Champion of Reason: John Adams

John Adams is regarded as one of the most important Founding Fathers of the United States of America. Before becoming the second President of the United States, John Adams served as the Vice-President under President George Washington. Prior to that, John Adams was a signer of the Declaration of Independence as a delegate from Massachusetts.

Founding-father John Adams was a Unitarian (but raised a Congregationalist) who rejected orthodox Christian beliefs, including the divinity of Christ and the far-fetched ‘trinity’. He valued religion in general because he believed it restrained “human passions” such as “avarice, ambition, revenge, or gallantry.” Like other Founders who leaned toward deism or agnosticism, Adams thought religion was important not because it was true but because it helped keep the common people in line.

In his youth, Adams’ father urged him to become a minister, but Adams refused, considering the practice of law to be a more noble calling. Although he once referred to himself as a “church going animal,” Adams’ view of religion overall was rather ambivalent: He recognized the abuses, large and small, that religious belief lends itself to, but he also believed that religion could be a force for good in individual lives and in society at large. His extensive reading (especially in the classics), led him to believe that this view applied not only to Christianity, but to all religions.

Adams was aware of (and wary of) the risks, such as persecution of minorities and the temptation to wage holy wars, that an established religion poses. Nonetheless, he believed that religion, by uniting and morally guiding the people, had a role in public life.

Adams was a champion of reason because he was objective in his thoughts on religion, which allowed him to be critical of religion’s flaws, and at the same time, he was tolerant of believers. He was reasonable, but was not one-sided or militant. For this we should thank him, as this post-Enlightenment luminary has set a fantastic example for all of us to follow.

Excerpted from:

The Religious Affiliation of Second U.S. President John Adams, with citations

And Everybody Hates the Atheists: Romney tries to get ahead by climbing over unbelievers – Reason

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