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Tag Archives: separation of church and state

Have We Been Deluded?

Posted on July 12, 2012 by Patti Wells

I’m going to quit talking about this soon (maybe!), but I recently heard a news personality say the first amendment was “freedom from religion.” See what I mean from my last post? We must get back to what the founders meant, not what the court’s have changed the Constitution to mean. One more time, the First Amendment says, “Congress shall make no law establishing a religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” This is not freedom from religion, but freedom from Congress’s establishing a religion or interfering with individual religious exercises. How much clearer can this be? How do we expect justices to correctly interpret a 2000 page bill if they can’t get this one right?

The Bible says Satan “deceives those who are perishing. They perish because they refused to love the truth and so be saved. For this reason God sends them a powerful delusion so that they will believe the lie and so that all will be condemned who have not believed the truth but have delighted in wickedness.” [2 Thess 2:9-12]

Have we been deluded? Consider the following:
  • The Pilgrims landed on Plymouth Rock with little more than their Geneva Bibles and their Calvinistic teachings that church and civil government should be separate and that man can serve God in any area of life. They knew first-hand the tyrrany and persecution of a state run religion, and they realized the importance of education in achieving their goal. Toward that end, they passed the Old Deluder Act in 1647, recognizing “the chief project of that old deluder, Satan” was to keep people from learning the true meaning of the original Scriptures.
  • The New England Primer, published by Benjamin Harris in 1690, was used by students into the 19th century. The Primer used the Bible to teach reading. Note the content of the 1877 edition, especially the questions at the end.
  • Upon completion of the Constitution, the Second Continental Congress passed the Northwest Ordinance off 1787 to determine how new states should be added to the union. One of the its stated purposes was to “extend the principles of civil and religious liberty.” [Section 13]. “Religion, morality, and knowledge, being necessary to good government and the happiness of mankind, schools and the means of education shall forever be encouraged.” [Section 14, Article 3]. The Congress saw the need for schools to teach children religion, morality and knowledge, in that order. They knew that citizens educated in Biblical principles were necessary for good government. “When the godly are in authority, the people rejoice, but when the wicked are in power, they groan.” [Prov 29:2]

Benjamin Franklin wrote, “History will also afford frequent opportunities of showing the necessity of a public religion…and the excellency of the Christian religion above all others, ancient or modern.”

Have we been deluded? Have we listened to the lie long enough to believe it? What do you think?

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Separation of Church and State

Posted on May 28, 2012 by Patti Wells

The term “separation of church and state” is bandied about today as if it were a vital part of the U. S. Constitution. Not only is it nowhere to be found in that document, but the phrase has come to mean the exact opposite of its original intent. “Separation of church and state” has been used to systematically dismantle our  Constitutional rights granted by the First Amendment.

Joseph Goebbels, Adolph Hitler’s Minister of Enlightenment and Propaganda, said, “If you tell a lie long enough, people will eventually start to believe it.” He also stated, “The essence of propaganda consists in winning people over to an idea so sincerely, so vitally, that in the end they succumb to it utterly and can never escape it.” I’m afraid that has happened in this case.

So what is in the Constitution?  The First Amendment states:  “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” Therefore, Congress is prohibited from establishing a state-controlled religion or denomination like the one the Pilgrims fled in coming to America. In England the king was head of the church, as well as the government, so he could punish those who violated the religious edicts he imposed. Our founders envisioned a country where Christians could practice their religion freely as long as they respected the rights of others to freely practice theirs.

The phrase “separation of church and state” was penned by Thomas Jefferson in a letter to the Baptists of Danbury, Connecticut. In 1801, the Baptists, concerned that the First Amendment would not go far enough to protect their religious liberty, wrote a letter to President Thomas Jefferson. He replied that the First Amendment “created a wall of separation between the church and state” so the federal government would not be able to infringe on their rights to practice their religious beliefs.  View the letters here.

Two days after he wrote the reply, President Jefferson rode his horse down Pennsylvania Avenue to church, as was his usual practice.   By the way, the church he attended was held in the United States Capitol Building. Obviously, the framers of this republic saw no problem with Christian worship in a government building.

Although Thomas Jefferson may have been one of the least religious among our founding fathers, he knew the importance of a moral, educated society in the proper functioning of the government he had been instrumental in forming. He knew that Christianity provided the self-control that is necessary in a free society.  He had seen God’s Providence in the birthing of this nation, one founded on Christian principles.

I don’t think he would’ve been very happy about the use of his words today.

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