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Not since the medieval church baptized, as it were, Aristotle as some sort of early — very early — church father has there been an intellectual hijacking as audacious as the attempt to present America’s principal founders as devout Christians. Such an attempt is now in high gear among people who argue that the founders were kindred spirits with today’s evangelicals, and that they founded a “Christian nation.”
-- George F. Will for The NY Times
George Will writing for the New York Times?! I kinda like the feel of that. And I would have missed it if it were not for Andrew Sullivan's posting this.
Mr. Will is reviewing a book that is tackling this evangelizing of the founding fathers. Will holds that Ms. Brooke Allen, the authoress, overdoes it, maintaining that there was more respect for the popular feelings of religion than Ms. Allen supposedly allows for, but in the main, he does agree with the project, believing that, while respecting religion and the freedom of religion, the founders tended to have a healthy skepticisim. With respect to contemporary Americans, Will optimistically concludes:
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Not since the medieval church baptized, as it were, Aristotle as some sort of early — very early — church father has there been an intellectual hijacking as audacious as the attempt to present America’s principal founders as devout Christians. Such an attempt is now in high gear among people who argue that the founders were kindred spirits with today’s evangelicals, and that they founded a “Christian nation.”
-- George F. Will for The NY Times
George Will writing for the New York Times?! I kinda like the feel of that. And I would have missed it if it were not for Andrew Sullivan's posting this.
Mr. Will is reviewing a book that is tackling this evangelizing of the founding fathers. Will holds that Ms. Brooke Allen, the authoress, overdoes it, maintaining that there was more respect for the popular feelings of religion than Ms. Allen supposedly allows for, but in the main, he does agree with the project, believing that, while respecting religion and the freedom of religion, the founders tended to have a healthy skepticisim. With respect to contemporary Americans, Will optimistically concludes:
Allen and others who fret about a possibly theocratic future can take comfort from the fact that America’s public piety is more frequently avowed than constraining.
