Read "Age of Reason" by Thomas Paine. Part 1, chapter 9,10,11,12,13,14,15 in the following link http://www.ushistory.org/paine/reason/index.htm
Answer the following question:
In the following passage, Thomas Paine takes issue with Christianity:
"As to the Christian system of faith, it appears to me as a species of atheism; a sort of religious denial of God. It professes to believe in a man rather than in God. It is a compound made up chiefly of man-ism with but little deism, and is as near to atheism as twilight is to darkness. It introduces between man and his Maker an opaque body, which it calls a redeemer, as the moon introduces her opaque self between the earth and the sun, and it produces by this means a religious or an irreligious eclipse of light. It has put the whole orbit of reason into shade."
In your own words, what is Paine's objection to Christianity? Paine accuses Christianity of being "a species of atheism." Is Paine himself an atheist? What does he believe about God?
Your essay should be about 400 words of your own.