Even the More "Secular" States During the Founding Were Christian

Conversations That Matter

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Hey guys, it's John with the Conversations That Matter podcast, and I am walking.

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It is just past the golden hour here. The sun is actually setting on this beautiful trail, and I am thinking about my book, which is called

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Against the Waves, Christian Order in a Liberal Age. You can go to againstthewavesbook .com.

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That's againstthewavesbook .com if you want to order a copy. In one of the chapters called

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The Soul of America, I talk a little bit about the Founding Fathers, the origins of this country's

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Christian connection, and it really is dazzling. When you get into this stuff, you're amazed at how thoroughly embedded

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Christianity is. It's not even something that they were needing to express often because it just was part of their life.

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One of the things I talk about, I'm going to read for you a little section, is that New York, which is where I'm walking right now, is one of the states without a religious test because nine of the 13 states had religious tests during the adoption of the

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Constitution. New York was not one of them, but it stated in its Constitution, 1777, that free exercise of worship and liberty of conscience shall not be so construed as to excuse acts of licentiousness.

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So in other words, you can have blasphemy laws, basically. And this is one of the more liberal states, supposedly.

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The document limits its religious conception to Christian ministers of the gospel and priests of any denomination.

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So even when it's talking about religion, it's talking about Christianity. 10 years later,

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Virginia, which also precluded a religious test, and religious test just means the people that held office didn't have to agree to a statement of faith or anything to hold office, right?

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I mean, that used to be common, but Virginia didn't require that. 10 years later, it stated in its

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Constitution that the free exercise of religion was governed by, listen to this, the mutual duty of all to practice

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Christian forbearance, love, and charity towards each other. Now, this is just a little small sample, but I am taking you to the examples from the most liberal, supposedly, the most multicultural and diverse and expanding the openness and religious liberty beyond Christianity.

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I'm trying to take you to those examples so you can see that even when those are brought up from that time period, it's still privileging

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Christianity. It still has Christian conceptions of religion and God and so forth. And this is just all over the early part of our country's history.

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So I encourage you, there's a lot more in this chapter, Against the Waves, Christian Order in a

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Liberal Age. Go to againstthewavesbook .com. That's againstthewavesbook .com.