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From: za56@sdcc3.ucsd.EDU (Brian McNeill)
Newsgroups: talk.religion.misc,net.religion.christian
Subject: Re: Christian Roots of the U.S.
Message-ID: <3577@sdcc3.ucsd.EDU>
Date: Wed, 10-Sep-86 15:43:45 EDT
Article-I.D.: sdcc3.3577
Posted: Wed Sep 10 15:43:45 1986
Date-Received: Mon, 15-Sep-86 02:52:27 EDT
References: <1583@vax135.UUCP>
Reply-To: za56@sdcc3.UUCP (Brian McNeill)
Followup-To: talk.religion.misc
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Xref: linus talk.religion.misc:40 net.religion.christian:4621

In article <1583@vax135.UUCP> gks@vax135.UUCP (Ken Swanson) writes:
>The following is based on excerpts from a sermon, "Church and State," by
>Question:	Did the founders of this nation intend it to be a secularist,
>		neutral, humanist nation; or did they believe that this was
>		a nation created to the glory of God and that it was to be a
>		godly, Christian state?
>
>[Constitution of Virginia, 1620]
>[Plymouth Rock, 1600s]
>[Fundamental orders of Connecticut, 1639]

These were not of our country.  This was before the revolution, and
listed were colonies of the British empire.  In the constitution, 
it expressly states that there shall be a separation between church
and state, and that it shall remain unbroken.  Let me point out 
something you might have missed...a large portion of the Founding
Fathers were atheists, agnostics, or deistic freethinkers, including
such people as Thomas Jefferson (agnostic), Thomas Paine (atheist),
Ben Franklin (freethinker), John Adams (atheist), etc.  And these
were the people who founded our country, not the Puritans and
whatnot that you quoted.

>---------------------------------------------------------------------------
>Ken Swanson
>AT&T Bell Labs
>... ihnp4!vax135!gks

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