So, when do the moral police start policing the malls ready to cane people for flouting religious law like in certain Muslim countries? There was an article today about how Iran is enacting a law to execute pornographers. Who’s up for a good stoning? Bush & Co. apparently are determined to turn the US into a theocracy, one step at a time.
Justice Dept. Reshapes Its Civil Rights Mission
In recent years, the Bush administration has recast the federal government’s role in civil rights by aggressively pursuing religion-oriented cases while significantly diminishing its involvement in the traditional area of race.
Paralleling concerns of many conservative groups, the Justice Department has successfully argued in a number of cases that government agencies, employers or private organizations have improperly suppressed religious expression in situations that the Constitution’s drafters did not mean to restrict.
The changes are evident in a variety of actions:
– Supporting groups that want to send home religious literature with schoolchildren; in one case, the government helped win the right of a group in Massachusetts to distribute candy canes as part of a religious message that the red stripes represented the blood of Christ.
Well, if the Pubs can have the Justice Department drop racial discrimination cases, and the new Dem President stops this stoopid religious promoting, – – – – – – – – – – –
then one fine day maybe the “Justice Department” can go after criminals.
here here! Lets keep the nation and its population safe, not spend the time dealing with squables that are better dealt with one on one.
The right to excercise your religion is at least as important as any of the other civil rights. And don’t think they are not under attack.
In just this forum alone there are plenty of folks that we be more than happy if religion was outlawed.
3,
Your right to excercise your religion ends where I have to either pay or perform according to your church’s edicts.
Freedom of religion is a right. Freedom from religion should be a right too.
#3
This idea that religion is under attack in the US is complete BS. Religion (especially Christianity) is in fact having the best run of it’s existance. From the the Creation Museum to the fact that our executive branch is practically a bible study group enacting scripture on the world stage, this victimization is simply preposterous and offensive to people who have real civil rights complaints.
If anything, those who aren’t religious (or moderately so) are simply trying to defend themselves against the severe encroachment of religion in their lives. It’s the same attitude that says there’s a liberal bias in the media despite private media being owned and influenced by neo conservatives. Anything that doesn’t exactly jive with the religious right’s extremism is labled “liberal” or an attack on religion.
If it weren’t obscene and scary how strong the religious right’s Reality Distortion Field is it’d be amusing.
#4, #5
I agree with the #4 comment (exactly what the founding fathers have had in mind, in my opinion) but one must notice that most offenses on religious rights are not involving anything like that, but the simple presence of religion in the public eye (ex. donated 10 comm. plaque at the govt. institution). To go any further would be what #5 states: freedom from religion, and that is not in any founding document, for a good reason (places where that was the rule were such as Chaucesku’s Romania, Mao’s China and Stalin’s USSR….)
Mmm. The blood of Christ. Yummy!
Maybe it’s because Democrats have been pursuing bogus race cases that caused the drop in the number of those prosecutions?
I wonder how they’d feel about allowing groups sending religious text to our children if the religion wasn’t related to Christians? Maybe we could sent text supporting atheism.
Separation of Church and State has always meant keeping government out of religion. Not the other way around.
The extreme left and secular have reinterpreted this to also mean to keep religion out of government, but that’s quoting it out of context, much like Thomas Jefferson’s quote of “All men are created equal.”.
I could care less either way.
#6, My thoughts exactly. I couldn’t have said it better myself 🙂
#11 – “Separation of Church and State” means exactly that… separation. One should not interfere with the other. Where in hell do you get the idea that it’s one-sided? You religious nuts love to “interpret” everything. If it were to mean what you say, it would have been State will not interfere with Church.
#13 – Not exactly….
The state cannot advocate a religion, and therefore a guiding principal that should be advocated by both government and churches alike is that there should be no institutional intrusion by theology into legislation…
But there is a complication. If we truly separated church and state, then only atheists could hold public office or serve in the government, and while that might lead to more practical policy 🙂 , it obviously isn’t ethical or moral or right in any way. While I think Xian Thumpers are simply broken in the head, they cannot be denied the right to vote, to address government, to run for office, or denied the right to participate in any way.
You simply cannot separate an individual from his or her beliefs and they will exercise their Constitutionally guaranteed rights with their beliefs to inform their decisions.
The only tool we can really use against theological encroachment into law is the court and the power of persuasion in the public debate. As I always say, there is no debate between side A and side B, ever… It’s all a fight for the hearts and minds of side C.
And I guess the logic follows that politicians should not be allowed to be members of a church?
The only tool we can really use against theological encroachment into law is the court and the power of persuasion in the public debate. As I always say, there is no debate between side A and side B, ever… It’s all a fight for the hearts and minds of side C.
Comment by OhForTheLoveOf
The basis of all Debate (not to be confused with the name-calling, etc. often referred to as ‘debate’) after all. You’re not trying to ‘convert’ the other side, but prove your point to the neutral/undecided.
J/P=?
Schools that require watching an Inconvenient Truth should probably be counted as promoting religion.
#17 – Well, no… They shouldn’t. If only because English is a language and words have meaning, and watching a documentary that you don’t like isn’t promoting religion.
14. Over the years it has grown to mean what you’re describing for a segment of the population but it’s a reinterpretation of the original meaning.
The fore fathers did not want a national religion. (i.e. The Church of England). The fore fathers were trying to avoid a Church of the United States.
You can see this one way intent clearly from the founding documents of our country. They have lots of religious verbage. Our forefathers wanted separation of church and state to be strictly a one-way street. None of them were objected to religious influences in our government.
That being said, I’m not saying that religion should / shouldn’t linked with government. Just that the phrase when used often, is used out of context.
13. I may be a nut, but I’m not religious.
If what you say is true, we should be discussing why history classes don’t cover the biggest contradiction cover up of all time.
#14
I have to disagree with you a little. Seperating government and religion doesn’t mean that only atheists can run for office. Saying that suggests falsely that morals is the exclusive pervue of religionists. Atheists usually find that statement out right obnoxious and offensive.
Religion often ends up being more of a source of rituals and biases, not the root of morals. But if you want to say that your religion is the origin of your morals, fine. That doesn’t mean you have to be dogmatic and impose your religion’s dogma on your constituants through your governance. It also doesn’t mean that you have to be blind to the fact that not everybody thinks the way you do.
If Kerry said anything right during his presidential campaign, it was that while he doesn’t like abortion, he understands that others disagree with him and as such he can’t support legislative bans on the practice. That’s seperation of church and state!
Well said.
Lets get rid of both govt & religion – then i think everyone would be happy
and bring free love back while yer at it
Be not mistaken; freedom of religion is under attack in this country, from all of the fundies that think that the law should reflect their brand of religion. Forcing the religious beliefs of any majority or (in this case) minority on the populous is a fundamental violation of that right.
“Bush & Co. apparently are determined to turn the US into a theocracy”
Oh, PLEASE. Bush is just as heathen as the rest of them. If he were trying to make the U.S. a theocracy he wouldn’t be high-fiving homos and backing his pro-abortion A.J. Gonzales!! What are YOU smoking??
Arguing “original intent” is a loser’s position as it is always ambiguous and therefore arguable and not dispositive AND it is almost always irrelevant anyway.
Interpretation of our constitutional rights rationally begins and stops with supreme court interpretations of the past 50 years or so.
EG–court has repeatedly expressly ruled that “freedom of religion” also means “freedom from religion.” You are either in the game, or arguing from left field.
Most “christians” aren’t.
Read your bible then a history book and see for yourself.
26. 🙂 Not arguing any position. Just pointing out the phrase is used out of context. But you make a good argument for ignoring Thomas Jefferson’s original intent on “All men are created equal.”.
The new definition for Separation for Church and state has been pushed this way for the past 50 years or so. I could care less either way. I’m looking at it from a historical perspective and how it’s been re-interpreted.
Judges deal with the spirit of the law vs. letter of the law and nowadays the letter of the law is how separation of church and state has now been re-interpreted. Again, I don’t care either way and not trying to say separating government from religious influences is good / bad.
28–Well, you demonstrate the evils of an even handed approach. Mixing state and religion is bad, keeping them seperate is good.
Thats what the Supreme Court says, and I believe it too.
Any evidence out there that mixing the two is a good thing?
29. I believe Renquist and another Supreme Court Justice were on the record for also concuring about separation of church and state was a one way street…. I think they went so far as to imply / say that it probably is okay for religion to mix into government but to what degree I don’t recall.