Classical Liberalism and Christianity

Tyler Cowen:

Religion has so much power over the human mind, in part, because its basic teachings about life are largely true. Furthermore classical liberalism is far more of an intellectual offshoot of Christianity than most non-Christians are keen to admit. (Muslims and Chinese often see this more clearly.)

I have often wondered not only why more libertarians are not interested in religious issues, but also why more Christians aren't libertarians? If you start off with the presumption that everyone is a sinner (one of the foundational tenets of Christianity), it's not a very large logical leap to distrust political power in the hands of any man.

While not all of America's Founding Fathers had a Christian faith, all of them were influenced by Christian thinking and conceived of men as being sinners who were corruptible by power. That laid the foundation for the development of the separation of powers between the three branches of government and the balance of power between the federal government and the states.

Read Wikipedia's entry for more on classical liberalism.