Faith, Freedom, and the Founders: What America Was Really Built On

There’s a common refrain in today’s politics: “America is a Christian nation.” But if you look back to the words and intentions of our Founding Fathers, that claim doesn’t hold up. Jefferson, Madison, Adams, Washington, and Franklin, who were men of different temperaments and beliefs, all agreed on one thing: government should never be built on religious rule.

Thomas Jefferson drafted the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom, declaring that our rights don’t depend on religious opinions. James Madison, the “Father of the Constitution,” went further, writing that “Religion & Govt. will both exist in greater purity, the less they are mixed together.” John Adams signed the Treaty of Tripoli, which plainly stated: “The Government of the United States is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian Religion.”

Even George Washington, who valued religion as a moral compass, refused to tie the republic to a specific church. And Benjamin Franklin, with his Deist leanings, reminded us that the best service to God is simply “the doing good to man.”

These men were products of the Enlightenment, an age that trusted science, reason, and evidence alongside personal faith. They understood that mixing church and state would corrupt both, leading to oppression rather than liberty. Their solution was bold for its time: a secular Constitution that protects all religions by favoring none.

Fast-forward to today. When we see groups like Turning Point USA encouraging young people to view America as a Christian nation, we need to pause. Their outreach in high schools, paired with fiery rhetoric and a cult-like insistence on one version of faith, is not what the Founders intended. In fact, it’s closer to what they feared. Jefferson and Madison warned us that once political leaders claim God’s authority, dissenters lose their freedom, and religion itself loses its purity.

Calling America a Christian nation doesn’t just rewrite history; it risks reshaping the future into something more like theocracies our ancestors fled. Our founders trusted us to build a society grounded in freedom of conscience, where belief is personal and government is accountable to the people, not to a pulpit.

If we want to honor their vision, we need to resist political movements that use faith as a recruitment tool or a wedge to divide. America works best not when it is “Christian” or “secular,” but when it is free. America was intended to be a place where all can practice faith, science, or philosophy without fear, and where no single creed controls the law. 

At the end of the day, I think about how those men, Jefferson, Madison, Adams, Washington, and Franklin, lived in a world far different than ours, but still wrestled with the same tension we face now. They tried to set up guardrails on how to honor faith without letting it control freedom. They chose the harder path, one that protects all beliefs by keeping government neutral.

For me, that feels like both a gift and a responsibility. A gift, because I’m free to practice faith in my own way. A responsibility, because it’s on us! This generation is held responsible for keeping that wall of separation strong, no matter how loudly others try to tear it down.

The Founders trusted reason, science, and open thought alongside personal belief. I think they’d want us to keep trusting those things today. Because America works best not when it forces one religion, but when it makes space for all of us to seek truth, kindness, and meaning in our own ways.

That’s the country I still believe in. And it’s worth protecting.

XOXO,

Whimsy Jenny