The Founders ate the signing of the Declaration of Independence
When I was growing up in the fifties and sixties, almost no one in politics or everyday life went around proclaiming, “I am a Christian.” If indeed you were a Christian—that is, someone who considers Jesus Christ the Messiah—you identified yourself as a Lutheran, a Methodist, a Baptist, a Catholic, and so on in excelsis in order to let others know where you stood in the vast American religious landscape.
Calling oneself a Christian today, by contrast, has a special, politicized meaning. For most people in public life, this self-identification suggests a particular form of conservative Christianity, a brand of religion that seeks not only to proselytize but to impose its values on others through the machinery of the state. The huge exception to this rule is President Barack Obama, who has been forced by the birther-paranoids to advertise his credentials as a Christian in order to refute the lie that he is a “secret Muslim.”
I would love to read this article but you cannot- you get to the Altnet website and cannot get on it unless you donate money before you see the site- bizarre and annoying- how would I know if I like the site without seeing it ?
Part of the problem may be related to the book written by Thomas Jefferson, who’s book titled “The Jefferson Bible” and sub-titled The Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth” which was handed out to newly elected Senators when they swore their oath of office until 1930. If one actually reads the book one finds out Jefferson’s dislike of the power of clergy to corrupt the government, not to promote Christianity. Jefferson was more of a Universalist not unlike myself. I detest the power of clergy to have influence on government officials. Jefferson saw the bad results of this kind of power in the “old country”. and did not want that for the U.S.A.