Abraham Lincoln and His Religion
by Kailee Neuner
University at Buffalo Honors Program
Abraham Lincoln -- the deist, the Presbyterian, the Baptist, the Calvinist, the highly religious, the scoffer of religion -- all are claims about the sixteenth president of the United States. Lincoln's religion has been a controversy since his death and quite honestly was a controversy even when he was alive. Religion first entered his life when he was a child and subjected to strong Calvinistic Baptist beliefs. He then moved to Springfield, Illinois where he was exposed to evangelism through the Methodists. This period of his life turned him off to religion and he became a free thinker. Even though he was disappointed with the fighting religions and evangelist preachers, he still had a curiosity concerning religion. He decided to rent a pew at the First Presbyterian Church in Springfield. When he entered the White House, one could say his religion was Republicanism. He strongly believed the Declaration of Independence should be the moral ruling of the nation. He always believed in a higher being, however. He believed there was a God, but never makes reference to Jesus Christ, the Son of God. His God was his own personal God. He did not believe or agree with organized religion, however, he attended Presbyterian services with his wife in Washington and was said to occasionally go to mid-week prayer meetings. He strongly believed in prayer and it, as well as his personal God, became more important in his life as the Civil War progressed. Friends, family members, and thousands of Union and Confederate soldiers were dying. Lincoln turned to God for an answer. He began to believe in a highly radical belief that God was not on either the Union side or the Confederate side. God was punishing the nation as a whole because everyone, not just the South, was guilty for the sins of slavery. He also believed everything was preordained and that what would happen would be the doing of God. Lincoln struggled for years over his religious views and they were constantly transforming as events unfolded. Although Lincoln never formally joined a church, there is no doubt that he was a highly religious man who respected his personal God to the utmost.
"Abraham Lincoln, Religious Views: Letter to the Editor of the Illinois Gazette,” August 11, 1846 . Teaching American History http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/index.asp?documentprint=781
Guelzo, Allen C. "Lincoln and the Abolitionists," The Wilson Quarterly 24 no. 4 (2000): 58-70.
Guelzo, Allen C. Abraham Lincoln: Redeemer President. Grand Rapids , Michigan : William B. Eerdman's Publishing Company, 1999.
Noll, Mark A. "The Puzzling Faith of Abraham Lincoln," Christian History 11, no. 1 (1992): 10-15.
Parrillo, Nicholas. " Lincoln 's Calvinistic Transformation: Emancipation and War," Civil War History 46, no. 3 (2000): 227-253.
Stevenson, James A. “A Providential Theology: Shakespeare's Influence on Lincoln 's Second Inaugural Address," The Midwest Quarterly 43, no. 1 (2001): 11-28.
