When the Puritans hit the shores of the Americas in 1620 they carried with them all the viruses of false guilt and manufactured shame that still contaminate reason to this day. It is noted in Time Frames and Taboo Data—p 327:
By myth and tradition the year 1620 is regarded in the United States as when the “Founding Fathers” or the “Pilgrims” first set foot in the Americas. Although the Mayflower did indeed reach the bleak shores of what is today Massachusetts, the Pilgrims were at that location because of bad weather and poor navigation. Their intended destination had been Jamestown and “The Old Dominion” of Virginia, 500 miles to the south, which had been established in 1607. And tradition has it that the Puritans brought by the Mayflower were fleeing religious persecution in England, but the bulk of them had lived for eleven years in Holland where they were not persecuted. The real reason for the Puritans to strike out for the New World was to bring aid and support to the Puritan element in Virginia, for the Puritan deputy governor, Samuel Argall, had been deposed by the Episcopalians in 1619—a great setback to the Whig/Puritan cause.
Apparently it never occurred to the Puritans that they might have been led astray because their intolerant faith was not much appreciated by god. Their hardened hearts chose instead to establish a new colony of Massachusetts on the tenets of harsh intolerance of any beliefs other than their own. Unfortunately, the bigotry and cruelty of the Puritan “fathers” would for centuries taint even the more tolerant faith systems of the U.S.
A few years later, 1634, Cecilius Calvert, the second Baron Baltimore, after his father’s death, wished to found a colony where coreligionists might worship freely without incurring the persecution they were subjected to in England. Of the little more than 200 colonists to arrive, however, probably over half were Protestants. The settlement they founded was called St. Mary’s. The first statutes of the Providence (Maryland) were passed in 1638 and religious tolerance was the central feature of the project. By this time the Puritans and their coreligionists had regained their hold over the Episcopalians of Virginia (mentioned in 1620), and with assistance of the Massachusetts Puritans actually invaded Maryland! Typical of theocratic mentality, the Puritans quickly dismantled the Maryland Constitution in which the “Act of Toleration” was clearly proclaimed and replaced it with the disgraceful “Act Concerning Religion,” which mandated that the Puritan doctrine and tenets were to be followed by all.
Three years later, December 1641, another example of Christian/Puritan piety was played out in the disgraceful carnage known as the Cos Cob Massacre. The New England settlers had been kindly received by the Indians under Cos Cog at Myanus and Stamford. The Indians had taught the settlers how to make a living from the sea and from the forest. But when the number of settlers had grown and they attained sufficient firearms, they displayed their Christian neighborly love by creeping out on Christmas Eve to the Indian village of Petuquapen. In the spirit of Christ they built a huge fire at each of the village gates and then shot down every man, woman and child that sought to escape. Every inhabitant of the village perished—some 400 “savage” souls.
Then in 1643 a company of Puritans were excluded from Virginia for religious nonconformity. The shunned Puritans then founded a settlement called Providence on the site of present day Annapolis. Interestingly, at the Naval Academy at Annapolis, Md., cadets had to legally petition the school there in 2008 to abolish mandatory daily prayer at weekday lunch. The practice was/is unconstitutional—but it does remain true to Puritan tradition.
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