Deism

Getting it right the second time.

Deism was practiced by many of America's Founding Fathers, and I would argue that it's the most pertinent to today's society. It was a departure from Puritanism (anything is better than Puritanism), that focused on going away from the idea of the elect, and more towards the idea of free will and salvation. They have five tenants, most of which deal with God.

1. There is one supreme God.

2. Humanity's Duty is to revere God.

3. Worship is linked to practical morality.

4. Forgiveness for repentance.

5. Good work is punished 

It's a big step up from the "damned to hell" mentality of puritanism, right?

They believe that their faith is a natural religion. Which, for me at least, is a faux pas. But to be fair, puritanism is all about condemning other people's religions. At least the deists are polite about it. They're actually one of the major forces behind "freedom of religion." Granted, back when they said that, freedom of religion meant praying on Saturday rather than Sunday or getting divorced, but the sentiment is nice. They thought that as long as people were revering God, their method of worship shouldn't matter.

I don't know how they'd respond to this though.

Their relationship to God was also rather interesting. They believe that God created the universe, and then just left it and doesn't do anything. Then why even have a God? Because there was still a Heaven, it just wasn't invitation only. They thought that anyone could gain repentance by living a good life. They didn't believe in the Holy Trinity (The Father, The Son, and the Holy Spirit), and they didn't believe in miracles either. They thought that Jesus was just a man. They thought that be Bible was just a historical record.

We all remember when this happened, right?

In the end, God couldn't be accessed through organized religion, rituals, personal beliefs, etc. He was a detached figure who created the world, and is now chilling on a beach somewhere up in Heaven. Similarly, prayers were just for thanking God for the things you had, not asking for more things.

You're not getting parents like that Annie.

The best thing that they advocated was the idea that people are inherently good. Puritans, of course, though they'd never publicly admit it, thought that their neighbors were pretty much all going to Hell for doing literally anything. Samantha ate cheese twice in one week? Tsk tsk. James fell down and broke his leg? He probably earned it. Deists thought that people were nice. We had to be in order to cooperate enough to build up the society that we had. They thought that since people were nice, they did good things because of this. This was only natural.

Puritans are calling this woman a b*tch in their heads.

Deism came into being because society in America began to be more developed. Once people weren't fighting to not die of dysentery, they had the time to take a step back, look at their ideologies, and think "What the f*ck were we doing?" When they weren't so reliant on the idea of God to get them through their day, they allowed themselves more personal freedoms, and stopped living like almost literal monks. They allowed themselves to be people. They were reasonable. They were logical. They didn't kill people for being witches. They were accepting of other people. They still believed that a giant man in the sky had created everything, but we can overlook that for the benefits.

4 stars, because they managed to impress me.