A scholar sympathetic to the Christian nationalist perspective wrote in 1950, “One of the chaplains for eight years from 1792 on, complained of the thin attendance of members of Congress at prayers. He attributed the usual two-thirds absences to the prevalence of freethinking.”29 He also noted other complaints that the “Congressional Chaplaincy was not always treated with respect,” including that congressmen nominated freethinkers like Thomas Paine to fill the chaplaincy.30 Not exactly a pious group.
