John Locke and the Truth About "True and Saving Religion".

The liberal insistence that religion is a private affair is a very old opinion. It is said to go back at least to Locke's Epistola de tolerantia (A Letter Concerning Toleration), published in 1689 and, more precisely, to his claim that true and saving religion "consists in an inward persuasion of the mind." This article demonstrates that Locke's text has been mistranslated and misconstrued. He never claimed that religion was simply a matter of inward persuasion or private belief. Rather, he postulated a natural duty to worship God publicly that made church membership a necessity for all human beings.