“The government of the United States is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion.”—John Adams. Founding Father. Conservatives love to leave out this fact. Among many.

This made me remember of something. I've said that quote on SH to a lady that kept saying the USA is a Christian country, and the government was persecuting Christians and their values, and breaking the Constitution (I don't remember exactly what the topic was, but I know it was something about the LGBTQ community). And I can honestly say, her full denial of it was my first clue that some people are best to let them talk crazy. You can't reason with it. Some people do want to live in a theocracy, and you will not change their minds. They're fanatics and that's it.

Conservatives love to ignore certain founding fathers targets often include John Adams, and Thomas Jefferson, occasionally Franklin, who would DEFINITELY be a pro science liberal

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/j...b_6761840.html

Proof for the rednecks

I'm a Christian, and I stopped attending a Baptist Church in my area, of which I was a member of, because all the Pastor could talk about was how bad Obama was, then he started calling the Muslims....Towel Heads....and then they had a congratulatory meeting when Trump won. I wonder now, what they think of this monster that is in the White House, tearing up all American values, threatening war, all the lies he's spouted, all the denials when what he has said is on tape.... I'm sure the good people of that church are feeling pretty disgusted now.

The 1797 treaty with Tripoli was just one of the many treaties in which each country recognized the religion of the other, and in which America invoked rhetoric designed to prevent a “Holy War” between Christians and Muslims. 16 Article XI of that treaty therefore stated:

As the government of the United States of America is not in any sense founded on the Christian religion as it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion or tranquility of Musselmen [Muslims] and as the said States [America] have never entered into any war or act of hostility against any Mahometan nation, it is declared by the parties that no pretext arising from religious opinions shall ever produce an interruption of the harmony existing between the two countries.

Critics end the sentence after the words “Christian religion,” thus placing a period in the middle of a sentence where no punctuation currently exists, stopping the sentence in mid-thought. However, when Article XI is read in its entirety and its thought concluded where the punctuation so indicates, then the article simply assures Tripoli that we were not one of the Christian nations with an inherent hostility against Muslims and that we would not allow differences in our “religious opinions” to lead to hostility.

(Significantly, even if Article XI contained nothing more than what the critics cite – i.e., “the government of the United States is not in any sense founded on the Christian religion” – this still would not refute America being a Christian nation since the article only refers to the federal government. Recall that while the Founders themselves openly described America as a Christian nation, they also included a constitutional prohibition against any official federal establishment of religion. Therefore, if Article XI is read as a declaration that the federal government of the United States did not establish the Christian religion, such a statement does not repudiate the fact that America was considered a Christian nation. However, the history of the Treaty, of the treaties negotiated before and after it, and the circumstances of the conflict discounts even that reading.)