American Presidents Writing on Christianity

George Washington said, "Being no bigot, I am disposed to indulge (humor) Christian ministers and the church." Washington refused to take communion, looking upon it as superstition.

The Treaty of Tripoli, negotiated during George Washington's administration stated in Article 11: "As the government of the United States is not in any sense founded on the Christian religion...." The treaty was ratified unanimously by the Senate in 1797.

John Adams said, "The doctrine of the divinity of Jesus has made a convenient cover for absurdity." Adams signed the Treaty of Tripoli.

Thomas Jefferson, author of our Declaration of Independence said, "I have examined all the known superstitions of the world, and I do not find in our particular superstition of Christianity one redeeming feature. They are all alike, founded on fables and mythology. What has been the effect of this coercion? To make one half the world fools and the other half hypocrites. And to support roguery and error all over the Earth.... the Bible is a dunghill."

"In every country and in every age the priest has been hostile to liberty; he is always in alliance with the despot, abetting his abuses in return for protection to his own." "The serious enemies are the priests of the different religious sects to whose spells on the human mind its improvement is ominous"
"It is not to be understood that I am with him [Jesus] in all his doctrines. I am a Materialist."

"His [Calvin's] religion was demonism. If ever man worshiped a false God, he did. The being described in his five points is ... a demon of malignant spirit. It would be more pardonable to believe in no God at all, than to blaspheme him by the atrocious attributes of Calvin"

Writing to Jefferson on the 5th of May, 1817 John Adams declares. "This would be the best of all possible worlds if there were no religion in it." Jefferson replied: "If by religion, we are to understand sectarian dogmas, in which no two of them agree, then your exclamation on that hypothesis is just, 'that this would be the best of worlds if there were no religion in it' "

James Madison, author of the Constitution and Bill of Rights said, "A just government, instituted to perpetuate liberty, does not need the church or the clergy. During almost 15 centuries, the legal establishment of Christianity has been on trial. What have been its fruits? These are the fruits, more or less, in all places: pride and indolence in the clergy, ignorance and servility in the laity, and in both clergy and laity, superstition, bigotry and persecution."

Madison passionately objected to state-supported chaplains in Congress or in the military as well as the exemption of churches from taxation.

Abraham Lincoln said, "Christianity is not my religion. I have never united myself to any church because I could never give assent to the long, complicated statements of Christian doctrine and dogma which characterize their articles of belief." According to Mary Todd Lincoln, her husband,”... would never be baptized, never joined a church and never made any profession of faith.” Moreover she said: "My husband is not a Christian, but is a religious man, I think."

Dark Ages

The adoration of Jesus, the new god, by the Laguna gang of three, Jay Grant, Edward T. Graney, and Al Enderle and the exclusion of everything just and humane has blinded these philistines to the realities of history, their own holy book, and just plain common decency. Then in a twist of irrational zeal, in letter and column, this gang continues to press upon the people of our town a religious and political point of view which has its philosophical roots in the the Dark Ages.

Graney’s use of the bible to justify an atrocious philosophy of political morality is nothing more than blind hypocrisy. When Graney condemns that baptist preacher’s son and Blue Dog hypocrite Gary Condin and ex-president Clinton for their philandering, Graney exposed his ignorance of recent history. Graney conveniently forgets that christian-corporatist Newt Gingrich had two affairs while in Congress including one while Speaker of the House. He forgets christian-corporatist Henry Hyde, the leader of the impeach Clinton crowd, destroyed his friends marriage by sleeping with his friends wife. He forgets christian-corporatist Bob Livingston, the Louisiana Republican who was touted far and wide as Newt Gingrich’s replacement for House Speaker, had to withdraw when it was discovered he was sleeping with his wife and four of his secretaries. In past letters to the local newspaper Graney condemned Hillary Clinton and called Laura Bush a wonderful person and an example of morality restored to the White House. Tell me Mr. Graney, if Hillary had been speeding while drunk driving, ran a stop sign and broad sided another car killing its driver, would you be as kind to her as you are to Laura Bush? Clinton is a bad guy because he did not inhale that marijuana cigarette, but Scrub Bush is a wonderful man when it is known he snorted enough cocaine to blow up a dust storm in west Texas? Have you ever heard of the “shoe on the other foot test?” Your one-sided morality is based on bible thumping dramatics justifying the corporate capitalist destruction of our democracy and natural environment. Admit it Mr. Graney, what you and your fellow travelers really want is a christian-corporatist theocracy enforced by a new christian Inquisition.

Jay Grant and his fundamentalist/charismatic pals have deconstructed christianity to a set of mutually exclusive categories which are only asserted, never proven. In their philosophy of christianity there is no logic, no connection to natural history, and certainly no connection to humanity. Evidence for this warped and ossified thinking is provided by Grant in his weakly (sic) column where he writes Jews are a race rather than a religion, love of Jesus is greater than love of one’s spouse or family, evolution is nonsense, and women are nothing more than incubators. Grant’s religious philosophy is based on Calvinist greed and the primitive capitalist need to accumulate wealth as an indicator of a heavenly destination. Grant and his reactionary christian pals use their wooden ideas of love and life as a vehicle to promote hate, war, greed, and poverty. In Grant’s world view christian soldiers are sent out to defend a christian corporate state that will not provide a living wage or universal health care for its own people while invading and exploiting foreign lands peopled by poor non or “lesser” christians. It is Grant and his ilk’s brand of christianity which reveals the darkness of their, not our, collective hearts.

Turning to Al Enderle, I must ask the following: Mr. Enderle, do you really need to torture and mutilate the facts to gain christian converts? Does a christian end justify deceptive means?