His Excellency: George Washington
I keep a list of some of the books I have read over the years on my wiki. Recently I just concluded a book on Washington and was bothered enough about the author’s areligious slant on Washington’s life that I did a little digging and found sufficient fodder for my viewpoint: that Washington was indeed a religious man. Although I confess that this is my viewpoint, I also assert there is no historical backing for any other conclusion. Biographers, such as the one who wrote the book I just read, have of late been putting this areligious spin on famous Americans such as Washington and Lincoln – a spin I don’t think these individuals would appreciate if they were still living. In many of the books the authors support their views in a manner of reasoning that boils down to this: “There were no ministers at his death, so what do you think that says about what that man thought about religion?” Implying I suppose that they were not religious? That is a far cry from a reasonable argument – not because it differs from my viewpoint, but because historical documents do not support it. To be religious does not mean one must join a religion – especially in light of what we know about the restoration. The true church was not restored until most of these men had long since passed. Their faith in God was still evident. This quote on the secularization of Washington sums up what I want to express; that, in light of the vast amounts of now easily accessible documents, it is no longer scholarly or acceptable to just assert that people like Lincoln or Washington were not religious:
Historians ought no longer be permitted to do the legerdemain of turning Washington into a Deist even if they found it necessary and acceptable to do so in the past. Simply put, it is time to let the words and writings of Washington’s faith speak for themselves.