Founding presidents not Christian

One of my favorite times of the year is the Presidents month of February. Why? Because it gives me an annual opportunity to make a dent in the historical and religious ignorance of the political and Christian knee jerk right wingers. They spend almost full time in perverting American history claiming that the bible and Christianity were at the foundation of this nation. What total hogwash. Once a year I get to bring a few undisputed facts to their attention.

THE ENCYCLOPEDIA BRITANNICA, 1968, vol.2, p.420, quote:
“One of the embarrassing problems for the nineteenth-century champions of the Christian faith was the fact that NOT ONE of the first six presidents of the United States was a Christian. They were Deists.”

In Deism there is no personal God, only an impersonal “force” or “energy” or “natures God” or “providence”. In Deism, the bible is nothing but literature, and bad literature at that. Jefferson and Paine both called it “a dunghill”. Others of our founders used the same language. In Deism, Jesus was nothing more than a nomadic teacher. I will now let these men speak for themselves:
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Love…the perfume of the soul

I started Valentine week with thoughts about love, about Eros and Amor. I am closing Valentine week now with more thoughts about the birth and origins of something we call “love”.

Thousands and thousands of years before the bible was written, or Jesus was born, love filled human hearts and dreamed of immortality. Resting gently on my mind is a vision of the dawn of humanity, perhaps on an African savannah. A scene opens before my eyes. Staring into space over a grave, filled with flowers, a first tear flooded two eyes.

Whence came that first tear flowing out of a heart having experienced love? Whence came that first sob in the throat but from the source of love, that which is eternal? And today, still, the mystery of life and death, two mysteries which are yet one, remain.

Life and death are equal Kings. Presidents and babes lie side by side. Kings and Peasants share the same soil. Every birth asks: “Whence came thou?” Every grave asks “Whither goest thou?” The most unlettered person weeping over his loved one can answer the questions of this mystery equally aa well as the most learned scholar in his study. For, we are all equal as we stand, with tears in our eyes, before a loved one’s grave.
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Amor and Eros: a celebration

Valentine week is here with a celebration of eros and amor. I am writing this on one of those days so breathtaking, with sky and breeze, flowers and sun, doves and quail, that surely the earth must stand in amazement at its own beauty.

The biblical Song of Solomon (Song of Songs) raptured over love on such a day. “O that you would kiss me with the kisses of your mouth! For your love is better than wine. Arise, my love, my fair one, and come away; for lo the winter is past, the rain is over and gone. The flowers appear on the earth, the time for singing has come, and the voice of the dove is heard in our land. O queenly maiden! Your thighs are like jewels and your breasts like two fawns. O loved one, delectable maiden, I will give you my love.”

This Old Testament book is the only literature in the entire bible where Eros and Amor are celebrated and praised. To me, this omission is one of the great failures of biblical literature.

The word “Eros” and the expression of it, with Amor, are not to be found in the entire New Testament. And yet Eros and Amor have been the source of more enormous creativity, genuine joy, personal enrichment, and spiritual visions than any other emotion in the human species.
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