Religious affiliations of presidents of the United States
1. George Washington – Washington was known to his friends as one who rejected Christianity; his membership in a church was merely formal. Historian Barry Schwartz writes that Washington's "practice of Christianity was limited and superficial, because he was not himself a Christian. In the enlightened tradition of his day, he was a devout Deist--just as many of the clergymen who knew him suspected" (George Washington: The Making of An American Symbol, p.175) Many sources, however, list him as an Episcopalian
2. John Adams – Unitarian
3. Thomas Jefferson – No official affiliations, his beliefs were primarily Deist, and are considered very close to Unitarian. The Famous UUs website at http://www.famousuus.com says:
- Like many others of his time (he died just one year after the founding of institutional Unitarianism in America), Jefferson was a Unitarian in theology, though not in church membership. He never joined a Unitarian congregation: there were none near his home in Virginia during his lifetime. He regularly attended Joseph Priestley's Pennsylvania church when he was nearby, and said that Priestley's theology was his own, and there is no doubt Priestley should be identified as Unitarian. Jefferson remained a member of the Episcopal congregation near his home, but removed himself from those available to become godparents, because he was not sufficiently in agreement with the trinitarian theology.
4. James Madison – Episcopalian
5. James Monroe – Episcopalian
6. John Quincy Adams – Unitarian
7. Andrew Jackson – Presbyterian
8. Martin Van Buren – Dutch Reformed
9. William Henry Harrison – Episcopalian
10. John Tyler – Episcopalian; Deist
11. James Knox Polk – Presbyterian
12. Zachary Taylor – Episcopalian
13. Millard Fillmore – Unitarian
14. Franklin Pierce – Episcopalian
15. James Buchanan – Presbyterian
16. Abraham Lincoln – Christian; see Tbc/Abraham Lincoln)
17. Andrew Johnson – none
18. Ulysses S. Grant – Methodist
19. Rutherford B. Hayes – none
20. James Garfield – Disciples of Christ
21. Chester A. Arthur – Episcopalian
22. Grover Cleveland – Presbyterian
23. Benjamin Harrison – Presbyterian
24. Grover Cleveland – Presbyterian
25. William McKinley – Methodist
26. Theodore Roosevelt – Dutch Reformed
27. William Howard Taft – Unitarian
28. Woodrow Wilson – Presbyterian
29. Warren G. Harding – Baptist
30. Calvin Coolidge – Congregationalist
31. Herbert Hoover – Quaker
32. Franklin Delano Roosevelt – Episcopalian
33. Harry S Truman – Baptist
34. Dwight D. Eisenhower – Presbyterian
35. John F. Kennedy – Roman Catholic
36. Lyndon Johnson – Disciples of Christ
37. Richard Nixon – raised as a Quaker
38. Gerald R. Ford – Episcopalian
39. Jimmy Carter – Baptist
40. Ronald Reagan – Disciples of Christ
41. George Bush – Episcopalian
42. Bill Clinton – Baptist
43. George W. Bush – Methodist
The Unitarian Church is the religious body extant today that had an ideology most closely resembling those who held by Deism.
Link: John Adams was a Deist
Link: Thomas Jefferson was a Deist
Link: Abraham Lincoln was a Deist
- See also : President of the United States of America