American Minute with Bill Federer
Virginia's Religious Founding
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Ten years before William Shakespeare died, English settlers landed in the
Colony of Virginia,
named for the
"Virgin Queen" Elizabeth I.
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Virginia's First Charter
stated, April 10, 1606:
"Greatly commending ... their Desires for the Furtherance of so noble a Work, which may, by the Providence of Almighty God, hereafter tend to the Glory of His Divine Majesty,
in propagating of
Christian Religion
to such People, as yet live in Darkness and miserable Ignorance of the true Knowledge and Worship of God."
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Thomas Jefferson
wrote in his
Autobiography,
1821:
"The first settlers of Virginia were Englishmen,
loyal subjects to their King and Church,
and the grant to Sir Walter Raleigh contained an express proviso that their laws
'should not be against the true Christian faith, now professed in the Church of England.'"
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On APRIL 26, 1607, English settlers landed at the site of
Cape Henry,
named for Prince Henry of Wales.
Their first act was to erect a wooden cross and commence a prayer meeting.
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They ascended the
James River,
named for
King James I,
and settled Jamestown, the first permanent English settlement in America.
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The Second Charter of Virginia,
May 23, 1609, stated:
"The principal Effect which we can expect or desire of this Action is the Conversion and reduction of the people in those parts unto the true worship of
God
and the
Christian Religion
...
It shall be necessary for all such our loving Subjects ... to live together, in the Fear and true Worship of
Almighty God, Christian Peace,
and civil Quietness, with each other."
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The
Third Charter of Virginia,
March 12, 1611, stated:
Our loving Subjects ... for the Propagation of
Christian Religion,
and Reclaiming of People barbarous, to Civility and Humanity, We have ... granted unto them ... the first Colony in Virginia."
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In 1622, an Indian convert to
Christianity
named
Chanco,
saved the
Jamestown Colony
by warning
Richard Pace.
The account to the
London Company,
stated:
"This Slaughter was a deep and grievous wound to the yet weak and infant colony; but it would have been much more general, and almost universal, if
God
had not put it into the Heart of
a converted Indian,
to make a discovery.
This convert (whose name was
Chanco)
lived with one
Richard Pace,
who treated him, as his own son.
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... The night before the
massacre,
another Indian, his brother, lay with him; and telling him the
King's (Chief's)
command, and that the execution would be performed the next day, he urged him to rise and kill
Pace,
as he intended to do by
Perry,
his Friend.
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... As soon as his brother was gone, the
Christian Indian
rose, and went and revealed the whole matter to
Pace;
who immediately gave notice thereof to
Captain William Powel,
and having secured his own house, rowed off before day to
James-Town
, and informed the Governor of it."
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A plaque erected at
Jamestown
reads:
"In memory of
Chanco,
the Indian who lived with
Richard Pace,
at
Pace's Paines
in this county, and who on the night of March 22, 1622, informed
Pace
of Opechancanough's plot and
thus saved the Jamestown Colony."
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The
Church of England
was
established
as the
official denomination
in
Virginia
from 1606 till 1786.
Noah Webster's 1828 Dictionary
defined
"establishment" of religion
as:
"The
episcopal form of religion,
so called in
England."
The
Second Charter of Virginia,
1609, stated:
"None be permitted to pass in any voyage … into the said country, but such as
first shall have taken the Oath of Supremacy."
England's
Oath of Supremacy,
1535, stated:
"I declare … that
the King’s Highness
is the ONLY Supreme Governor of this Realm … in
all Spiritual or Ecclesiastical things."
On March 5, 1624,
Virginia's legislature
passed the
ordinance:
"Whosoever shall
absent himself
from
Divine service
any
Sunday
without an allowable excuse shall
forfeit a pound of tobacco."
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In 1699, the
Virginia Assembly
adopted the statutes of monarchs
William and Mary
allowing for limited
toleration
of some
Protestant dissenters.
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James Madison
wrote to Robert Walsh, March 2, 1819:
"The
English Church
was originally the
established religion
...
Of
other sects
there were but
few adherents,
except the
Presbyterians
who predominated on the west side of the Blue Mountains ..."
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Madison
continued:
"A little time previous to the Revolutionary struggle, the
Baptists
sprang up, and made very rapid progress ...
At present the population is divided, with small exceptions, among the
Protestant Episcopalians,
the
Presbyterians,
the
Baptists
and the
Methodists."
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U.S. Supreme Court Justice Hugo Lafayette Black
wrote in
Engel v. Vitale,
1962:
"As late as the time of the Revolutionary War, there were
established Churches
in at least
eight of the thirteen former colonies ...
The successful Revolution against English political domination was shortly followed by intense opposition ... in
Virginia
where the
minority religious groups
such as
Presbyterians, Lutherans, Quakers and Baptists
had gained such strength ..."
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Justice Black
continued:
"In 1785-1786, those opposed to the
established Church
... obtained the enactment of the famous
'Virginia Bill for Religious Liberty'
by which all religious groups were placed on an equal footing."
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The
'Virginia Bill for Religious Liberty',
drafted by
Jefferson,
prevented the government from infringing on the rights of conscience, January 16, 1786:
"Almighty God
hath created the mind free, and manifested his supreme will that free it shall remain by making it altogether insusceptible of restraint;
that all attempts to influence it by
temporal punishments
... are a departure from the plan of the holy author of our religion,
who being lord both of body and mind, yet chose not to propagate it by
coercions
on either, as was in
his Almighty power
to do, but to extend it by its influence on reason alone ..."
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Jefferson
continued:
"To compel a man to furnish contributions of money for the propagation of
opinions which he disbelieves and abhors,
is sinful and tyrannical ...
that ... laying upon him an incapacity of being called to offices of trust ... unless he ... renounce this or that
religious opinion,
is depriving him injuriously of those privileges ... to which ... he has a natural right ...
that the opinions of men are not the object of civil government, nor under its jurisdiction;
that to suffer the civil magistrate to intrude his powers into the field of opinion ... is a dangerous fallacy, which at once destroys all
religious liberty,
because he being of course judge of that tendency will make his opinions the rule of judgment, and approve or condemn the sentiments of others ...
that truth is great and will prevail if left to herself ..."
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Jefferson
concluded:
"that
no man shall be ... molested
... on account of his
religious opinions or belief;
but that all men shall be free to profess, and by argument to
maintain, their opinions
in matters of religion."
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Jefferson's
view, that no man should be molested "on account of his religious opinions" would have pitted him against
LGBTQ and hate crime laws,
as they discriminate against individuals holding Biblical views of marriage and sexuality.
Another dilemma, is that
sharia Islam
is not just a
religion,
but also
a political and military system,
with an agenda to establish an intolerant system
prohibiting freedom of religion or conscience.
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The
Virginia Declaration of Rights,
Article 16, ratified June 12, 1776, stated:
"That
Religion,
or the duty which we owe to our
CREATOR,
and the manner of discharging it, can be directed only by reason and conviction, not by force or violence;
and therefore, all men are equally entitled to the free exercise of
religion,
according to the
dictates of conscience,
and that it is the mutual duty of all to practice
Christian
forbearance, love, and charity, towards each other."
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During the colonial times, only a small number of
Catholics
settled in the
Anglican Colony of Virginia.
Virginia's 1609 Charter
decreed:
"We should be loath
that any Person should be permitted to pass that we suspected to affect the
Superstitions of the Church of Rome."
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After the Revolution, the first
Catholic Church
in
Virginia
was erected in 1795,
St. Mary Church in Alexandria.
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The first permanent
Jewish synagogue
in
Virginia
was built in
Richmond
in 1820.
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Named
'Kehilah ha Kadosh Beth Shalome',
it is considered
one of oldest colonial Jewish congregations
in
America,
along with others in:
- New York,
- Philadelphia,
- Newport,
- Savannah, and
- Charleston.
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Virginian George Washington
wrote November 27, 1783:
"Acknowledge ... our infinite obligations to the
Supreme Ruler of the Universe
for rescuing our country from the brink of destruction;
I cannot fail ... to ascribe all the honor of our late success to the same glorious
Being ...
The establishment of
Civil and Religious Liberty
was the Motive which induced me to the Field ...
It now remains to be my earnest ...
prayer,
that the Citizens of the United States would make a wise and virtuous use of the blessings, placed before them."
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American Minute is a registered trademark of William J. Federer. Permission is granted to forward, reprint, or duplicate, with acknowledgment.
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Schedule Bill Federer for informative interviews & captivating PowerPoint presentations: 314-502-8924
wjfederer@gmail.com
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