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Sunday, February 13, 2022

If You Cherish Freedom Of Religion, You Should Thank Some Baptists, Anabaptists And Quakers

Roger Wlliams promoted religious freedom,
separation of church and state, and fair
dealings with Native Americans.

The seventeenth century founder of the Baptist Church in North America, Roger Williams, shared many convictions of his free-church Anabaptist counterparts in western Europes. 

Like them, he also experienced a lot of persecution for his beliefs. The General Court of Boston stripped him of his ordination and ordered him banished from the colony for spreading "diverse, new and dangerous opinions" that today would be considered mainstream.

In our own colony of Virginia every colonist was to be a baptized member of the church of England. Adult members who failed to show up for Sunday services without an allowable excuse were subject to a fine of a pound of tobacco, and for missing a whole month, 50 pounds. Those who disagreed with or disobeyed church rules were subject to censure. Taxes or "tithes" were levied on all citizens to  support members of the clergy and to cover church expenses.

Quakers were specifically targeted for having unlawful assemblies and for teaching and propagating "lies, miracles, false visions, prophecies and doctrines... attempting thereby to destroy religion, laws, ceremonies and all bonds of civil societies." Until Virginia adopted the English Edict of Toleration in 1699, any Quaker landing at Jamestown was to be held in prison without bail, then banished and forever forbidden to return. And attendance at some place of worship recognized by the 1699 act of parliament continued to be required by law.

In the early 1700's Presbyterians, Baptists and Methodists were attracting so many converts among the common people in Virginia that in 1747 the governor issued an order that all "itinerant preachers" were to be restrained. Some were tried and fined for "unlawful assembly," casting doubt on what the Edict of Toleration really tolerated.

After the American Revolution the Act of Toleration was amended to read "all men shall enjoy the free exercise of religion," and members of dissenting groups were longer required to pay the church tax. But it was not until 1786, and after contentious debate, that Thomas Jefferson's "Act for Establishing Religious Freedom" was finally passed, resulting in the officially established Anglican Church becoming incorporated as an independent Protestant Episcopal Church. In the meantime, the book of Common Prayer had been amended to remove all prayers for members of the English crown.

Religious freedom has come with a price, not one primarily fought and paid for on the battlefield, but through the heroic sacrifice and martyrdom of thousands of brave men and women who insisted that the church was to be made up of those who freely chose to follow the life-giving and liberating Prince of Peace.

In addition to Wikipedia articles I gleaned some of the above information from extensive footnotes in Anne Frysinger Shifflet's 2002 self-published book "Of Time and Place" about her Virginia ancestors.

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