The full title of of this book is The Church of Saint Thomas Paine: A Religious History of American Secularism. Which might seem a bit of a contradiction to those unfamiliar with the wonderful history of secularists and secularism, but for those of us in the know, it makes a lot of sense.

This wonderful book paints such a delightful picture of those somewhat eccentric characters in this history who wanted to ‘reclaim’ the ideas of church and religion for the non-religious. It travels all through the US, throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries of small little churches and congregations, all espousing various levels of agnostic to atheist tenants of their church. They were always really small, some barely reach 100, a few in the thousands. They rarely outlasted their founder, either because of infighting afterwards or just because they wound their church up as they god older. Everyone was fascinating in their own right.

However, it was one of the last chapters that was the most interesting for me. Basically in a footnote in a court case Torcaso v Watkins ended up being used by lots of evangelicals claiming that ‘secular humanism’ was violating the establishment clause (because they wanted to retain their religious faith in privileged positions and in schools, of course, not because they actually wanted separation of church and state). What was really well contrasted though was the power ascribed to ‘secular humanism’ as an established religion vs the reality of the history of these types or churches being small and dispersed.

I loved reading about all this stuff in another context, given I am so familiar with the UK experience, especially the build up of case law, allowing for freedom of belief for those of a non-religious persuasion. One of the ones I examine in my PhD in this area was Bowman vs National Secular Society in 1917. This overturned decades of legal precedent of overturning gifts and legacies to atheist organisations (there had been a long tradition of families overturning wills as no one of ‘sound mind’ would give money to an atheist organisation!)

The other thing I enjoyed was the absolute inability for these agnostic / atheist groups to agree on anything. It was so fragmented, even though they really were all aiming for the same end goal of a world that was more rational, less adherent to theistic religious. To one degree or another. The same thing happened in the UK, and heck, the same things happen now. We do love some infighting among people who have broadly the same philosophical outlook.

I also loved that the American secularists used Thomas Paine as secular saint. They would celebrate his birthdays well over 200 years later. As well as using the phase ascribed to Paine ‘my country is the world and my religious is to do good’ to describe their ultimate goals for their churches. Which I literally have as a framed pictured in my living room. I would have definitely have celebrated Saint Thomas Paine. And for those of you who are unaware of the long saga of what happened to poor Thomas Paine’s body, that is a weird story in itself!

Such a great read, definitely a good one for any atheists and / or history buffs!