Not a put down coming from me either, but I would ask you, as you seem to be turning a corner lately, to think about your statement about conservatives painting with a broad brush. I'd ask you to think about the brush you use as well. For a long time, I skipped or skimmed quickly your posts because they were all the same, all conservatives are evil etc.

I've started reading you again and still find that to be the case, but you do seem to be improving a little bit.

Immie

 

[rdean]

This is not a put-down.

One of the problems I have with many conservatives is that they seem to paint with really broad strokes.
Let's end abortion.
Let's teach the controversy.
We want small government.
Marriage has always been between a man and a woman.

Just for a second, I'll talk about "small government".

When you start getting into a conversation with a conservative and bring up such things as the DMV, the post office, the military, maintaining the infrastructure, regulations on business - the environment , maintaining the law, then it suddenly becomes not so small.

The post was about the perfect world. Well, if everyone could live in a nice house with a large yard and there was plenty of good food and TV's and Computers and cars were just "available" and we all had satisfying jobs and no kids ever got pregnant until they were married.

Conservatives have a longing to return to some past time where "race" wasn't an issue. Where the US reigned "supreme". Where everyone followed the law. Where people were "happy". The problem is those times never really existed except for maybe a few.

It's all about "consequences". Making laws are OK, but what are the unintended consequences?

Not a put down coming from me either, but I would ask you, as you seem to be turning a corner lately, to think about your statement about conservatives painting with a broad brush. I'd ask you to think about the brush you use as well. For a long time, I skipped or skimmed quickly your posts because they were all the same, all conservatives are evil etc.

I've started reading you again and still find that to be the case, but you do seem to be improving a little bit.

Immie

I hope not too much. I have a very low opinion of conservatives in this country for about the last 10 years. Republicans used to be called the "Party of Ideas". Because I'm being nice, I won't say what I call them now.

 

[Immanuel]

This is not a put-down.

One of the problems I have with many conservatives is that they seem to paint with really broad strokes.
Let's end abortion.
Let's teach the controversy.
We want small government.
Marriage has always been between a man and a woman.

Just for a second, I'll talk about "small government".

When you start getting into a conversation with a conservative and bring up such things as the DMV, the post office, the military, maintaining the infrastructure, regulations on business - the environment , maintaining the law, then it suddenly becomes not so small.

The post was about the perfect world. Well, if everyone could live in a nice house with a large yard and there was plenty of good food and TV's and Computers and cars were just "available" and we all had satisfying jobs and no kids ever got pregnant until they were married.

Conservatives have a longing to return to some past time where "race" wasn't an issue. Where the US reigned "supreme". Where everyone followed the law. Where people were "happy". The problem is those times never really existed except for maybe a few.

It's all about "consequences". Making laws are OK, but what are the unintended consequences?

Not a put down coming from me either, but I would ask you, as you seem to be turning a corner lately, to think about your statement about conservatives painting with a broad brush. I'd ask you to think about the brush you use as well. For a long time, I skipped or skimmed quickly your posts because they were all the same, all conservatives are evil etc.

I've started reading you again and still find that to be the case, but you do seem to be improving a little bit.

Immie

I hope not too much. I have a very low opinion of conservatives in this country for about the last 10 years. Republicans used to be called the "Party of Ideas". Because I'm being nice, I won't say what I call them now.

I have a pretty low opinion of Republicans. It fits right up there on the shelf next to my low opinion of Democrats. Note: My low opinions do not transfer to low opinions of conservatives or liberals or even people who happen to be part of those two parties. My low opinion translates to those who are so set on their party that they can't see the fact that there are caring members of this country that find themselves in one party or the other... just because.

When I first registered to vote, I registered as a Democrat. Later, I found myself (when pushed by others) to be pro-life and found the Democratic Party to be anti-me. I converted to the Republican Party and stuck with them for a few years until I realized that despite their rhetoric, they were not all that much different than the Democrats and I have found myself party-less and quite happy too.

I can understand your low opinion of Republicans over the last ten years. I don't look back on the Bush II years with any fondness either, but I don't think that holding every conservative responsible for Bush II is the right thing. Hell, if you guys had given us a decent candidate in 2004, things might have been different. It would have suited me just fine, but I could not and still can't stand John Kerry.

Immie

 

[Lonestar_logic]

Two things:

1. Clearly, not everyone feels that way.
2. I think we're talking about two entirely seperate subjects. To this point, I've refrained from bringing abortion into the discussion because I myself do not have a clear answer on that front.

Of course if your murdering children in the womb you wouldn't want to be called a murderer, but it doesn't change the fact that you are taking the life of another human and ...well.. that makes you a murderer.

"To accept the fact that after fertilization has taken place a new human has come into being is no longer a matter of taste or opinion ... it is plain experimental evidence." The "Father of Modern Genetics" Dr. Jerome Lejeune, Univ. of Descarte, Paris

"By all the criteria of modern molecular biology, life is present from the moment of conception." Dr. Hymie Gordon, Chairman, Department of Genetics at the Mayo Clinic

A scientific textbook called “Basics of Biology” gives five characteristics of living things; these five criteria are found in all modern elementary scientific textbooks:

1. Living things are highly organized.

2. All living things have an ability to acquire materials and energy.

3. All living things have an ability to respond to their environment.

4. All living things have an ability to reproduce.

5. All living things have an ability to adapt.

According to this elementary definition of life, life begins at fertilization, when a sperm unites with an oocyte. From this moment, the being is highly organized, has the ability to acquire materials and energy, has the ability to respond to his or her environment, has the ability to adapt, and has the ability to reproduce (the cells divide, then divide again, etc., and barring pathology and pending reproductive maturity has the potential to reproduce other members of the species). Non-living things do not do these things.

Gee, I wonder how many of those abortions come from people who are getting a divorce?

Typical left wing idiot tactic, shift the subject.

 

[Lonestar_logic]

Of course if your murdering children in the womb you wouldn't want to be called a murderer, but it doesn't change the fact that you are taking the life of another human and ...well.. that makes you a murderer.

...

Non-living things do not do these things.

You have still failed to address the fact that I am speaking of sexuality where you are speaking on abortion--albeit controversial, the issues are markedly different.

Homosexuals bring nothing of value to society, nothing more needs to be said.

 

[jez90nj]

Homosexuals bring nothing of value to society, nothing more needs to be said.

I fundamentally disagree with your statement. They bring culture, class, new ideas and innovation. Some of the most world renowned hairdressers are gay. They push the envelope in design--in home decor, in fashion, in architecture and in art. In both poetry and prose. On stage and on screen. And at the same time, even if you say the aforementioned qualities are meaningless, they are significant to many people.

So what are you saying we should do with them, since they "bring no value to society?" They rob society of nothing, either.

Typical left wing idiot tactic, shift the subject.

Funny, how you tried to do the exact same thing to me. Typical right wing hypocrisy.

 

[Toronado3800]

Later, I found myself (when pushed by others) to be pro-life and found the Democratic Party to be anti-me.

What does pro-life have to do with being Republican? If they're "in office" or president for 20 of the next 28 years and there is no meaningful change in abortion law will you feel cheated? Like the Republican party just used rhetoric to collect the votes of one issue voters then did nothing about it.

By all means I'd vote pro-whatever if it mattered to me. After the third of fourth time of nothing being done I'd lean my lesson.

 

[Immanuel]

Later, I found myself (when pushed by others) to be pro-life and found the Democratic Party to be anti-me.

What does pro-life have to do with being Republican? If they're "in office" or president for 20 of the next 28 years and there is no meaningful change in abortion law will you feel cheated? Like the Republican party just used rhetoric to collect the votes of one issue voters then did nothing about it.

By all means I'd vote pro-whatever if it mattered to me. After the third of fourth time of nothing being done I'd lean my lesson.

Maybe you only read that one sentence?

Did you try reading the entire paragraph?

by Immanuel When I first registered to vote, I registered as a Democrat. Later, I found myself (when pushed by others) to be pro-life and found the Democratic Party to be anti-me. I converted to the Republican Party and stuck with them for a few years until I realized that despite their rhetoric, they were not all that much different than the Democrats and I have found myself party-less and quite happy too.

Immie

 

[Yurt]

What do they really want?

The conservative Republicans have been very clear in their opposition to abortion and gay marriage.
They say they don’t want to get rid of all the gays, merely lead them to God and help them stop being gay.
They say they don’t want to stop teaching “science”, but merely want to add a “religious element”.

Now, the question becomes, “What is the goal?”

Say they were somehow able to “turn all the gays straight”. How would that help marriage? How would that help straight marriage to end the 50% divorce rate? Or the huge number of people participating in the “swinger’s” lifestyle?

So they add a “religious element” to science. What would that do to better science? What great discoveries will come from adding a “religious element”? How will that help people? What great religious conservative scientists right now will “lead the charge”?

Say they are able to completely outlaw abortion. What will they do to keep those women who didn’t want children from abusing the very children they didn’t want? How will they ensure these children grow up safe and well taken care of as well as being loved?

We know what the religious conservative Republicans want to change. But what do they want to change into? What is the goal?

I have never heard the conservative Republicans speak of the “ideal” country. If they could design the perfect country, what would it be?

obama and many religious dems are oppposed to same sex marriage....

your dishonesty on this matter isn't helpful

 

[jeffrockit]

This is not a put-down.

One of the problems I have with many conservatives is that they seem to paint with really broad strokes.
Let's end abortion.
Let's teach the controversy.
We want small government.
Marriage has always been between a man and a woman.

Just for a second, I'll talk about "small government".

When you start getting into a conversation with a conservative and bring up such things as the DMV, the post office, the military, maintaining the infrastructure, regulations on business - the environment , maintaining the law, then it suddenly becomes not so small.

The post was about the perfect world. Well, if everyone could live in a nice house with a large yard and there was plenty of good food and TV's and Computers and cars were just "available" and we all had satisfying jobs and no kids ever got pregnant until they were married.

Conservatives have a longing to return to some past time where "race" wasn't an issue. Where the US reigned "supreme". Where everyone followed the law. Where people were "happy". The problem is those times never really existed except for maybe a few.

It's all about "consequences". Making laws are OK, but what are the unintended consequences?

Not a put down coming from me either, but I would ask you, as you seem to be turning a corner lately, to think about your statement about conservatives painting with a broad brush. I'd ask you to think about the brush you use as well. For a long time, I skipped or skimmed quickly your posts because they were all the same, all conservatives are evil etc.

I've started reading you again and still find that to be the case, but you do seem to be improving a little bit.

Immie

I hope not too much. I have a very low opinion of conservatives in this country for about the last 10 years. Republicans used to be called the "Party of Ideas". Because I'm being nice, I won't say what I call them now.

Your problem is that you are lumping conservaties in with Repubs. One can be a Conservative and not a Repub.

 

[code1211]

This is not a put-down.

One of the problems I have with many conservatives is that they seem to paint with really broad strokes.
Let's end abortion.
Let's teach the controversy.
We want small government.
Marriage has always been between a man and a woman.

Just for a second, I'll talk about "small government".

When you start getting into a conversation with a conservative and bring up such things as the DMV, the post office, the military, maintaining the infrastructure, regulations on business - the environment , maintaining the law, then it suddenly becomes not so small.
The post was about the perfect world. Well, if everyone could live in a nice house with a large yard and there was plenty of good food and TV's and Computers and cars were just "available" and we all had satisfying jobs and no kids ever got pregnant until they were married.

Conservatives have a longing to return to some past time where "race" wasn't an issue. Where the US reigned "supreme". Where everyone followed the law. Where people were "happy". The problem is those times never really existed except for maybe a few.

It's all about "consequences". Making laws are OK, but what are the unintended consequences?

All of the things you discuss are worthy. In speaking abut the size of government, I have no problem with these bureaus, but do see areas in which there are might be abuse.

F'rinstance:

DMV: License fees are charged. They are higher for luxury cars and lower for cheap cars, lower for trucks. I feel like there should be some charge to license a vehicle as the roads need to be maintained. Could this be reflective of social engineering? Are the rates fair in pursuit of maintaining roads? Are the luxury cars taxed more stiffly simply because that's where the money is?

Post Office: There's no better bargain in the world of letter delivery. Should they be looking at their rates? Should the same charge apply to the letter cross town that applies to Florida to Alaska? Take a look at UPS and Fed Ex to find the logical answer.

The Military: Does anyone question this? "To provide for the common defense" comes to mind.

Maintaining the infrastructure: The highway bill, the annual pork fest, is a multi billion dollar orgasm of graft that still allows bridges to collapse. This is a prime example of government waste. The right dollars are allocated and the wrong destinations are appointed.

Regulations on business: If this is what government did and stopped there, there is no problem. It's when there are ridiculous tax arrangements, usery tax rates or regulatory strangulation that it gets a bit stifling. At the time that the framers endorsed the regulation of commerce, the term meant to make it regular, that is, dependable and not subject to undue changes and unpredictable restraints.

"Compliance officers" are universal in banking and insurance and in most large corporations. They exist only to assure that banks and insurance companies comply with regulations put in place by government.

It's obvious from recent events that these guys need to be regulated and just as obvious that the cumbersome regulations are both irrelevant and mis directed.

Environment: The national environment is cleaner today than it has been in the last 50 years. It is becoming cleaner daily.

Maintaining the law: The argument on this seems to be between those advocating individual rights and those advocating societal needs. Do we Mirandize terrorists? Do illegals have a right to Constitutional protections? Does an individual have a right to bear arms? Shout "Fire" in a movie theater? Display a crucifix in a jar of urine? Display a crucifix on a T-shirt in a High School?

Determining what the law is might be the hardest step in this.

In all of the above, my version of Conservatism calls out to the Constitution and to common courtesy. Individual liberty must be restrained by societal realities. All of these things are needed in a society, but the smallest doses are the best.

Everyone has a right to enjoy a public park, but the jack ass with a boom box playing a song saying he'll cut da bitch is not courteous. Likewise for the Fisbee guy running through a picnic or the dog owner not packaging his dogs business.

Rights and responsibilities.

 

[jez90nj]

This is not a put-down.
Environment: The national environment is cleaner today than it has been in the last 50 years. It is becoming cleaner daily.

...

In all of the above, my version of Conservatism calls out to the Constitution and to common courtesy. Individual liberty must be restrained by societal realities. All of these things are needed in a society, but the smallest doses are the best.

By and large, I'll agree with you, but I have two small questions.

1. Do you think the environment is becoming cleaner because people/businesses want it to be cleaner, or because of regulation? I'd daresay the latter. Of course everyone WANTS the environment to be cleaner... but, I doubt people want to spend the money to do it.

2. Regarding "Individual Liberty." The question is, which liberties need to be restrained? Certain restraints (i.e. the marriage issue) just don't make sense. (I will, however, agree that some liberties--i.e. the dogwalking, frisbee playing, boom-boxing individual in the park--ought to be... for want of a better term, regulated)

 

[Qball]

Here's a riddle for everyone:

What's the difference between the Republican Party being, as rdean asserts, intolerant and homophobic, and rdean herself, who never has anything positive to say about conservatives and can't go five posts without going off on some diatribe about how evil and stupid right-wingers are?



































The answer? Nothing.

I'd give more weight to the idea that the right-wing is uniquely intolerant and oppressive...if I had never met a liberal.

 

[Alvin]

Weather you like it or not, our constitution and the declaration of independence were written by people who beleived in a divine presence. It is clear and documented evidence that we are a Christian Judeo nation. Thomas Jefferson the 4th President of the U.S allowed church services in the congress and the White House and also approved federal funding $100 per year for a Catholic Priest who was teaching his religion to indians. He also approved that children be taught to read by reading the bible and religious song books.

You libs try to distort the history and the facts on this. God is against abortions.

That is bollox. Jefferson was a Deist, not a Christian. Yes he did collect many religious ideas (including the Quaran that Ellison was sworn in on as the first Muslim member of congress...He had very specific ideas on the implimentation of religion at a governmental level.

Try these snippets from one of your most profound founding fathers...


Millions of innocent men, women and children, since the introduction of Christianity, have been burnt, tortured, fined and imprisoned; yet we have not advanced one inch towards uniformity.

-Thomas Jefferson, Notes on Virginia, 1782


But it does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods or no God. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg.

-Thomas Jefferson, Notes on Virginia, 1782


What is it men cannot be made to believe!

-Thomas Jefferson to Richard Henry Lee, April 22, 1786. (on the British regarding America, but quoted here for its universal appeal.)


Question with boldness even the existence of a god; because if there be one he must approve of the homage of reason more than that of blindfolded fear.

-Thomas Jefferson, letter to Peter Carr, August 10, 1787


Where the preamble declares, that coercion is a departure from the plan of the holy author of our religion, an amendment was proposed by inserting "Jesus Christ," so that it would read "A departure from the plan of Jesus Christ, the holy author of our religion;" the insertion was rejected by the great majority, in proof that they meant to comprehend, within the mantle of its protection, the Jew and the Gentile, the Christian and Mohammedan, the Hindoo and Infidel of every denomination.

-Thomas Jefferson, Autobiography, in reference to the Virginia Act for Religious Freedom


I concur with you strictly in your opinion of the comparative merits of atheism and demonism, and really see nothing but the latter in the being worshipped by many who think themselves Christians.

-Thomas Jefferson, letter to Richard Price, Jan. 8, 1789 (Richard Price had written to TJ on Oct. 26. about the harm done by religion and wrote "Would not Society be better without Such religions? Is Atheism less pernicious than Demonism?")


I never submitted the whole system of my opinions to the creed of any party of men whatever in religion, in philosophy, in politics, or in anything else where I was capable of thinking for myself. Such an addiction is the last degradation of a free and moral agent.

-Thomas Jefferson, letter to Francis Hopkinson, March 13, 1789


They [the clergy] believe that any portion of power confided to me, will be exerted in opposition to their schemes. And they believe rightly; for I have sworn upon the altar of god, eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man. But this is all they have to fear from me: and enough, too, in their opinion.

-Thomas Jefferson to Dr. Benjamin Rush, Sept. 23, 1800


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.

-Thomas Jefferson, letter to Danbury Baptist Association, CT., Jan. 1, 1802


History, I believe, furnishes no example of a priest-ridden people maintaining a free civil government. This marks the lowest grade of ignorance of which their civil as well as religious leaders will always avail themselves for their own purposes.

-Thomas Jefferson to Alexander von Humboldt, Dec. 6, 1813.


The whole history of these books [the Gospels] is so defective and doubtful that it seems vain to attempt minute enquiry into it: and such tricks have been played with their text, and with the texts of other books relating to them, that we have a right, from that cause, to entertain much doubt what parts of them are genuine. In the New Testament there is internal evidence that parts of it have proceeded from an extraordinary man; and that other parts are of the fabric of very inferior minds. It is as easy to separate those parts, as to pick out diamonds from dunghills.

-Thomas Jefferson, letter to John Adams, January 24, 1814


Christianity neither is, nor ever was a part of the common law.

-Thomas Jefferson, letter to Dr. Thomas Cooper, February 10, 1814


In every country and in 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.

-Thomas Jefferson, letter to Horatio G. Spafford, March 17, 1814


If we did a good act merely from love of God and a belief that it is pleasing to Him, whence arises the morality of the Atheist? ...Their virtue, then, must have had some other foundation than the love of God.

-Thomas Jefferson, letter to Thomas Law, June 13, 1814

Ridicule is the only weapon which can be used against unintelligible propositions. Ideas must be distinct before reason can act upon them; and no man ever had a distinct idea of the trinity. It is the mere Abracadabra of the mountebanks calling themselves the priests of Jesus."

-Thomas Jefferson, letter to Francis Adrian Van der Kemp, 30 July, 1816

My opinion is that there would never have been an infidel, if there had never been a priest. The artificial structures they have built on the purest of all moral systems, for the purpose of deriving from it pence and power, revolts those who think for themselves, and who read in that system only what is really there.

-Thomas Jefferson, letter to Mrs. Samuel H. Smith, August, 6, 1816

You say you are a Calvinist. I am not. I am of a sect by myself, as far as I know.

-Thomas Jefferson, letter to Ezra Stiles Ely, June 25, 1819


As you say of yourself, I too am an Epicurian. I consider the genuine (not the imputed) doctrines of Epicurus as containing everything rational in moral philosophy which Greece and Rome have left us.

-Thomas Jefferson, letter to William Short, Oct. 31, 1819


Priests...dread the advance of science as witches do the approach of daylight and scowl on the fatal harbinger announcing the subversions of the duperies on which they live.

-Thomas Jefferson, Letter to Correa de Serra, April 11, 1820

Among the sayings and discourses imputed to him [Jesus] by his biographers, I find many passages of fine imagination, correct morality, and of the most lovely benevolence; and others again of so much ignorance, so much absurdity, so much untruth, charlatanism, and imposture, as to pronounce it impossible that such contradictions should have proceeded from the same being.

-Thomas Jefferson, letter to William Short, April 13, 1820


To talk of immaterial existences is to talk of nothings. To say that the human soul, angels, god, are immaterial, is to say they are nothings, or that there is no god, no angels, no soul. I cannot reason otherwise: but I believe I am supported in my creed of materialism by Locke, Tracy, and Stewart. At what age of the Christian church this heresy of immaterialism, this masked atheism, crept in, I do not know. But heresy it certainly is.

-Thomas Jefferson, letter to John Adams, Aug. 15, 1820


Man once surrendering his reason, has no remaining guard against absurdities the most monstrous, and like a ship without rudder, is the sport of every wind.

-Thomas Jefferson to James Smith, 1822.

I can never join Calvin in addressing his god. He was indeed an Atheist, which I can never be; or rather his religion was Daemonism. If ever man worshipped a false god, he did.

-Thomas Jefferson, letter to John Adams, April 11, 1823


And the day will come when the mystical generation of Jesus, by the supreme being as his father in the womb of a virgin will be classed with the fable of the generation of Minerve in the brain of Jupiter. But may we hope that the dawn of reason and freedom of thought in these United States will do away with this artificial scaffolding, and restore to us the primitive and genuine doctrines of this most venerated reformer of human errors.

-Thomas Jefferson, Letter to John Adams, April 11, 1823


It is between fifty and sixty years since I read it [the Apocalypse], and I then considered it merely the ravings of a maniac, no more worthy nor capable of explanation than the incoherences of our own nightly dreams.

-Thomas Jefferson, letter to General Alexander Smyth, Jan. 17, 1825


May it be to the world, what I believe it will be, (to some parts sooner, to others later, but finally to all,) the signal of arousing men to burst the chains under which monkish ignorance and superstition had persuaded them to bind themselves, and to assume the blessings and security of self-government. All eyes are opened, or opening, to the rights of man. The general spread of the light of science has already laid open to every view the palpable truth, that the mass of mankind has not been born with saddles on their backs, nor a favored few booted and spurred, ready to ride them legitimately, by the grace of God.

-Thomas Jefferson, letter to Roger C. Weightman, June 24, 1826 (in the last letter he penned)

 

[Qball]

That is bollox. Jefferson was a Deist, not a Christian. Yes he did collect many religious ideas (including the Quaran that Ellison was sworn in on as the first Muslim member of congress...He had very specific ideas on the implimentation of religion at a governmental level.

Deism is a religious philosophy, not a religion per se. Though he allied closely with it when it came to his political views -- namely disestablishment of the church and keeping it separate from the notion of government -- he's largely considered to be Unitarian, though he was associated with the Episcopal Church during his lifetime as well.

 

[Alvin]

That is bollox. Jefferson was a Deist, not a Christian. Yes he did collect many religious ideas (including the Quaran that Ellison was sworn in on as the first Muslim member of congress...He had very specific ideas on the implimentation of religion at a governmental level.

Deism is a religious philosophy, not a religion per se. Though he allied closely with it when it came to his political views -- namely disestablishment of the church and keeping it separate from the notion of government -- he's largely considered to be Unitarian, though he was associated with the Episcopal Church during his lifetime as well.

You can not be a deist and a Christian. That's kind of fundemental isn't it? If anything, he was more humanist than anything else. Look up the Jefferson bible...
And humanism does not equate well with Christianity either.

 

[Qball]

That is bollox. Jefferson was a Deist, not a Christian. Yes he did collect many religious ideas (including the Quaran that Ellison was sworn in on as the first Muslim member of congress...He had very specific ideas on the implimentation of religion at a governmental level.

Deism is a religious philosophy, not a religion per se. Though he allied closely with it when it came to his political views -- namely disestablishment of the church and keeping it separate from the notion of government -- he's largely considered to be Unitarian, though he was associated with the Episcopal Church during his lifetime as well.

You can not be a deist and a Christian. That's kind of fundemental isn't it? If anything, he was more humanist than anything else. Look up the Jefferson bible...
And humanism does not equate well with Christianity either.

You're right, but I think deism more accurately describes Jefferson's approach to government more than his personal religious beliefs. That's why I think the two are separate yet equally important.