The American Religion

"We have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion. Avarice, ambition, revenge, or gallantry, would break the strongest cords of our Constitution as a whale goes through a net. Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other."

John Adams October 11, 1798

“We have staked the whole future of American civilization, not upon the power of government, far from it. We’ve staked the future of all our political institutions upon our capacity…to sustain ourselves according to the Ten Commandments of God.”

James Madison, 1778 to the General Assembly of the State of Virginia

I had a loving friend (I mean that literally, not facetiously) who replied to a post I made on a social network and thought I would share it and my response. The post involved me encouraging my Christian friends to take a look at the Manhattan Declaration and if they agreed with it consider signing it. Here were the three comments made to that post.

1) “It's not a Christian country. It's a country with christians in it.”

2) "Two quotes from James Madison:"
“And I have no doubt that every new example will succeed, as every past one has done, in showing that religion and Government will both exist in greater purity, the less they are mixed together.”
“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 with blood for centuries.”

3) "The Christians are fine, Rick, they're protected. It's the rest of us I'm concerned with. Please note:"

Artilcle VI of the Constitution states that “no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States...

Here was my response.

“You make some good points. But first make this distinction, I wrote this post on the Manhattan Declaration TO Christians of America and never insinuated this is a Christian nation. Our founders did not use that religious characteristic. But they all agreed to the “American Religion” essential for all philosophies including the basic tenets of our nations founding. This means they drew their perspectives from all religious ideas of the time, philosophers (heavily on Cicero) and similar historical readings. This gave them principals (28 according to W. Cleon Skousen, “The 5000 Year Leap”) which all the founders agreed upon to include even the deists and agnostics present.
     Now, Christian principals fit nicely into this frame but it was meant to be the essential components of our republic government: not validate or promote any religious ideals upon the governed. Hence, the reason for the separation of Church and state. They did not want any particular sect or denomination to pollute the tenets they agreed upon for a good government. All the founders agreed with this and the quotes from Madison simply support it. They wanted separation OF religion not FROM religion. And finally, the Christians are not fine or anyone else who calls themselves Americans, because our current course is undermining the fore mentioned principals our republic is founded upon. Unless you are for socialism or something even more constricting, then everyone should try to express ways to keep us from going down that road. For a Christian, that might mean the Manhattan Declaration but maybe not. There are many other petitions to achieve the same goal.”



There are hundreds of quotes by our founders that support this concept. I happen to be a Christian and the American way of government fits nicely with my philosophies. But every patriotic American, people who believe in our republic, need or should understand the principals our nation is founded upon and at the very least adhere to the “American Religion” or if it makes you feel better, the “American Philosophy”.