Dr. Leigh Eric Schmidt is the Edward C. Mallinckrodt Distinguished University Professor in the Humanities at Washington University in St. Louis. He joined the John C. Danforth Center on Religion and Politics in 2011. He previously taught at Harvard and Princeton. He has appeared in and on all kinds of media to talk about his work and he’s the author of several books. His latest is Village Atheists: How America’s Unbelievers Made Their Way in a Godly Nation.
We spoke with Leigh about whether we were ever a “Christian nation,” why the “New Atheists” really aren’t new at all, what we can learn from a cartoonist who lived a century ago.