Ceremonial deism

Stemming from the European Enlightenment came the American Enlightenment. “This as a movement to prioritize the human capacity for reason as the highest form of human attainment” (Schultz, K. 2014 p. 69.). The main idea of this is that each of the central thinkers such as John Locke, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, and Adam Smith suggested that progress was possible as people achieved more of their natural rights and people were invested in their own life and should have the ability to reject authority…

The Enlightenment period was a time marked by revolutions in science, philosophy, and politics. It was period that lasted from the seventeenth century to the eighteenth century. Long cherished notions about the physical world, knowledge and truth, human nature, and society were altered. The main focus of the enlightenment period was discovering the truths of the physical world and the sciences behind those truths.In this search for truth, rhetoric underwent many changes. The Ciceronian…

The Age of Enlightenment manifested towards the end of the Renaissance period around 1650 and propelled the movement from the Medieval Age to an Age of Reason in Europe and the Western world. The Enlightenment was a time in which challenging the church was not considered heresy but rather appraised as productive curiosity. The most prominent aspect since the commencement of the Enlightenment period was the centralization of the scientific method during the Scientific Revolution. Likewise, the…

Sam Harris and His Rational Point of View In his book Letter to a Christian Nation, Sam Harris pulls no punches on the subject of atheism, which according to Harris, is “Simply an admission of the obvious.” (Harris 51) He provides many compelling arguments that may make even the most devout of Christians to rethink their beliefs. Stated very basically, Christianity is an antiquated system of beliefs and morals that hinders our progress in the sciences, offers no moral advice that average human…

played a role in the causes of the event. Voltaire's main goal was to separate the church and the state. He believed that monarchs of France should not have any influence on the church, nor vice versa. He was also a firm believer in the concept of "Deism", which meant that the earth was simply created by a god who wanted nothing more than to create it, and leave it to freely thrive and prosper without their influence. The high powers of France did not only disagree but were furious with his…

The arguments between atheists and theists have been the same since the dawn of time and will continue until the end of time; however, it is imperative to examines one life and one’s views to see if what one is believing is true or false. Plato said it best when he said “The unexamined life is not worth living”. Therefore, it is imperative to examine one’s theological views to determine if one is believing false beliefs or if one is actually believing in the truth. McCloskey’s article On Being…

Marie Therese Geoffrin was a leading female figure in the French Enlightenment. The French Enlightenment happened in the 18th-century. During this time, the ideals were liberty, equality, and fraternity. These topics were discussed in the Salons hosted by Geoffrin. Salons were places that women provided for men, the philosophers, to have an intellectual discussion. Even though both men and women played a part in the salons, the roles were unequal. Geoffrin was a French Enlightenment salonnière…

The scholarship of religion has historically borrowed from the fields of anthropology and sociology in its analysis of religious practices. In response to the displacement of understanding around religion into a fully observable and explainable phenomenon, a subset of scholars have argued to bring back an understanding of religion that is theological, giving respect to divine factors. One such scholar, German theologian and philosopher Friedrich Schleiermacher pushed the envelope within the…

On Being an Atheist The existence of God is an ongoing argument between the atheist and the Christian. While the atheist needs undeniable proof that there is in fact an intelligent being that is causally necessary for the existence of everything on earth, Christians argue that one hundred percent certainty may not be possible. Foreman offers four ways to approach this argument: the existence of God is the best explanation for certain effects in the world, we may need to offer more than one…

Throughout history, religious and government officials have ruled over countries and kingdoms as a cooperative force and have often ignored the will of the people. The United States of America is one of the few nations that, at least at one point in time, strived for a complete and irreparable rift between the clergy and the governing body (Ingersoll 4). Despite the secular nature of the constitution, an increasing number of United States citizens are pushing for the acknowledgement that the…