Understanding that the powers of government are to follow Godly behavior for the benefit of an orderly society to ensure Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness, the Constitution has a section that isn’t well understood; but when studied in relation to the beliefs of the time, the meaning becomes clear. At issue are the words no religious test found in Article VI, Clause 3: but no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States. Now what does that phrase mean?

In order to understand the reason for those words, we must go back to the time before they were written to find the meaning. The English King required all in the new land to pay homage to him and England for all things. He was the lord of all and the head of the Church of England to which all were to be obedient for worship of God.

What is religion? There are five verses in the New Testament that use the word religion which denotes the outward ceremonial service of religion or external form, and piety in the worship of God. In four instances, the word refers to ceremony in a formal sense prior to the advent of Jesus and the Christian life, but in James 1:26 the new practice for religion is given: Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world.  The meaning is for Christians to take care of those in need and to keep away from sin. Here James has shifted the meaning of religion away from ceremony and toward the service of others. The fact is that when one is doing good as God instructs, it is impossible to sin.

The use of the word religion in the founding documents was used in the sense of denomination or system of belief, and though they didn’t apply the word in the sense of James, they did apply it to the Creator in that belief had its foundation in God. Fearing a state religion of some particular denomination being forced upon them, they included no religious test in Article VI, Clause 3 for the sole purpose of ensuring that a particular religious system or denomination wouldn’t be criteria for holding office. (It is the opinion of this writer that anyone who didn’t profess belief in God was automatically disqualified when the whole body of the work of the founders is reviewed. Courts have ruled otherwise but that doesn’t mean that wasn’t the intent of the founders.)

The First Amendment expressly and plainly says that that Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion which only limits Congress. Originally, the states could apply a religious test since the restriction of no religious test applied only the federal system. The states were free to institute a test under the Ninth and Tenth Amendments until Torasco v Watkins when the Supreme Court ruled that any test anywhere was unconstitutional, thus extending federal rule to the states and effectively limiting the freedom of the states they previously enjoyed under the Ninth and Tenth Amendments.

The point in closing this lesson is that the nation was much better served when God was honored and the office holders held to godly principles, which guided them according to their religion or system of belief [oriented to God], and whose principles tempered their personal behavior while in public office. How have the godly principles of morals, right, and decency harmed anyone? The truth is that they haven’t and have been but one of the many reasons the nation has prospered.

© 1-31-06 DEC

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