P   Founding Documents. What evidences for our purpose can be found in our founding documents?

  The Mayflower Compact. If we go back to 1620 and the landing of the Pilgrims at Plymouth, we find the very birth certificate of America. In this charter they recorded their purpose—clearly stating that it was for “the glory of God and the advancement of the Christian faith.”

  New England Confederation of 1643. This first American experiment in federation, written in 1643, stated that the one single aim of the American colonies was “to advance the Kingdom of our Lord Jesus Christ, and to enjoy the liberties of the Gospel thereof in purities and peace.…”

  Trinity Decision of the U.S. Supreme Court. In 1892, the Court completed a 10-year examination of all of the documentation, which amounted to thousands of pages, concerning our founding. They came to a unanimous conclusion that “These…add a volume of unofficial declarations to the mass of organic utterances that this is a Christian nation….”

P   Founding Fathers’ Statements. In addition, there are volumes of documented statements by our Founders confirming our biblical foundations.

  John Quincy Adams—President of the U.S. and one of the great lights in the early days of this country, said, “The highest glory of the American Revolution was this: it connected in one indissoluble bond the principles of civil government with the principles of Christianity.”

  George Washington—First President and Father of our Country, has often been called a deist. A deist is defined as one who believes God created the world and then went on a long journey, leaving it to wind down on its own. Yet the evidence shows Washington was a devout Christian who arose at 4:00 every morning and spent an hour on his knees praying before an open Bible. In the evenings he dismissed himself from friends and family at 9:00 and returned to that same room, again kneeling before an open Bible in prayer. The idea that he would spend 2 hours every day praying to an absentee God is utterly ridiculous. In his Farewell Address he said this: “Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, Religion and morality are indispensable supports. In vain would that man claim the tribute of Patriotism, who should labor to subvert these great Pillars of human happiness….” According to Wash-ington, no atheist was a patriot! And he added, “reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle.” Far from the popular idea that we can have morality without religion, Washington knew better and warned against it in his last words to the nation.

  Thomas Jefferson—President, scientist, and author of the Declaration of Independence, he is the Founder who is said to have included the concept of “separation of church and state” in the Constitution. Yet no one seems to be able to find it. Well, it is found in article 52 of the Constitution…of the former Soviet Union! It is not in the U.S. Constitution at all! The phrase comes from his personal letter to the Danbury Baptists in Connecticut. It was virtually unheard of until 1947 when an ACLU lawyer by the name of Leo Pfeffer used it in his response to the Everson decision. But, in fact, the curator of the Library of Congress states that Jefferson, one of only two of the signers of the Declaration who wasn’t undeniably born-again, went through a conversion of sorts in the 1790s. He changed his views markedly and supported positions that his opponents had previously supported. Among other actions, while serving as both president and Superintendent of Washington D.C. schools, he required only two texts: the Bible and Watts Hymnal. Such commitment to use two clearly religious texts is hardly typical of the “separation of church and state” which is so often attributed to him.