Interesting article on Founding fathers

Any time opponents of gay marriage speak out they inevitably get to the point that this country was founded on christian principles and as such the laws should reflect those principles. Of course my standard response to that would be: Hello, how about separation of chruch and state, freedom of relgion, although it should be freedom from religion. LOL. But the point is that I had always heard that many of the founding fathers, especially Washintgon, were not in fact christians but Deists or Unitarians. Wikipedia explains deism in the following:

"Deism is a religious philosophy and movement that became prominent in England, France, and the United States in the 17th and 18th centuries. Deism differs from theism in that according to deism God does not interfere with human life and the laws of the universe.

Deists typically reject supernatural events (prophecy, miracles) and divine revelation prominent in organized religion, along with holy books and revealed religions that assert the existence of such things. Instead, Deists hold that religious beliefs must be founded on human reason and observed features of the natural world, and that these sources reveal the existence of one God or supreme being."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deism


Well, the site I previously mentioned, gayheroes.com, had an interesting article. Here's a snippit. BTW, I don't have any affiliation with the site. I just think its cool.

GEORGE WASHINGTON: a Deist, not a Christian. Said "no one would be more zealous than myself to establish effectual barriers against the horrors of spiritual tyranny." (more about George below)
THOMAS JEFFERSON: a Deist. Said "In the New Testament there is internal evidence that parts of it have proceeded from an extraordinary man; and that other parts are of the fabric of very inferior minds. It is as easy to separate those parts, as to pick out diamonds from dunghills." (much more below)

BEN FRANKLIN: a Deist, said (about the story of Jesus): "I apprehend it has received various corrupting changes, and I have, with most of the Dissenters in England, doubts as to his divinity." (much more below)

JOHN ADAMS: a Unitarian. As President of the U.S., he signed the Treaty of Tripoli in 1797, which says "As the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion... it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion, or tranquillity, of ... any Mehomitan nation."

THOMAS PAINE: Said "I do not believe in the creed professed by the Jewish church, by the Roman church, by the Greek church, by the Turkish church, by the Protestant church, nor by any church that I know of…. Each of those churches accuse the other of unbelief; and for my own part, I disbelieve them all."

JAMES MADISON, fourth president and Father of the Constitution, said: "Religious bondage shackles and debilitates the mind and unfits it for every noble enterprise" and "During almost fifteen centuries has the legal establishment of Christianity been on trial. What have been its fruits? More or less in all places, pride and indolence in the Clergy, ignorance and servility in the laity, in both, superstition, bigotry and persecution."

ABE LINCOLN said "That I am not a member of any Christian Church, is true,"