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3 2 8 I n t e r p r e t a t i o n Volume 41 / Issue 3college was not specifically sectarian at all, but allowed the presence of manyreligious faiths without establishing one as predominant. However, his relegationof the religious community to a competitive position within the academiccommunity is not evidence of his hostility to religion; quite the opposite.Jefferson believed that even in the absence of a professor of divinity, God,the creator, preserver, and supreme ruler of the universe, would have a placeon campus in a general sense. Liberal education, then, included a space forGod. It is striking that Jefferson speaks of God nonspecifically. This is nota God of a specific sect. The Sage from Monticello perhaps reveals a morephilosophical reason for the exclusion of a particular religious denominationalcontrol from higher education. Though he found room for manydenominations, he did so to preserve a place for reason: “By bringing therival sects together and mixing them with the mass of other students we shallsoften their asperities, liberalize and neutralize their prejudices, and makethe general religion the religion of peace, reason, and morality.” 44 It shouldnot go without mention that religion was both beneficial and viewed withcaution—as something potentially destructive—in the young republic. Theeffect of bringing together several faiths and sects not only moderated them,and moderated their appeals, but it allowed reason an exalted place on thecampus. Taken together, reason and revelation had the effect of fostering ageneral morality in the community, which in turn would be beneficial to theyoung republic. Part of the problem, according to Jefferson, was that religioussects could become fanatical and hence hostile to reason or the mind. If theywere allowed unchecked power in education, they would be so ambitious asto tyrannize over others. 45 It is in the context of education that he explains,44Thomas Jefferson to Dr. Thomas Cooper, 2 November 1822, in Writings, ed. Peterson, 1465. See alsoRingenberg, Christian College, 80.45Jefferson to Cooper, 2 November 1822, in Writings, 1464. We should note that Jefferson certainlyhad a bias against certain sects, but his position was consistent with respect to liberal educationand sectarianism. See Dumas Malone, Jefferson and His Time: The Sage of Monicello (Boston: Little,Brown, 1981), 378. Some have noted that the word “fundamentalist” has been dropped for “evangelical”because of its negative connotation. Not all evangelical schools are fundamentalist, however. Thereaction to the secularization of many colleges led to the creation of fundamentalist schools. Thesereligious schools have such a passionate attachment to their theological position that they have endedup denouncing those who one would think would be their allies. For example, Bob Jones Jr. condemnedJerry Falwell and the Moral Majority as “one of Satan’s devices to build the world church ofthe Antichrist.” The stifling intellectual atmosphere of these schools led none other than Billy Grahamto leave Bob Jones after only one semester. The danger of these fundamentalist schools is that theyclaim to have speculative surety in all things, and that leads them to express surety in nonspeculativethings. Therefore, these schools are authoritarian in institutional organization and campus politics.See Ringenberg, Christian College, 83, 172, 179, and 180. A more recent and popular treatment of thisphenomenon is Hanna Rosin, God’s Harvard: A Christian College on a Mission to Save America (NewYork: Harcourt, 2007).