Leading Clergy of the American Revolution

Nearly a hundred years prior to the American Revolution, New England pastors were resisting the tyranny of English kings and their appointed governmental officials. The primary reason for the rise in tension between the English monarchs and the American church was the place the Bible held in colonial life. During the Protestant Reformation, churchmen north of the Alps returned to biblical texts and the Church Fathers as sources of authority in faith and Christian practice. South of the Alps, however, the Roman Church turned to the Greco-Roman world for its source of authority. The stream of influence that gave rise to the thirteen American Colonies flowed from currents north of the Alps where Scripture dominated cultural life. After the Bible, the second most referenced source of the Founding Fathers for the ideas that birthed American government was provided by Baron De Montesquieu. In his two-volume work, The Spirit of Laws, Baron Montesquieu noted the difference in government that resulted between Christians north of the Alps and the Roman Church to the south: "...the Catholic religion is most agreeable to a monarchy, and the Protestant to a republic." The Protestant Reformation gave rise to republican forms of government around the world and diminished or eventually eliminated the rule of many monarchs. In the 1680s, tension arose between New England pastors and the King. Increase Mather, Samuel Willard, and John Wise were among those pastors who resisted the tyranny of King Charles II. Their writings and influence inspired Christian ministers and laymen nearly one hundred years later in the American Revolution when pastors were called upon to resist the tyranny of King George III. Contrary to the belief of many, the primary ideas that gave rise to America were not those of Voltaire and Enlightenment thinkers. While most historians completely neglect the role of pastors in the rise and progress of the Revolution, Joel Tyler Headley and the candid historian find no difficulty in tracing the pastoral influence of the birth of the American Republic. The biographical accounts of nearly three dozen pastors who became chaplains to the American Revolutionary Army in part recounts the Christian influence in the rise of America as a sovereign nation.