William M. Beck, a former mayor of Fredericksburg and member of the Fredericksburg Council of The Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom recently penned a letter to The Free Lance-Star announcing an upcoming event that I would like to share. He wrote:
On Friday, Jan. 21, at 7:30 p.m., two esteemed religious scholars will speak at UMW's Dodd Auditorium to discuss Thomas Jefferson's "Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom" and its meaning for our world. Martin E. Marty (left), professor emeritus of the history of modern Christianity at the University of Chicago, and Seyyed Hossein Nasr (right), university professor of Islamic studies at George Washington University, are uniquely qualified to comment on religious freedom from the different perspectives of Islam and Christianity. Certainly, Jefferson envisioned such discussions when he said that his statute was meant "to comprehend, within the mantle of its protection, the Jew and the Gentile, the Christian and Mahometan, the Hindoo, and infidel of every denomination." This year's program is the latest in an annual series presented by the University of Mary Washington, with support from the community (More Details Here). As my latest long-term book project, Faith and Freedom in Fredericksburg: Thomas Jefferson and the Virginia Statute of Religious Freedom, examines Jefferson’s experiences here in Fredericksburg in 1777, I am extremely interested in what these Christian and Muslim scholars have to say. If I am able to attend, I will provide a write-up of my experience and if I am unable, I will provide a link to whatever press coverage follows. This subject, beyond all others that I have studied, remains the most complex to me. Although I have written editorials about my own interpretations on Jefferson and religious freedom (Read Here), I really don’t feel that I, or most people for that matter, truly understand the statute as Jefferson intended it.
Updated: Thursday, 13 January 2011 10:01 PM EST
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