THE FIRST AMENDMENT VS. SEPARATION OF CHURCH AND STATE

THE FIRST AMENDMENT VS. SEPARATION OF CHURCH AND STATE

Where did the idea of separation of church and state come from? Do you know that no where in the Constitution is this clause written? This idea came from Thomas Jefferson, one of the founding fathers, and from a letter he had written to the Danbury Baptist Association in 1802. He was assuring them that no action by the government now or never should infringe on their right to believe.

He stated further that because that clause in the Constitution provided a wall separating chuch (religion) from state; not the state from the church. The state was the power that threatened the church not the church, as was so often interpreted in cases today.

This stresses that the "constitutional separation was between ecclesiastical institutions and the civil state." "Daniel Dreisbach, author of Thomas Jefferson and the Wall of Separation Between Church and State, contends that Jefferson’s metaphor, as interpreted by the courts, has been improperly “used to inhibit religion’s ability to inform the public ethic,” to thwart citizens from participating in politics guided by their faith, and to prevent religious communities and institutions from speaking prophetically in the public arena." (Faith & Freedom)