Likewise, Thomas Jefferson wrote that the Virginia statute protecting religious freedom, which he drafted, deliberately covered “the Jew and the Gentile, the Christian and Mahometan, the Hindoo, and Infidel of every denomination,” and that a proposal to mention Christ in the bill “was rejected by a great majority, in proof that they meant to comprehend” all religions.

The VC post also notes that prior to the drafting of the U.S. Constitution, various state constitutions had included language that protected any and all religious beliefs so long as they acknowledged Christ, or any and all religious beliefs so long as they acknowledged a Supreme Creator, etc. Thus, the framers of the Constitution had been very much aware of these alternative phrasings — but rejected them — when they chose the language used in the Constitution’s “no religious test” clause and in the First Amendment.

Reading the relevant sections, it becomes clear that Fischer has pulled out a section out of the context of Story’s eloquent tribute to freedom of conscience that is the First Amendment.

Where have we seen this before…pulling out material from its proper context?

They knew, that bigotry was unceasingly vigilant in its stratagems, to secure to itself an exclusive ascendancy over the human mind; and that intolerance was ever ready to arm itself with all the terrors of the civil power to exterminate those, who doubted its dogmas, or resisted its infallibility.

What a wonderful sense of clarity Joseph Story ascribed to the framer’s of the constitution. Where is this same sense of clarity in today’s vitriolic dialog visa vie all matter of social issues, whether it be Islam, education, universal coverage for all members of society, same sex marriage and the definition of family, and the rights of sexual minorities?
I, for one, would hope that reasonable people would prevail in their attempt to uphold the principle of the separation of church and state in the never-ending dialog. I also hope that the emerging nations that are currently challenged and handicapped by the influence of their religiosity—case in point Uganda, where sexual minorities are under attack—might also embrace this principle.