Should we revive the use of the word "Puritan"?

Thanks to Lydia Leftcoast who referenced England's Puritans in a post and got me thinking about this. Using this word takes discussion about what is going on in America out of an anti-religious, or anti-Christian, context, and puts it in a context of "don't tell me what to do," or "don't force your morality on me." These are concepts that seem rooted in America, across the political spectrum. Our Congress is now full of Puritans, and we have one in the White House. They owe their power, to a large degree, to an organized effort by Puritanical forces to get their flocks to the polls. They will now enforce their idea of morality on the country, through legislation and court and executive decisions, whether we like it or not. And polls show that the majorty of Americans, while finding "values" and "morality" important, do not agree with the specifics of the morality of these modern-day Puritans, as interpreted in public policy. Maybe the use of this word, with its historical context in our language, would make clearer to more people what is happening.

when they are in fact
TOXICANS.

Add extremist and radical as modifiers

about this segment of our society -- I'm trying to find a way to communicate what is happening to those who don't understand what's happening to our country.

maybe without the modifiers if you dont want to be harsh. I think that religious fundamentalist conveys the idea that they believe their manifestation of god is the only correct one.

that their way is the only way, and everybody else be damned (literally).

"My way or the highway!"

Puritans

A puritan is a person who pours righteous indignation into the wrong things.
Gilbert K. Chesterton


The puritan hated bear baiting, not because it gave pain to the bear, but because it gave pleasure to the spectators.
Thomas B. Macaulay


The truth is, as every one knows, that the great artists of the world are never Puritans, and seldom even ordinarily respectable. No virtuous man -- that is, virtuous in the Y.M.C.A. sense -- has ever painted a picture worth looking at, or written a symph
H. L. Mencken


What the Puritans gave the world was not thought, but action.
Wendell Phillips


The puritan through life's sweet garden goes to pluck the thorn and cast away the rose.
Kenneth Hare


Puritanism: The haunting fear that someone, somewhere, may be happy.
H. L. Mencken

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From www.borntomotivate.com

The original Puritans were good people and steadfast true Christians who left Europe to escape religious persecution. They didn't force their beliefs on others or demand that govt adopt their religion.

That's quite the opposite of today's fundamentalists. If fundies want to move to Idaho, establish their own town with a taxpayer funded religious school and mandating prayer in the classroom, I say go for it fundies. As long as you don't force me to move there, do whatever the hell you want.

But if you are going to demand that an existing town and an existing school conform to your religious demands, then take a hike.

However, in a way, I can't say I find that particularly wrong. Not the ear cutting off part, but the 'keeping the Quakers out' part.

The Puritans went halfway around the world at great expense and risk to form their own religious community. I think it would be interesting to debate whether they had the right to restrict who should and should not be allowed into their community. The Quakers women surely had options. They could have gone to Pennsylvania (which was founded by Quakers), or they could have changed their religious beliefs.

IMO, when you are talking about a brand new community and people who purposely relocate to establish their own religious community, I think they should be allowed the option to restrict membership in the community to people who share their same beliefs, or who at minimum are willing to abide by any laws promulgated to enforce their religious beliefs.

It's another story when you have an established city which has welcomed multiple religious group suddenly changing and requiring all people living there to convert to a particular branch of religion.

that all of the states would divide up and each be a different religion.

People would have to follow ALL the rules of that religion or face the death penalty.



It's not my ideal world.....


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You wrote:
" They didn't force their beliefs on others or demand that govt adopt their religion. "

That is simply false.

I'm agnostic, and I don't want fundies cramming their crap down my throat.

By the same token, if they want to move to some uninhabited place or buy up some small town and turn it into Fundieland, it's fine with me. I'm not going to demand to live in Fundieland and demand that I be allowed to spread my agnostic gospel.

would Rhode Island have been settled?
Surely twas better to put all such heathen there, than to simply smite them.

Did they have orgy parties? How would these Puritans know that? Why they should be HANGED for taking a peek!

What about the Indians? What about the Quakers they burned for being witches?

But I would argue that the Puritans didn't force the Quakers to move in with them. I'm certainly no expert on the Puritans though, so I could be wrong.

their communities. There were strict laws requiring meeting attendance and people could be fined or even placed in the stocks for refusing to attend meeting. Although these Puritans came to America seeking religious freedom, they seldom extended that freedom to anyone who did not share their religious beliefs. Quakers were routinely persecuted. Many were imprisoned, some branded and literally ridden out of town on a rail. Still some were executed (Mary Dyer who was executed in 1660 springs to mind). Others who disagreed with Puritan beliefs or connections of church and state were run out of Massachusetts and Connecticut - thus the founding of Rhode Island by Roger Williams. The Puritans even passed laws in Massachusetts making it illegal to deny the Bible. In Connecticut, laws requiring compulsory church attendance were written on blue paper, hence the term "blue laws." Most of the trials for witchcraft in New England were because these women and men did something to was considered heretical in the eyes of the Puritans. These people were not tolerant of other's beliefs in the least.

See my response to bloom above.

So what do you think? If I am really, really religious, and decide I can't live in a multicultural place anymore and need to establish a brand new community 1/2 way around the world where just me and others who share my beliefs can live, is it really reasonable to force me to accept people who don't share my same religious beliefs into my little utopia?

After all, it's not like me & 100 fellow sectists moved in and took over an existing community and forced everyone to convert.

by displacing the Separatists (the Mayflower dudes), a group that had established a treaty with local Indians and allowed people to live among them that did not accept their religion (the Strangers, John Alden, George Soule, and Miles Standish among them). I think the Separatists were closer to achieving the utopian society and believed in the big tent idea (inclusive), while the Puritans tended to impose their beliefs on others (fundamentalists, exclusive).

Hey, I'm a proud descendent from two lines of Strangers - no wonder I'm a Democrat. :)

I was under the impression that the Mayflower Pilgrims were Puritans and Separatists.

You'd think I'd know this stuff. John Alden is my great, great,.....grandfather on my mother's side.

Puritans arrived after the Separatists!

Puritans insisted on foisting their religion on others while the Separatists were more tolerant. Separatists wanted to separate church from State while the Puritans moved in the opposite direction.

From 1630 onward, Puritanism became the overriding religiopolitical force in the Bay Colony, and leaders sought to establish a Bible commonwealth. Citizenship (called freemanship) was restricted (until 1664) to church members. Religious dissenters, most notably Anne Hutchinson and Roger Williams, were banished from the colony. Even great (x10) uncle John Alden Jr. was jailed twice during the witch trials. Indian wars, Witch trial and a whole slew of other problems ensued...
Purtians were fundamentalists plain and simple.

He is descended from John Alden and Pricilla Mullins he is also descended from William Brewster.

The Puritans came into an existing colony and enforced their beliefs on all in the community whether they were already there or not.

Doni - whose husband is also descended from the Mayflower bunch including Separatists and strangers. I myself am descended from the Jamestown bunch who never pretended to be here for religious reasons.

I think he was only interested in Pricilla Mullins...and maybe a great adventure, too...but I think Pricilla Mullins was the main reason for him jumping ship. ;)

or else I wouldn't have my husband. :)

Puritans had freedom to practice their religion in England, and some rose to positions of great power under Anglican monarchs. Sir Francis Walsingham, the chief of Elizabeth I's secret service, was a Puritan.

What they did not have freedom to do was force their "purified" brand of Christianity on the rest of the population. At least, not until Cromwell and his "Parliamentarians" took power after forcing Charles I from the throne and beheading him. (Yes, Charles was a bad king. Separate issue.) When Charles II came back in the Restoration, a number of the Puritans went to Holland, where they had the same problem. They could worship as they pleased, but could not supplant official Dutch Lutheranism.

So they sailed for Massachussetts, where they proceded to hang "witches; massacre the local inhabitants in the "Indian Wars;" murder Quakers and other dissenters such as Anne Hutchinson; and drive out Roger Williams for his sympathies toward Native Americans, as well as for his heretical notion of the primacy of conscience.

No, not nice people at all.

Okasha

This is closer to what my impression has always been:

http://www.apuritansmind.com/PuritanArticles/PuritanRoots.htm

"During the 17th century, there were legal actions taken against the Puritans because they did not want to follow the Act of Uniformity, and could not in good conscience. This Act of Uniformity was an "edict" which demanded that preachers would read form the ceremonial prayer book during services, wear Anglican vestments, and support the Anglican ceremonies. The Church of England was also demanding that young preachers who desired a degree from the university of Oxford or Cambridge, were compelled to sign the Act before they could earn any degree at all. The conscious act of rejecting a forced religious view gave them the name "Puritans." They desired to purify the church. The Puritans, because of this Act, were vehemently persecuted, and they could expect anything from being burned at the stake, to being placed in prison for an indefinite period of time (You may recall that John Bunyan penned the classic, Pilgrim's Progress from prison.) The Puritans desired to "purify" the church of England from its corruption. They did not aspire a full separation from the Church of England, but rather a reformation of it, copying the reformation under John Calvin in Geneva.

Those Puritans who could not tolerate the church of England and their persecutions, deemed separatists, left England and became "pilgrims." These pilgrims ultimately settled down in the Massachusetts Bay Colony thinking that religious freedom was the only venue to be untainted from the Anglican tyranny and imposition. As a result, many of the Puritans left to be Pilgrims in the New World, the Netherlands, and various parts of Europe."

in school, where Puritan/Pilgrim were used pretty much interchangeably. I was in college and studying British history as a complement to my BritLit major before I found out any different.

And by then, early American historians were deconstructing the myth on this side of the Pond, too. It seems that the Puritans had higher rates of alcoholism ("public drunkenness")and illegitimate births than other immigrant communities.

On edit: I went back to this site to see if it could name a single Puritan burned at the stake in the 17th. Century. And it didn't. What I did find, following the links from "Non-Christian" from the menu to the left of the page, was a series of God-Hates-Fags-Matthew-Shepherd-in-hell-style illustrations of what awaits the non-believer. The modern-day puritan author of the site, at least, is a fundie through and through.

It's enough to gag a maggot.

Okasha

What I see is that most of the teachers at my school leave pretty much just teach the traditional first Thanksgiving story. They do not teach their kids about the religion and politics of the time. Our book offers about 1 page to the Puritans and although it does treat the Puritans and Separatists as separate entities, it muddies the waters a bit. I teach my students extensively on this period, because I believe it is very important to what would occur later. I spend a great deal of time on studying the early colonies and how the New England, Middle, and Southern colonies differed. I go into great detail of the religions of the New England colonies and what religious tolerance looked like as opposed to what religious intolerance looked like. My little fourth grade history nuts can tell anyone the difference between the Separatist Pilgrims of Plimouth and the Puritans of Connecticut. They can explain Quaker beliefs and why the Puritans found them so odd as to accuse them of witchcraft. Most of the kids in my school are Baptist and have had little if any exposure to other religious beliefs. For that reason, I take great care to teach the religious dynamics of the colonial period to my students. I had kids in my class who did not know what Catholocism was. None had ever heard of the Episcopal church, nor had any ever heard of Quakers. My guess is most of these kids parents have never stepped foot into a church other than a Baptist one themselves. Most adults I know are woefully ignorant about early American history and religion. People just assume things are the way they have always been.

And did every chance they got.

I was reading Thom Hartman's article today:

Two weeks before the Alien and Sedition Acts were passed, June 1, 1798, as Adams was already rounding up newspaper editors and dissidents in anticipation of his coming legal authority...

Several states had gone completely over to Adam's side, particularly Massachusetts which was filled with preachers who wanted theocracy established in America, and Connecticut, which had become the epicenter of the wealthy who wanted to control the government's agenda for their own gain. It was red states and blue states, writ large. There was even discussion of Massachusetts seceding from the rest of the nation, which had become too "liberal" (to use George Washington's term) and secular.

http://www.commondreams.org/views04/1108-34.htm
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It is interesting how times have changed with Massachusetts and Connecticut being the Bluest of the Blue states now. But there was quite a history of religious intolerance to overcome...

I like the use of the word Puritan - because people don't call themselves that - but manifest many of those intolerant attitudes and beliefs. (So it seems more like attacking the beliefs than particular people).

somewhat, anyway, that the descendents of the Puritans (the Massachusettians) have legalized gay marriage and have the lowest divorce rate in the country.

if we have to divide ourselves with labels, i prefer using broader economic terms rather than social terms.

i prefer to think of the "red states" as the "welfare states", in that they disproportionately rely on money from the federal government to make ends meet- of course, the fed serves as a passthrough from the "blue states", who pay disproportionately into the fed, thus acting for the good of the common.

these states should be known as the "commonwealth states." Like MA and I think Pennsyvania.

whalerider55

In the UK, it's still almost a dirty word.

A moral story: A country has a monarchy, fights a war to get rid of it, becomes a republic, the republic is taken over by puritan fanatics, republic fails.

I'm talking about the UK. Where did you think I was talking about?

Especially some of us with Irish roots.

Not that we blame the brits as a nation. We know what they did to Cromwell's remains after the Restoration.

And all that. Some people.

I think "fanatic", "fundamentalist", "extremist" and so on are better labels.

As for the Civil War, the ironic thing is that I'm a republican. If the Rump Parliament had found a way to maintain control, Britain might be the oldest republic on Earth. But Cromwell was a brutal, murderous, tyrannical swine.

Putting it in today's terms, the Pilgrims were more like the Amish, where as the Puritans were more like today's evangelicals. The Pilgrims completely separated from the Church of England, the Puritans wished to make the Church more PURE.

By defintion. So a pilgrim is a puritan who left. Much the same thing. The Amish and the Quakers are whole different kettle of fish (to employ a pun on early Christian iconography).

There was a real difference. Puritans wished to make the Church of England more pure (hence the name) and Separatists separated from the Church of England (hence the name). Although some of the beliefs were the same, they were not the same group.

that's the point. The puritans thought they could achieve them inside, the pilgrims didn't. That's pretty much the only difference.

i use repuritans.

snake oil peddling conmen

If the only people who know that Puritans were intolerant religious extremists are liberals - the word will not work on the general population...

Some words can be re-defined, but that would take a massive effort.

I don't see where you would want to associate the current Fundies with the old Calvanist Puritans. Despite all of their shortcomings, to associate them with the current group in congress is a bit of an insult.

...conservatives have actually very little to do with Puritanism which, after all, was a New England culture. Southern conservatism, which is what defines the current Republican party, does not have its root in Puritanism.

The most politically dangerous group--has its roots in Presbyterianism. (Of course, most modern Presbyterians are not that radical at all.) That harks back to the Scots Irish (Ulster Protestants) who settled in the South long ago.

However, they share strong Calvinist roots with the Puritans--who existed before there was a New England. (Hint: Old England.)

adherents to "Scotland's covenanted work of Reformation." They were terrorists, plain and simple, who assassinated rival clergy and/or were willing tools of the Crown in the persecution of Catholic Highlanders.

Their roots are showing.

Okasha

It's a taking of Calvin to the extremes. Although it has a foothold among separatist Presbyterians (Orthodox and Reformed Presbyterians) it didn't really begin to gain notice until it was taken up by Independent Fundamentalist Baptists and particualary Charismatic Circles (namely the Faith movement, i.e. Name it Claim it churches). What is interesting about the Faith movement is that they are not really Calvinistic at all. In fact, some are Arminian in their beliefs that salavation can be lost (e.g. the backslidden). Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell brought this movement out of the fringes of Christianity and gave it voice. Rushdoony, North, et al had not been able to attract a wider audience for this belief, but with the birth of the moral majority and the Christian coalition, this movement moved into more churches, although most in it had no idea of its history and beliefs. Most still do not, and you will find precepts of Christian Reconstructionism being taught in churches that do not hold to the movement's post millenial view, nor adhere to its strict Calvinism. What all do share is a belief that there needs to be a return to some degree or another to Old Testament law.

a blend of the worst of the Golden Age with Puritan New England.

Fundamentalists believe in following the fundamental tenets of Christianity, whereas puritans want to purify Christianity and America of "unclean" elements.

Fundamentalists believe all people sin and make mistakes, while puritans believe they're righteous and sinless and everyone else is unworthy.

Puritan confers the meaning of self-righteousness whereas fundamentalist makes them sound devoted and honorable.

n/t

I think "Puritan" is an excellent term to use. Regardless of who they were or what they believed or how they acted, most people have a poor sense of history and react emotionally to the term "Puritan."

We are dealing with a base of people who respond in knee-jerk fashion to words. That's why I advocate "Puritan" rather than "fundamentalist." To them, "fundamentalist" implies getting down to the fundamentals of the issue. I honestly believe they think it's a compliment to strip something down to literalism, although most don't realize that's what they're doing.

We're dealing with a very touchy, emotionally erratic group of people in bush's fundie base. Start from there, and move forward to dismantle their power.

and I am paraphrasing here...." sometimes I think the country be been better off if the puritans had stayed home and just the rogues and libertines had come over"