"America is a Christian nation and it was founded on Christian principles." This is the Big Lie that is constantly being uttered from fundamentalist pulpits. This untruth has been repeated so often, that most Christians believe that Jesus Christ was one of the Founding Fathers of our great nation.

This was not true when America was founded more than two centuries ago, and it's certainly not true today ;America is one of the most religiously diverse nations on the planet. It's this ethnic, religious and political diversity that's our greatest strength; religious polarization can only weaken our union.

If fundamentalists lie about this important matter -- they shouldn't be believed when they wax indignant on moral and spiritual matters. America is not a Christian nation; abortion is not murder; feminists are not witches; abstinence-only sex education does not work; SpongeBob and Tinky Winky are not gay (not that there is anything wrong with being homosexual); and George W. Bush does not have a direct line to the Almighty.

Our nation was founded not on Christian principles but on Enlightenment ideals.The intellectual leaders who created America believed that human reason could be used to combat ignorance, superstition and tyranny ; they had a natural animosity toward organized religion. It's not surprising that God is only a footnote in the grand documents that are the bedrock of our democracy.

The Constitution makes no mention whatever of any deity. In the eighty-five essays that make up The Federalist Papers, the Supreme Being is mentioned only twice. In the Declaration of Independence, the Big Guy gets two brief nods: A reference to "the Laws of Nature and Nature's God," and the often quoted line about men being "endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights."

If the Founding Fathers were Christians and they wanted to establish a Christian nation, then why didn't they mention Jesus Christ even once in a document that they knew would be the cornerstone and foundation of the emerging democracy? That's like Marx writing the "Communist Manifesto" without mentioning "socialism".

The distinguished leaders of the American revolution were not devout individuals, and they fought energetically to erect, in Thomas Jefferson's immortal words, "a wall of separation between church and state."

If we define a Christian as a believer in the divinity of Jesus Christ, then most of the leading lights of the American Revolution were not Christians at all. Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson and Tom Paine were deists -- they believed in one Supreme Being but rejected revelation and all the supernatural elements of evangelical Christianity. John Adams was a professed liberal Unitarian; in his published writings he seemed more deist than Christian. In other words if these gentlemen were alive today, they would be more at home in a liberal Presbyterian congregation than at Jerry Falwell's Thomas Road Baptist Church.

It's latter-day interlopers who have breached the wall of separation between church and state. In God We Trust" did not appear on our coinage until the Civil War, and "under God" was introduced into the Pledge of Allegiance during the McCarthy hysteria in 1954.

If we really want to abide by the spirit of the Constitution and The Declaration of Independence -- we will put an end to all this foolishness about bringing back God into our public schools. Those who imagine a Christian America would be paradise, would be well advised to consider the theocracies of Iran, Saudi Arabia and Afghanistan under the Taliban.

Ironically, as our nation becomes less Christian and more religiously diverse, evangelicals redouble their efforts to make America more Christian.

Everyone who loves democracy and freedom must fight the efforts of fundamentalists to tear down the wall of separation between church and state. Jesus Christ may reign supreme in evangelical churches, but He should be kicked to the curb if He tries to scale the wall of separation and enter the political arena.

America is not a Christian nation. America is not a Christian nation. America is not a Christian nation. God, it feels good telling the truth. I may be a "little voice crying in the wilderness", but with the truth on my side, I will defeat a lie -- no matter how big.

Robert Paul Reyes

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