Fin De Siecle Religion and the Price of Freedom

I emerge from another self-imposed public exile with a mind overburdened with the daily privation of intellectual discourse. Every day I read another piece of excrescence from Dinesh D’Souza, or a local opinion column about the collectivism, communism, or statism of non-belief, about how atheism is teaming up with Islam, threatening our kids, or destroying society; everyday I force myself, for some unknown mental sadistic reason, to scroll through another contentious and jejune dictum on the greatness of superstition and mental obedience. I came home last night to another piece of D’Souza’s agitprop, and that shit-eating grin of his, and I lost it emotionally. The unending stream of garbage spouting the same refuted points is exhausting. I don’t have the time or the energy to single handily combat all of it. Most of the time I pass the articles over to AANR, sometimes I feel better commenting myself, but of late it just seems to be gaining momentum. One-liner punditry, worthless, and devoid of any real substance, spewed over and over; I marvel at my passionate contemporaries’ ability to brush off most of it as merely the death throes of a wasting and dying religion.

Let them have their precious beliefs one might say; and I hear you. My issue is not the lay-believer, the weekly participant, or even the piously devout who twist their own revelations towards reason to fit into society. On the contrary, my problem lies with the twisting of reality to fit into the revelations! The revision of history, the systematic theology of apologetics and Christian defense of Theonomy, and the current political Theocratic Dominionism prevailing through our culture and politics.

The abuses of the clergy and their megalithic churches is undeniable. It is a matter of principle and reason, and chiefly a matter of philosophical understanding.

The modern day atheist is the intellectual descendant of Enlightenment monism. This is not a theory, this is fact. It was with even greater courage and greatness that any true non-believers existed prior to 1859, to mollify the mental disposition towards authoritative natural conscience would have required profound intelligence, prevalent in men like Spinoza and Hume.

Today it is easier to obtain the truth, requiring nothing more than selective readings of great minds. I always ask that in the spirit of discourse one reads and understands the best the opposition has to offer, as to realize that their best is wholly insufficient. Scientists do balk at the “atheism” of evolutionary science, but evolution is the final brick in the philosophical destruction of revealed religions. Today it appears as if every major politician and leader must pander to the believers in our time in a way that is more barbaric than the early founding of our country. The deism of Jefferson, Paine, Franklin, Allen, Washington, Madison, and Adams was contrary to every utterance of the modern churches. Rights are endowed by the Creator, or Nature’s God, but the the rule of the people is by the people, not a god, and certainly not the god of the revealed religions! A single quote, completely in context, can sum the entire disdain for some of the most important Founding Fathers, if there still remains any uncertainty about the subject. In context, imagine Hillary Clinton, John McCain, or Barack Obama saying any of the phrases, and having a chance to remain in Presidential contention. Christianity has changed little since this time period, but it has gained tremendous power, against all expressive attempts to prevent a Theocracy. Imagine, as I have, the response Washington gave to Hancock about chaplains being assigned to the military; “Among many other weighty objections to the Measure, it has been suggested, that it has a tendency to introduce religious disputes into the Army, which above all things should be avoided, and in many instances would compel men to a mode of Worship which they do not profess.” He would not get away this today!

John Adams:
“Where do we find a precept in the Bible for Creeds, Confessions, Doctrines and Oaths, and whole carloads of trumpery that we find religion encumbered with in these days?”

Thomas Jefferson:
“The day will come when the mystical generation of Jesus, by the Supreme Being as his father, in the womb of a virgin, will be classed with the fable of the generation of Minerva in the brain of Jupiter.”

James Madison:
“The difficulty of reconciling the Xn [Christian] mind to the absence of a religious tuition from a University established by law and at the common expense, is probably less with us than with you. The settled opinion here is that religion is essentially distinct from Civil Govt. and exempt from its cognizance; that a connection between them is injurous to both; that there are causes in the human breast, which insure the perpetuity of religion without the aid of law; that rival sects, with equal rights, exercise mutual censorships in favor of good morals; that if new sects arise with absurd opinions or overheated imaginations, the proper remedies lie in time, forbearance and example; that a legal establishment of religion without a toleration could not be thought of, and without a toleration, is no security for public quiet & harmony, but rather a source itself of discord & animosity; and finally that these opinions are support by experience, which has shewn that every relaxation of the alliance between Law & religion, from the partial example of Holland, to its consummation in Pennsylvania Delaware NJ, &c, has been found as safe in practice as it is sound in theory. Prior to the Revolution, the Episcopal Church was established by law in this State. On the Declaration of independence it was left with all other sects, to a self-support. And no doubt exists that there is much more of religion among us now than there ever was before the change; and particularly in the Sect which enjoyed the legal patronage. This proves rather more than, that the law is not necessary to the support of religion.”

Benjamin Franklin:
“…Some books against Deism fell into my hands….It happened that they wrought an effect on me quite contrary to what was intended by them; for the arguments of the Deists, which were quote to be refuted, appeared to me much stronger than the refutations, in short, I soon became a thorough Deist.”

Thomas Paine:
“The most detestable wickedness, the most horrid cruelties, and the greatest miseries that have afflicted the human race have had their origin in this thing called revelation, or revealed religion.”

Ethan Allen:
“Denominated a Deist, the reality of which I have never disputed, being conscious that I am no Christian.”

—In this, I share only the philosophical belief that the enemy is not the religious, and that other atheists and agnostics ought to take the word Freethinker instead. “Revealed” religion is the enemy of reason, that which accepts revelation as in any way a reliable source of knowledge and information about the world. All religions that profess revelation as this source, are the enemies of reason, and contrary to the Freethinker, contrary to the Founders of this country.