Thomas Jefferson was a great man. Both liberal and conservative historians rank him as one of the top five Presidents of the United States. He was the principle author of the Declaration of Independence, and became the third President of the United States in 1801. His effigy has been immortalized on Mount Rushmore, the U.S. Nickel, and at the Jefferson Memorial in Washington, D.C.. Despite his notoriety and success in nineteenth century America, his views of government and religion are in sharp contrast with those of twenty-first century evangelical Christian Americans.

While most Americans know the aforementioned achievements of Jefferson, far fewer remember him as the author of the Virginia Statue for Religious Freedom in which it states:

“...our civil rights have no dependence on our religious opinions, any more than our opinions in physics or geometry; that therefore the proscribing any citizen as unworthy the public confidence by laying upon him an incapacity of being called to offices of trust and emolument, unless he profess or renounce this or that religious opinion, is depriving him injuriously of those privileges and advantages to which in common with his fellow-citizens he has a natural right. ...”

Religious Freedom in America was no minor concern to Jefferson, for Jefferson was not a Christian. He wrote in a letter, "I am of a sect by myself, as far as I know." Indeed, Jefferson's independent spirit led him to an commit act that, in too many modern countries, would result in his execution – for he committed blasphemy by desecrating a holy symbol, the Word of God. His act of shredding his bible with scissors was not done out of malice, for Jefferson was a religious man, but was done in the pursuit of truth. A truth that did not accept biblical miracles, prophecy, angels, the divinity or resurrection of Jesus.

If America is to remain a democracy that supports free speech, it must continue to support religious freedom, and the separation of church and state. Yet this freedom is under attack at the United Nations and in England. On March 12, 2009, the U.N. Human Rights Council passed its “Resolution
Combating Defamation of Religions” initiated as far back as 1990 by the Organization of the Islamic Conference who reject the idea that blasphemy should be abolished. Passages of the Defamation of Religions include:

7. Expresses deep concern in this respect that Islam is frequently and wrongly associated
with human rights violations and terrorism and in this regard regrets the laws or
administrative measures specifically designed to control and monitor Muslim minorities,
thereby stigmatizing them and legitimizing the discrimination they experience;

8. Deplores the use of the print, audio-visual and electronic media, including the Internet,
and any other means to incite acts of violence, xenophobia or related intolerance and
discrimination towards any religion, as well as targeting of religious symbols and
venerated persons;

Under sharia law the desecration of a religious symbol is blasphemy. What is the punishment? That is a question Fanish Masih, a Christian youth, could have answered, except that he was tortured to death this month for desecrating the holy Quran. Under the U.N. resolution reporting this event could be conceived as an act wrongly associating Islam with human rights violations. Renouncing Islam and converting to another faith, or non at all, is also an act that his punishable by death under sharia law. Yet this has not stopped the Archbishop of Canterbury from saying that the adoption of certain aspects of sharia law in England is unavoidable. He is quoted by the BBC as stating, “An approach to law which simply said - there's one law for everybody - I think that's a bit of a danger.” Is not having one law for everyone the fundamental basis for the U.S. Judicial System?

As I write this it is Blasphemy Day International, which is administered by the Center for Inquiry as part of the Campaign for Free Expression. While such a day may offend many, let all Americans remember that without religious freedom, free speech, and the right to critically analyze religious beliefs our nation would be extraordinarily different from the one Thomas Jefferson conceived and helped establish.