Comments on: David Barton: Did Early Presidents Sign Documents "In the Year of Our Lord Christ?"

By: ken

ken — Sun, 17 Jan 2021 13:40:07 +0000

“the horror of moral white men forging a more perfect union.”

by wiping out the indigenous people
enslaving non-white men
treating women as property

How moral of them.

btw, Warren isn’t claiming most of the founders weren’t christian. Just that they didn’t found a nation where christianity is the “official” religion or should be exalted above other religions, as Barton often suggests.

By: ben marshall

ben marshall — Sat, 16 Jan 2021 22:01:44 +0000

God forbid our founders were mostly Christians. The dire threat that is.
” We have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion. Avarice, ambition, revenge, or gallantry, would break the strongest cords of our Constitution as a whale goes through a net. Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.” ~John Adams October 11, 1798

“…at least 51 of the 55 delegates to the Constitutional Convention were members of Christian churches, and that leading American political figures in the founding era quoted the Bible far more than any other source”. John Eidsmoe

“29 of the DOI signers held seminary degrees”

Oh the horror of moral white men forging a more perfect union.

By: Richard Willmer

Richard Willmer — Wed, 30 May 2018 20:30:32 +0000

Isn’t ‘in the year of Our Lord [Christ]’ simply the English for ‘A.D.’?
(I think Warren’s point is that Barton may be reading too much into the Presidents’ use of the phrase, especially given that it was preprinted, and that early Presidents did not oppose, for example, the separation of Church and State simply because that phrase was used. Is that so, Warren?)
On a theological note: acknowledging a ‘supreme being’ is of course not congruent with being Christian. Muslims, Jews, Unitarians, Mormons, Jehovah’s Witnesses, ‘non-religious theists’ and others do so, after all.
As I see it, the essential worry with Barton’s ilk is that they trying to justify the abuse of Christianity for power-political ends and/or as an instrument of ‘control’ or even – in the case of some ‘christian’ extremists – terror. This was a temptation that was resolutely resisted by Our Lord himself, of course (see inter alia Luke 4 : 5 – 8).

By: Richard Willmer

Richard Willmer — Wed, 30 May 2018 20:30:32 +0000

There are indications that he was a historical figure, though very little was written about him by contemporary historians (which is perhaps not surprising, given that he wasn’t what we would normally view as a ‘big historical figure’* – which is perhaps part of his charm for many of us!).
* Would-be messiahs were probably two-a-penny in Jesus’ day … and crucifixions were almost certainly ten-a-penny under the very brutal occupation regime of the Romans.

By: Warren

Warren — Wed, 30 May 2018 20:30:32 +0000

Beth – Key phrase – “I just glanced over your article.” You need to read it. You missed the point and some key historical points. Our presidents did not place those words there. Read again to see where they came from.
If you want to make a case that shipping business proves something whereas the Constitution does not, then you have a tough road ahead.