As the world awaits the results of last Saturday's election in Zimbabwe, the stakes are high. Here's one firsthand account of Robert Mugabe's tyrannous rule and disastrous mismanagement of the economy (just two of the problems that, as the April issue of Sojourners described, have prompted anti-Mugabe protests by people of faith).

Oddly, the main street of Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe, is much like Disneyland. There are massive casinos, tourist shops on every corner, and luxury hotels replete with stereotypical African décor: large elephant tusk-lined foyers, thatched roofs, and zebra rugs abound. This part of the city is meant for the tourist.

What is not meant for the tourist, and what president Mugabe does not want the rest of the world to see, are the markets and backstreets, the hovels and the empty grocery stores - the reality of Zimbabwe. At the Zimbabwe/Zambia border crossing, multitudes of women and men line up at all hours of the day, in hopes of crossing into Zambia to sell their wares, where the Zambian Kwacha fares a much better rate than the Zimbabwean dollar. Women wait - patiently, fervently, with their babies wrapped to their backs, balancing baskets on their heads for hours on end - in order to sell enough soap, homemade sadza, or beads to feed their children for the day.

When I spent time in Zimbabwe last summer, banks were open, but they had no money. American dollars were coveted, but hyperinflation made them impossible to use. The Zimbabwean government had fixed the exchange rate so that, even as its own dollar lost value by the hour, individuals seeking to legally exchange American dollars for Zim dollars would do just as well to simply give the banks their money.

The problems in Zimbabwe are much deeper than fiscal. It is uncouth to publicly say the name "Mugabe"; if it must be spoken, it is to be whispered. I learned this quickly. After sitting in a restaurant with fellow volunteers and referencing him in conversation, the entire restaurant grew silent, and I felt all sets of eyes on me. Civilians are not able to speak freely of their opinions of Mugabe. At the mentioning of his name, even in casual conversation, lips tighten and eyes avert, for fear of imprisonment or worse.

Few expected last Saturday's election in Zimbabwe to be conducted fairly, and many now look to the future of Zimbabwe with hopelessness, with or without Mugabe's leadership. But this situation is not, and cannot be, regarded as hopeless - for to concede as much would be tantamount to dismissing the future of all Zimbabweans. The truth is, there is a power in the people of Zimbabwe that cannot justly be ignored. In the history of justice movements, nothing has ever been accomplished by conceding to lost causes. Mugabe is undeserving of the amount of international attention he has received; the real story is found in the hope of his people.

Anne Junod spent last summer volunteering in Zambia and Zimbabwe with the U.K. based volunteer organization African Impact.

We've gotten enough calls and e-mails from folks concerned about my state of mind for me to think it's probably time for a more upbeat post. If you've been among those worried, you can rest assured that I'm far from despair. On the contrary, I can't remember ever feeling more alive than I have these past few years in Cincinnati, in spite of all the trouble and confusion we've found here. My worldview surely has been shaken some, but my soul is safe and sound.

Not to boast, but, amidst our many mistakes in starting over as servants of God, it turns out that Marty and I did right the single, most important thing we had to do right: We didn't try to do it by ourselves. If nothing else, we have learned on this adventure that loving people well - and loving poor people especially - is a team sport. And if I feel alive and well instead of utterly defeated, it is mainly because the other members of our somewhat intentional community here give me strength and security on a daily basis, whether or not they mean to do so.

I say 'somewhat intentional' to avoid giving the impression that we are some kind of religious order, with formal rules and a common purse and a weekly regimen of prayer. If you thought that, I'm afraid you'd be sorely disappointed when you came for a visit. What we are instead is a handful of families and individuals who have moved next door or around the corner from each other on purpose. This is so that we can share our lives and our meals and our stuff more easily, and so we can all love the same neighbors without having to walk very far. We still have our own jobs and houses, but because the houses weren't very expensive the jobs don't take all our time, and there's more left for each other and for the folks we're trying to bless one way or another.

For example, recently, when Marty and I weren't sure about inviting a struggling kid who's on his own to come live with our family, we ran next door for Karen's advice. The week before, Karen, Ric, and Marty handled the whole Monday night dinner party because my plane home from Vancouver was delayed. The other night, Sarah walked over to talk through her career options now that she knows she doesn't want to be a massage therapist forever. The night after that, Sarah offered to tutor the neighborhood girl the rest of us just couldn't fit in.

If that kind of give and take sounds appealing to you, well, join the club. Especially for those of us with kids, it is a pure joy to have such wonderful brothers and sisters around to help raise them. And when it comes to coping with the often absurd consequences of our beloved neighbors' bizarre combinations of poverty, neglect, and dysfunction, well, we're all better off with plenty of partners to share the load.

Out on the road as a speaker, when people tell me they admire the sacrifice of our 'radical' inner-city ministry lifestyle, I can't help but smile. If they had any idea how amazing it is to daily be surrounded by the kind of love, support, understanding, and practical help that my family takes for granted here, I think their admiration might turn to envy instead. After all, who else gets to live so close to their friends?

Please don't worry. This street-level ministry stuff is indeed much harder than I remembered, mainly because I know better now what it means for a child not to have a decent parent, or for a parent not to have a decent job, or for a family not to have a decent place to live. But it is richer now, too, because I also know better the true value of love, which is our God. And because here, in that knowledge, I am not alone.

Bart Campolo is a veteran urban minister and activist who speaks, writes, and blogs www.bartcampolo.com about grace, faith, loving relationships and social justice. Bart is the leader of The Walnut Hills Fellowship www.thewalnuthillsfellowship.org in inner-city Cincinnati. He is also founder of Mission Year www.missionyear.org, which recruits committed young adults to live and work among the poor in inner-city neighborhoods across the USA, and executive director of EAPE, which develops and supports innovative, cost-effective mission projects around the world.

The United States prides itself on being a country of laws. There is the settled conviction that here citizens obey the laws of the land and that those who do not are duly punished according to the nature of the violation. Christians who oppose the presence of undocumented immigrants turn to Romans 13 to emphasize that these people are breaking local and national laws and that the appropriate penalties should be applied. This passage is a quandary, too, for some of those who are more sympathetic to the plight of immigrants. They are torn between the harshness and contradictions of the laws and this biblical mandate to submit to the authorities.

Several observations can help put this passage into proper perspective. To begin with, Christians must recognize that their agenda is set in the previous chapter of Paul's letter. Chapter 12 tells believers not to be molded by the "pattern of this world" (12:2). Their lives should be characterized by service to others, love, and compassion—even toward enemies (12:3-21).

The authorities, however, have a different purpose and a different way of doing things, and this is spelled out in Romans 13. Christians are called to respect the government, says the apostle, but this does not mean sanctifying everything that it might legislate or do. Citizens of the U.S. have the right to disagree with the government, and, motivated by their principles, Christians do this in multiple ways: at the ballot box, through publications, by organizing educational, legal, and civic organizations that defend other points of view, by participating in peaceful protests of many kinds for a host of causes, and the like. Each of these actions in its own way expresses reservations about the state of affairs and the things that the government is mandating. Immigration is an example of an area where many believers diverge from the goals and enforcement of current legislation.

What is more, the U.S. government itself admits that legislation on immigration must be changed. Leaders from across the political spectrum recognize that what is in place now is not working. Recent efforts to craft a comprehensive immigration policy are clear evidence of the need for new immigration laws.

Therefore, to point to Romans 13 and adherence to the law in debates on immigration, without nuance or biblical and historical depth, simply will not do. Christians should search all of the scriptures for guidance in evaluating the development of immigration policy and engaging its challenges. From that foundation, Christians can begin to move forward to the legal issues. In other words, discussion on legality cannot be limited just to questions about complying with current laws, laws that all know are impractical and will soon be replaced. If these laws are problematic—theologically, humanely, and pragmatically—and if all sides agree that reform is needful, the call to submit to the authorities in Romans 13 should be rethought in fresh and constructive ways. Respect for the nation's present laws can be coupled with and informed by the move toward a new set of laws. Ideally, laws should embody the best moral principles of a nation. Clearly, immigration legislation does not measure up.

But what of immigrants who are Christians? How do they respond to Romans 13? They know that they are violating the law by living and working here. But, they also have experienced personally the law's inequities. For example, the government turns a blind eye to many employers because the country needs cheap labor, but then it makes access to social services increasingly difficult for these same workers. Hispanic immigrant believers admire the efficiency of the legal system of the U.S. and want to contribute to society, even as they work for a better life. Many do their best to obey the laws in every area that does not threaten their jobs, homes, and children's education and welfare. Many desire to be model 'citizens' as part of their Christian duty and in order to gain the respect of the majority culture in which they live. All fervently want a fair legal resolution of the situation.

Where can we go from here? If one evaluates immigration law in the U.S. as confused and unfair, and if one believes that these laws do not square with the teaching of the Bible and the ethical demands of the heart of God - let alone the historic openness of this country to foreigners - then these Christians will not say, "What is it about 'illegal' that you don't understand?" Instead, they might declare with the apostles, "Judge for yourselves whether it is right in God's sight to obey you rather than God" (Acts 4:19).

Before this statement raises all kinds of alarm, let me make it very clear that I am not advocating civil disobedience on a large scale, just as most Christians who have strong misgivings about undocumented immigrants are not lobbying for a massive national deportation operation to rid the country of one and all. It is a narrow understanding of the nature of law and the Christian's relationship to human government that must be questioned. We need to move ahead towards constructive change with Christian humility and charity, with respect for those placed in authority over us but especially with an eye to the higher calling of the people of God to be a blessing to the world.

Dr. M. Daniel Carroll Rodas is a distinguished professor of Old Testament at Denver Seminary, and author of Christians at the Border: Immigration, the Church, and the Bible (Baker Academic Books), from which this post is adapted.

Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust consume and where thieves break in and steal; but store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust consumes and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.

- Matthew 6:19-21

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The question we need to ask with any spiritual discipline is, What does God want to accomplish through this practice? ... Perhaps we can see, then, that the discipline of fasting has to do with the critical dynamic of accepting those limits which are life-restoring. Our culture would seduce us into believing that we can have it all, do it all, and (even more preposterous!) that we deserve it all. Yet in refusing to accept limits on our consumption or activity, we perpetuate a death-dealing dynamic in the world. That is whey the discipline of fasting is so profoundly important today.

- Marjorie J. Thompson
Soul Feast

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We were never likely to get away with "transcending" race in this election as the early Obama campaign suggested to some. The demons of race in America simply run too deep and were bound to eventually rear their ugly heads. And so they did with the now infamous taped sound bites by Rev. Jeremiah Wright and the furious media response to them. I've said before that the constant replaying of the tapes has become a metaphor for the continual replaying of our old racial tapes in this country. Black anger and frustration because of real grievances, provoking white indignation revealing the lack of white understanding, causing more black frustration and alienation etc; it just goes on and on.

So Barack Obama had to give a major speech on race that he likely hoped not to have to give. But it was an historic statement, offering a deeper vision and hope of our forming "a more perfect union" than we had heard in many decades. After the speech, the ball was again in America's court—in white America's court in particular. Would the nation respond to Obama's hopeful vision, of turning a corner from racial anger and frustration to new opportunity and unity, or would his candidacy be derailed by his pastor's mixture of prophetic black preaching and unfortunate overstatements? While it will likely take weeks and even months to know the final answer to that central question, the first polls taken since Wright tapes and Obama's speech suggest that it has not hurt his candidacy in the ways that some had feared. As the Pew Research Center reported yesterday on its new poll, "the Wright controversy does not appear to have undermined support for Obama's candidacy."

Another important voice entered the conversation yesterday. In an interview with The Washington Times, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said:

Black Americans were a founding population. Africans and Europeans came here and founded this country together — Europeans by choice and Africans in chains. That's not a very pretty reality of our founding. … That particular birth defect makes it hard for us to confront it, hard for us to talk about it, and hard for us to realize that it has continuing relevance for who we are today.

Because this issue is now about much more than a candidate or an election, but about the issue of race in America, the poll results and the voice of the highest-ranking black official in the country provide a small glimmer of hope that the nation may be ready to try and take a step forward. Obama should be judged, as should any candidate, on the basis of his policy positions and leadership capacity, not because of our old racial tapes.

The recent controversy over Rev. Jeremiah Wright has initiated a new conversation about race in America. It has done so by making clear to white America what almost every black American knows—that 40 years after the civil rights movement, there are still two Americas. More pointedly for Christians, it is manifestly evident that we have two churches. After the integration of schools, the military, and the workplace, the church remains the single most segregated institution in America.

Across this divide, black Christians necessarily maintain a double consciousness, knowing how to talk to their white brothers and sisters while also keeping alive the distinctive language of the black church. White Christians, however, are taken aback when they hear the "angry" tone and anti-American sentiments of prophetic black preaching. It is hard for us to believe that such rhetoric could be called Christian.

Like any pastor, Rev. Wright has been wrong. (I do not, for example, think it is prophetic to say that whites created the HIV virus.) But we would do well to remember that the same pastor who Barack Obama has distanced himself from also gave him the phrase "the audacity of hope." While it has made for a good book title, its origin in the prophetic tradition of black preaching points us to the peculiar nature of Christian hope.

Apocalyptic hope is one of the distinctive marks of black preaching. We pay lip service to this tradition in our annual Martin Luther King Day services, but we are tempted to water it down. We overlook the fact that Martin Luther King, Jr. spent the last year of his life criticizing America's role in the Vietnam War. It is almost never mentioned that on April 4, 1968, just hours before he was assassinated, King phoned Ebeneezer Baptist Church to say that his sermon title for the next Sunday would be "Why America May Go to Hell."

Black anger is not now nor has it ever been absent from prophetic black preaching. Like Jeremiah Wright after him, Martin King preached to a church that knew firsthand the extent of injustice in this nation. Many things have changed in forty years, not the least of which is the fact that a black man is seriously contending for the presidency of the United States. But the black church knows that the wealth disparity between blacks and whites has not changed since 1965. Black Christians in America know that nearly one half of their sons will not finish high school and a third of them will go to prison. Divorced from our black brothers and sisters, most white Christians do not know this reality.

But if we learn to tell the truth about race, what can Christian hope look like? It cannot be the hope of false prophets who say, "'peace, peace' when there is no peace," pretending that blacks and whites do not continue to suffer from a racial wound. But neither can our hope be entirely satisfied with progressive politics that calls us to move forward by getting along. Apocalyptic hope is audacious enough to admit that the problem is deep in all of us and the only solution is a love that comes from beyond us.

In the civil rights movement, no one was angrier about the plight of black people in this country than James Baldwin. His gift with words only served to sharpen his criticism and make his attack on white power more pointed. Yet, it was James Baldwin who wrote in a letter to his nephew, "the really terrible thing, old buddy, is that you must accept [white people] … for these innocent people have no other hope. They are, in effect, still trapped in a history which they do not understand."

One great gift of the black church that has been largely overlooked in the case of Rev. Wright is the tradition's ability to hold together apocalyptic criticism with radical love. This is the double miracle of the black church: that after hearing the gospel from their oppressors, black people found liberation in Christ and then loved the so-called Christians who had been their enemies. If the Enlightenment reduced our confidence in a God who performs miracles, the story of the black church alone should be enough to restore it.

What we need to heal the racial wound in America is nothing less than a miracle. Barack Obama cannot fix us, and thank God, he is honest enough to admit it. We Christians would do well to take a cue from his frankness and remember that judgment begins with the house of God. We should have the audacity to hope that racial divisions could be transgressed within the church so that the world might know another way is possible.

Such hope may seem apocalyptic from where we stand, but the resurrection of Jesus is a reminder that the end of all things has already interrupted history. On this side of Easter, we're invited to live a way that wouldn't make sense if miracles don't happen.

Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove is the author of Free to Be Bound: Church Beyond the Color Line (NavPress, 2008).

Will Zimbabwe's parliamentary and presidential elections, coming up Saturday, be a complete sham, like their predecessors? The government of Zimbabwe, under Robert Mugabe, has left Zimbabwe's economy in ruins and permitted the HIV/AIDS crisis rise to catastrophic levels, prompting protests among people of faith.

Here are a few websites to check for perspectives and news:

This is Zimbabwe, a blog by the protest group Sokwanele, offers on-the-ground info, including a Google Maps-based schematic of places where the government has taken steps to rig the election. At the bottom right, there's a list of other Zimbabwe-themed blogs.

ZimOnline, a South Africa-based online newspaper about Zimbabwe.

ReliefWeb's roundup of news stories and nonprofit press releases about Zimbabwe (as assembled by the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs).

Elizabeth Palmberg is an assistant editor of Sojourners.

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My people will abide in a peaceful habitation,
in secure dwellings, and in quiet resting places.

Isaiah 32:18

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I come together with others not out of need, but out of the recognition that they belong to the same heart I belong to, and that they cannot fulfill the deepest yearning of my heart. Why? Because God has created in me a heart that can only be satisfied by the One who created it.

Henri Nouwen
Lecture at Scarritt-Bennett Center

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I come together with others not out of need, but out of the recognition that they belong to the same heart I belong to, and that they cannot fulfill the deepest yearning of my heart. Why? Because God has created in me a heart that can only be satisfied by the One who created it.

Henri Nouwen
Lecture at Scarritt-Bennett Center

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Five weeks ago, we began a series of posts on the cost of the war in Iraq. We have focused primarily on the human costs – the death and suffering of Americans and Iraqis after five years of war. There have been moving posts from soldiers, veterans, their parents, Iraqis, peacemakers, and theologians. We launched a statement – "A Call to Lament and Repent" – which more than 26,000 of you have now signed – and publicized it with ads in the online editions of Christianity Today, Relevant, and The Christian Century.

While that series is formally ending, the war and the suffering go on. On Easter Sunday, four U.S. soldiers were killed in Baghdad, bringing the total to 4,000. Around the country of Iraq, more than 60 people were killed in attacks. The Iraq Body Count database has now documented 90,000 civilian deaths – other estimates go into the hundreds of thousands. And this week, new fighting is raging in several Iraqi cities, causing additional casualties.

More than ever, as our statement says, "The American occupation must end, a transition to an international solution to Iraq must be found, a peaceful resolution is possible and must be pursued. Our country should end this war; not try to "win" it; and we must help the Iraqi people build a safer and more peaceful country."

While the media pundits continue to debate levels of violence, "surge" successes and failures, and the lack of political progress in Iraq, we must continue to raise the larger and deeper issue of how fundamentally wrong it was to launch a pre-emptive and primarily unilateral war against Iraq. There were far better ways to deal with the evil of Saddam Hussein and the threats of terrorism - which this war has only made worse. Repentance means a fundamental change in direction; and that is what we must now call for in U.S. foreign policy.

On Easter we celebrated the resurrection of Jesus Christ and the new life he brings. Where is Easter, that new life, for Iraq? How long will the suffering and killing go on? The need to lament, to repent, and to continue praying and acting to end this war is more important than ever.

In March 2006, Sojourners editorial projects intern Celeste Kennel-Shank wrote a great feature article for us titled "Green Hair, Grey Hair" about the D.C.-based project "We Are Family" started by Mark Anderson. Now, for the first time on the independent screen, one of our articles has inspired a movie! Read the description below about the new film directed by Katrina Taylor and produced by Rachell Williams:

What do punk rockers and senior citizens have in common? As Washington D.C. rapidly gentrifies, a low income African American community is threatened. The documentary "Green Hair, Grey Hair," takes a look at the struggles of living in a city in the midst of change, and the unique relationships that can develop. Mark Anderson, a writer, activist and punk rocker, created "We Are Family" to provide an outreach network to a group of senior citizen. Through an existing group he worked with - punk rockers - he used similar DIY and punk rock ethics, to bring the two together. Through grocery deliveries, advocacy about the neighborhood, and visiting, "We Are Family" provides a unique model for changing the way we look at old age. Very punk rock.

Celeste (who is the daughter of Sojourners Senior Policy Adviser Duane Shank) is a 2004 graduate of Goshen (Ind.) College with a degree in environmental studies and completed her master's degree at Northwestern University's Medill School of Journalism in Evanston, Ill. She now works for the Mennonite Weekly Review and is based in Chicago.

Rose Marie Berger, a Sojourners associate editor, is a Catholic peace activist and poet.

We may not like the other but we are called to love. We may certainly not validate or condone his or her actions. But we are called into a radical sense of our interconnectedness as creatures and children of the same God. To perceive this deep level of interdependence, especially with those whose worlds are fashioned differently than our own or perhaps with those who would seek to harm or destroy our worlds, seems a nearly impossible task. Yet the Gospels prod us on.... At the furthest reaches of our capacities to love, we are urged, "Love even your enemies."

- Wendy M. Wright
The Rising

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Ha! You who hide a plan too deep for the Lord,
whose deeds are in the dark,
and who say, "Who sees us? Who knows us?"
You turn things upside down!
Shall the potter be regarded as the clay?
Shall the thing made say of its maker,
"He did not make me";
or the thing formed say of the one who formed it,
"He has no understanding"?

- Isaiah 29:15-16

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In the Washington Post and throughout the blogosphere, debates rage about the recent spate of violence between Palestinians and Israelis, each side condemning with righteous indignation the sins of the other and proclaiming their own side's innocence. In a recent Post letters section, for example, Yaffa Klugerman wrote, "I was shocked to read [the] assertion that the murder of eight students in a Jerusalem seminary ... was reminiscent of a 1994 attack by Baruch Goldstein, a Jew who shot a group of Palestinians at prayer" (killing 29 Muslims and wounding another 150).

Another writer decried the Post's lack of balance in putting the seminary killings on page one and having no mention at all of an attack a few days later in which Israelis killed five Gazans. (A short news item in the April issue of Sojourners magazine reported on Hamas rocket attacks that sparked reprisal raids into Gaza by Israeli Defense Forces, but the magazine went to print before the killings at the seminary.)

For those seeking to justify their next round of violence, there will always be another provocation to point to; revenge and retaliation will never end anything, but merely create the rationale for the next bloody attack. And both sides can legitimately condemn acts of inhumanity committed by the other. The only way to stop the deadly spiral is to stop – to recognize that all life, on both sides of the conflict, is sacred, and that the proper, humane response to suffering inflicted even on one's enemy is mourning, not vengeance. Until then, violence will continue to beget violence, and hopes for peace in the Middle East will remain a pipe dream.

Jim Rice is editor of Sojourners magazine.

Environmental consciousness seems to be gaining momentum with increasing numbers of "eco-friendly" products out there from organic bath towels to hybrid cars. But are we really being more environmentally conscious when we buy these products? Are we actually thinking twice about the ecological consequences, or are we just switching from "brand x" to "brand organic"? A recent Washington Post article, Greed in the Name of Green, critiques the idea of the "new green consumer" and challenges the notion that we can buy our way into environmental sanctification.

Paul Hawken, a well known environmentalist and author, comments that we may actually have to alter lifestyles and perhaps buy less, rather than simply buying green. I appreciate Hawken's sentiment, as our culture is constantly shouting at us through advertisements in all sorts of mediums to buy more. Buy more to make yourself feel good. Buy more if you are feeling good. Buy more if you are unsure of how you are feeling but because it's cool and everyone is doing it. The same strategy is being used on the eco-friendly consumer.

True environmental consciousness will challenge the way we respond to our culture of consumerism and create changes in lifestyles. I do think that you can be an environmentally conscious consumer. However, this will most likely mean being less of a consumer to begin with, and when you do have to put on your consumer hat, be critical and read between the lines of "brand organic" (as well as everyone else's) advertisements.

Reduce, Reuse, then Recycle. And if you still need something new, do your research before you hit the stores and know what all those "green labels" are/are not actually telling you.

Kim Szeto is a former Sojourners intern now working for the Community Food Security Coalition.

In writing my new book, Founding Faith, I was struck by two things of possible importance to today’s religious progressives.

First, the 18th century evangelicals had a very different approach to religious freedom than many of their 21st century descendents. They were crucial advocates for separation of church and state. This ought to be a challenge to both modern liberal secularists who assume that evangelicals are awlays on the side of tyranny, and for religious conservatives who have disowned the arguments of their ancestors. If not for evangelicals, we wouldn’t have religious freedom.

Second, the Founders mostly assess religion through the prism of one question: does it promote good behavior? Though each of the Founders I studied in Founding Faith (Washington, Adams, Jefferson, Franklin, and Madison) started at different religious places, they ended up at the end of their lives whittling their creeds down to a few simple items:

Benjamin Franklin: "That the most acceptable service we can render to [God], is doing good to his other children."

John Adams: "I have learned nothing of importance to me, for they have made no change in my moral or religious creed, which has for 50 or 60 years been contained in four short words: 'Be just and good.'"

Thomas Jefferson: "1) That there is one only God, and he all-perfect. 2) That there is a future state of rewards and punishments. 3) That to love God with all thy heart and they neighbor as theyself, is the sum of religion." (Click here for an online version of the Jefferson Bible that shows how he cut out the miracles from the Bible, and highlighted the moral teachings.)

George Washington: "In politics, as in religion, my tenets are few and simple; the leading one of which, and indeed that which embraces most others, is to be honest and just ourselves, and to exact it from others; meddling as little as possible in their affairs where our own are not involved. If this maxim was generally adopted, wars would cease and our swords would soon be converted into reap-hooks and our harvests be more peaceful, abundant and happy." (Washington letter to James Anderson, December 25, 1795, as quoted in Chadwick, p. 487.)

It’s not accurate to say these men were not religious. I don’t believe it’s even accurate to say they were Deists, since most of them believed in a God that intervened in history and in their lives. But it is clear that they judged the success of religion by whether it inculcated good behavior, and created good citizens.

Steven Waldman is editor-in-chief of Beliefnet.