Deist Alliance Deist Alliance member sites:

Deist.info Modern Deism Panendeism.org God's Online Home Church of Nature's God Deist Poet Deist Alliance Home Page

<< Previous Webring Join Next >>

Positive Deism Store Modern Age of ReasonWe have a paperback version of Modern Age of Reason available for purchase at our Positive Deism Store HERE.
From the back cover: "Thomas  Paine, who was one of the founding fathers of the United States of America, held to a religious philosophy called 'Deism'. Age of Reason was the book he wrote to share his reason-based theological beliefs with the world. The book was written in the 18th century, so we have paraphrased Mr. Paine's classic work into modern English in order to make it more accessible to modern-day readers." Purchase of this paperback, and other items in the store, will help support the Positive Deism website.

bottom corner

Welcome to Positive Deism and the Positive Deism Discussion Group Deism is a belief in God based on reason and nature. If you're not familiar with Deism, we'd like to suggest that you click on the Deist Document and other links in the list below to learn more.

Also available here at Positive Deism are:

Positive Deism is associated with a number of other Deist sites for the purpose of promoting Deism in the 21st Century. Please visit all of the other Deist Alliance sites.

A message from Peter Hilbig:

Early in 2007 Steve Dowell ceased ownership and administration of Positive Deism and passed it on to me. We all miss Steve and wish him well. I have tried to continue in the same spirit of open-mindedness and tolerance which he began. We are on a voyage of discovery, and the reality of that analogy is that long periods are spent at sea with no land in sight. We often venture into uncharted waters where the conventional aids to navigation prove inadequate.

So why are you here on this website? Are you searching for answers to the ultimate questions? Do you feel that the popular religions and atheism lack something? Do you feel that there is something “out there” to explain our universe and existence? Do you feel that the scientific method has its limitations? Or do you feel that science will one day explain everything? Do you believe that death is final, or are you of the opinion that there must be something more?

These are a few of the many questions of existence that we discuss in our forums. Christianity and Islam do not have a monopoly on the notion of an afterlife. And though not all Deists believe in or hope for one, I for one have great faith in the idea of an afterlife to make better sense of existence. Some of us believe that these two religions were founded by two people of such strong faith that they invoked the authoritative word of God falsely to bring credence to others. By this same reasoning we can believe that the words of the Old Testament of the Jews were not divine. The writers' manipulative use of fear results in obeisance rather than love of God - and this questionable human strategy has been continued by many faithful followers to this day. This being the case, then these religions are not founded on faith, but on deception, and therefore the pure concept of faith has become tarnished. Deism is a reasoned faith: that is, it is based on a certain amount of reasoning, which we can all identify as sound, but since there are no empirical proofs for our reasoning, there is a faith factor. Some schools of thought regard Jesus as a Deist, but reason that his biographers embellished the truth of the matter with the legends and myths which arose through folklore over time. Never forget that the gospels were written decades after Jesus’ death.

Scientific progress continues to bring clouds upon the claims of the “revealed” religions. It is a slow process to give up beliefs which have been inculcated in many of us individually since birth and in our societies over many centuries. It is understandable that most people cling to these hopes as they would a life-raft. The aims of Positive Deism are not to bring down those beliefs, but to give a reasonable alternative to those who seriously doubt them. Since Charles Darwin's revolutionary discoveries we have observed the rise of atheism which bases its claims on evolution theory. Yet most deists embrace evolution theory as God’s method of bringing variety and change to Creation without the need for constant intervention. The case for atheism is a strong one, but also relies on a good deal of faith – faith that science will one day be able to explain the origin of the laws of physics and chemistry, the origin of energy, matter, space, time and a host of concepts, which can only be described as bizarre when we try to account for their existence at present. Deism provides an acceptable alternative to atheism but also relies strongly on science for direction.

Doubt is the key to the pursuit of truth. At Positive Deism we avoid fundamentalism as you find it in so many schools of thought. Not many of us are dogged in our beliefs, and we challenge others to avoid dogmatic thought which only serves to blinker our field of view and shorten our horizons. If the concept of deism appeals to your sense of balance in a human world where it is often lacking, then please join us on our journey.

Peter Hilbig (Dad)
February 2009.

So what is Positive Deism? Positive Deism is simply keeping our focus on what Deism is instead of focusing on what Deism isn't. Click HERE to read an excellent essay that describes this principle. Traditionally, Deism has tended to spend much of its time being anti-Christian (negative). However, we want to confine our focus here to Deism. We are most concerned with everything that is Deistic in nature and would like to advance our knowledge and experience of it (positive).

Some of our members like the concept behind our discussion group so much that they want to adopt Positive Deism as a personal philosophy or theology on its own. Read about that here. This site and its associated discussion group is for Deists who are looking for a place to share their views and hear the views of fellow Deists without having to be involved in endless arguments with non-Deists. Non-Deists are welcome to join as long as they refrain from belittling our beliefs by arguing with us over the most basic tenets of Deism. There are other groups that are more appropriate for those types of debates. Please see our posting policy.

We hope that you will find the Positive Deism discussion groups an enjoyable place to be, and a place you can call 'home' on the Net. Again, Welcome to Positive Deism.Dove

Your Fellow Deist,
Steve Dowell

This profound statement was posted by one of our members in our discussion forum in March 2009:

"May deism grant us the reason to be able to judge our great sacred texts in the context of the times within which they were written and not to judge them out of context, in our own day and age, with the benefit of a holier-than-thou 20-20 hind sight not afforded the original authors who wrote the sacred texts hundreds and hundreds of years ago.

"We don't ridicule scientists of old and their outdated notions which now seem far-fetched; instead we stand on their shoulders.

"I suggest we give the same consideration to the sacred heritage of mankind. To respect rather than ridicule the path that led to deism."