Separation of Church and State: Fact or Fiction? An analysis of the argument and the truth behind it

“The government of the United States is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian         religion.”

“But how has it happened that millions of fables, tales, legends, have been blended with     both Jewish and Christian revelation that have made them the most bloody religion that ever existed.”

Thomas Jefferson, the author of the Declaration of Independence, was the third President of the United States. Jefferson’s political theories provided great inspiration in the outlining of the Constitution.

“Question with boldness even the existence of God; because, if there be one, he must more approve of the homage of reason than that of blindfolded fear.”

“I do not find in orthodox Christianity one redeeming feature.”

“Religions are all alike - founded upon fables and mythologies.”

“Millions of innocent men, women, and children, since the introduction of Christianity, have been burned, tortured, fined, and imprisoned, yet we have not advanced one inch toward uniformity. What has been the effect of coercion? To make one half of the world fools and the other half hypocrites.”

“History, I believe, furnishes no example of a priest-ridden people maintaining a free civil government. This marks the lowest grade of ignorance of which their civil as well as religious leaders will always avail themselves for their own purposes.”

“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.”

“In every country and in every age, the priest has been hostile to liberty. He is always in     alliance with the despot, abetting his abuses in return for protection to his own”

“But a short time elapsed after the death of the great reformer of the Jewish religion, before his principles were departed from by those who professed to be his special servants, and perverted into an engine for enslaving mankind, and aggrandizing their oppressors in Church and State.”

James Madison, who was not only an American President, but his political philosophy was if such breadth that it has earned him the epithet, “Father of the Constitution.”

“During almost fifteen centuries has the legal establishment of Christianity been on trial. What has been its fruits? More or less, in all places, pride and indolence in the clergy; ignorance and servility in the laity; in both, superstition, bigotry, and persecution.”

“In no instance have . . . the churches been guardians of the  liberties of the people.”

“Religious bondage shackles and debilitates the mind and unfits it for every noble enterprise.”

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