"Nature's God", Matthew Stewart on Atheists Talk

Stephanie Zvan

A couple of centuries of national pride and the gentle glow that history casts on winners have given today’s U.S. citizens a rather staid view of the radicals and revolutionaries who built a country from former colonies. Not only did they wage treasonous war against their king, but many of the crafters of our constitution were religious radicals. There were Quakers and Methodists and Christians who rejected the authority of the Bible.

There were also deists among the people who shaped our government. In his recent book, Nature’s God: The Heretical Origins of the American Republic, philosopher Matthew Stewart tells their story. He traces the strains of deism in Enlightenment thinking and shows how it shaped our country.

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"Nature's God", Matthew Stewart on Atheists Talk

About the author

Stephanie Zvan is one of the hosts for the Minnesota Atheists' radio show and podcast, Atheists Talk. She serves on the board of Secular Woman. She speaks on science and skepticism in a number of venues, including science fiction and fantasy conventions. Stephanie has been called a science blogger and a sex blogger, but if it means she has to choose just one thing to be or blog about, she's decided she's never going to grow up. In addition to science and sex and the science of sex, you'll find quite a bit of politics here, some economics, a regular short fiction feature, and the occasional bit of concentrated weird. Oh, and arguments. She sometimes indulges in those as well. But I'm sure everything will be just fine. Nothing to worry about. Nothing at all.
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One thought on “"Nature's God", Matthew Stewart on Atheists Talk”

  1. shadow
    1

    Fundies usually point to the Declaration of Independence as their foundation that “we are a christian nation” — they evidently don’t know (or care, or understand) that Jefferson could best be described as a deist.

    They would also be shocked to learn he had a Qur’an (sp) and had created his own bible (by only keeping what he thought was sound moral teachings, not relying on mysticism).

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