Today at work/school I was in the teacher's lunch room when the subject of atheist presidents came up. One person said, "We have never had an atheist president." Then she corrected herself and said, "Well, an outspoken one anyway." I said that it is likely we did and pointed to a few presidents of the past that were deist or atheist.

Another teacher then said, "Well it isn't surprising that we haven't had an atheist president. This country was founded on..."

Before he got it out, I started shaking my head "no." Then he said the founding fathers were all Christians. I refuted this myth (whith evidence)and then he said, "Well they all believed in something like a higher power.

I refuted this. (with evidence)

Then he said, "Well I am going to research it more closely, but I am pretty sure..."

The conversation ended there.

These people drive me N-U-T-S.

They may drive you nuts, but you handle them pretty well. People like to assume that those they admire are like themselves. I'm pretty sure that most Americans think that all of the Founding Fathers were Christians. I need to know who had what belief myself, just so that I can be exact when I tell people the truth. Jefferson and Franklin were atheists, right?

By the way, there's this website (www.celebatheists.com) about celebrity atheists, agnostics and skeptics. When people realize that some of those they like or admire are atheists, it might help them realize that they should be careful about making the kinds of assumptions that you pointed out earlier. It makes them think.

Judy said:

"Jefferson and Franklin were atheists, right?"

I doubt it. Too little was known about the natural world to reject the idea of a Creator outright. Franklin was almost always sarcastic when referring to devine power, though (something lost on the Christian fundamentalists when the quote him).

Jefferson did publish a Bible with all references to the divinity of Jesus (the miracles) removed.

Whenever people tell you the founding fathers were Christians, ask them: "What else would they have been?" Jews? Hindus? Animists?

Not atheists. The religious fervor of 17th century Europe made sure anyone of that bent met a gruesome end.

The founding father's views on Christianity would definitely not meet the modern definition of Christian, as the fundamentalists see it.

At most, you can claim the founding fathers were enlightened rationalists, who went along with Christianity for the benefits (which at that the time included Biblical justification for slavery).

Thomas Paine was likely a Deist (God has left the building!) Abraham Lincoln had no faith either, and evidently only used religion for rhetorical purposes.

The majority of the founding fathers were deist, not christian. Deism was a really close cousin to atheism back in that time period. After all, if your belief is that a god created the universe but is not involved with it in any way after its initial creation, you are pretty close to atheism. Atheism just removes that initial cause. I recommend "Fighting Words" by Robin Morgan if anyone wants to read up on the founding fathers and their personal beliefs.

Personally I feel it doesn't matter in any way. They did a lot of things back then that I don't agree with. The question to me is what is correct for us now. Either way, I think it is all just wanting to look to someone we think of as smart and good and have them tell us what is correct for us.

That isn't it for me at all Kristen. My only point is that Christians constantly try to claim that the founding fathers were religious and founded the country with Christian principles and values in mind. Then they attempt to justify all of their crazy beliefs using this claim (that there should be no seperation of church and state, no evolution taught in schools, no abortion, etc).

I like to be able to show that these claims are simply not true.

I agree totally. I tend to just ask them at the end of that type of argument. Why would it matter?

I remember someone saying that to my friend and I back at the protest for Last Temptation of Christ and she said it founded on principles of slavery and women as chattel too. He said that maybe that was a good thing... Sick. What a "good" Christian....

From this side of the Atlantic (UK) it seems to me that any politician in the USA that claimed to be an atheist just wouldn't get anywhere. So would they admit it even if they were an atheist?

I must admit I liked the Alan Alder character in the West Wing. It was a great episode with him and Bartlet eating ice cream in the White House kitchens.

"I recommend "Fighting Words" by Robin Morgan if anyone wants to read up on the founding fathers and their personal beliefs."

I'd also recommend Moral Minority: Our Skeptical Founding Fathers on this subject.


Freethinkers: A History of American Secularism also looks interesting.

The only reason I wouldn't read Freethinkers is because I read The Age of American Unreason by the same author, Susan Jacoby.

She is a rather booooorrrrring read.

nathan wrote: "The only reason I wouldn't read Freethinkers is because I read The Age of American Unreason by the same author,
Susan Jacoby.

She is a rather booooorrrrring read."

I strongly disagree with this. I can't speak to her prose in the book you read, but I'm in the middle of Freethinkers, and it's fascinating. I would say that it's even fired my sense of patriotism in a way that few books could nowadays. The greatness of this country doesn't lie in its presidents or military leaders, but in those who have dissented and fought to expand the rights of others to dissent. What Jacoby chronicle in her book is a whole intellectual tradition that is a distinctly American one which the Right has pathologized as treasonous or decadent and the Left is afraid to acknowledge. But it's people like Thomas Paine, Robert Ingersoll and Elizabeth Cady Stanton that still make America and its traditions worth fighting for, even if their more unorthodox ideas have been unceremoniously tossed down the memory hole by people across the political spectrum.

I found the Age of America Reason not boring. Jacoby's breakdown of the issues along both chronological and cultural time lines presented the material in a very thought provoking way. Her personal anecdotes removed the "academic" feel books likes this often have.

Yes, but her personal anecdotes were the bulk of the book. I found them tiresome.