09 June 2008
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Atheist. Skeptic. Libertarian. Revolutionary?
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About Me
3 comments:
Never mind the fact that the colonists came to this country in part to escape the religious oppression of the Catholic Church at that time. Catholicism =/= Christianity, but then Protestant Faith =/= Christian Faith either.
Really, I don't like John McCain any less for talking about his religion openly. FSM knows I've done that often enough. But I do agree that there's a difference between talking about your religion and forcing your religious ideals onto principles to which they do not apply (i.e. the Constitution), simply to make your stance seem more "divine".
For someone who doesn't like buzz words, you sure used a big one. The phase "separation of church and state" does not appear in the First Amendment, although is does appear in a letter by Thomas Jefferson referencing it. There are only 16 words dealing with religion in the First Amendment: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof". Most people only know and use the first phrase (establishment of religion) and forget about the second (prohibiting the free exercise). The concept has has also been called "freedom of religion" which is not the same thing as "freedom from religion". Some people use "separation of church and state" as a one way street to attempt to gain "freedom from religion". Mainly, there should never be anything that could be possibly construed as religious associated with anything that could possibly be construed as governmental. A cross, a six-pointed star, or a crescent moon used as a grave marker in a National Cemetery maintained by the DVA does not mean that Congress is establishing Christianity, Judaism or Islam as a national religion. By the way, a Latin Cross is not a symbol of all Christian religions. There are some Christian religions that don't use or acknowledge it at all.
In many ways atheism is as much a religion as any other religion. It has its own tenants, beliefs, symbols, and zealots. There are atheists who demand that everything that could be interpreted as Christian or religious be removed from all public venues. Doesn't this amount to the establishment of atheism as a state religion and prohibiting the exercise of Christianity or other religions? Let's reverse it, how far would a Christian get if he demanded that all depictions of a lithium atom (used by the American Atheists) be removed from the National Science museum? Or better yet, how about demanding the null set symbol (circle with a diagonal line and used by many atheists) be removed from all public signs. Far fetched, I grant you, but is it really?
I agree with you that the Founding Fathers were not necessarily Christians, but as you said, they were theists (believed in a Supreme Being) and they were religious. We cannot deny and rewrite history. The Constitution was written by religious men. I think the First Amendment should work both ways. There should no religious interference with with the functions of the state and no state interference in the functions of the church or the free exercise of religion. And all religions should be EQUAL before the law and NO PREFERENCE given to any religion, including the religion of atheism. Allowing an atheist to remove "under God" from the Pledge of Allegiance is every bit as bad, no more and no less, as requiring an atheist to pray in school.
rant mode off
This went longer than I intended and for that I apologize, but as you can tell you struck a nerve.
I don't necessarily disagree with anything in the first paragraph, except for the statement saying that "freedom of religion" is not the same as "freedom from religion." I agree with the general idea of that, but that seems to imply that the founding fathers wanted every person to be theists, but that's just me reading between the lines. Personally, I don't think that religion has any place in government, so I agree with you there. The dogmatic roots and principles of religion are one of the main reasons I do not practice it, so having such ideas in the governing system would make me uncomfortable.
But this point leads me into the point tying in with Brandon's post. If a person is building a campaign based on the religious support they'll get from advocating a certain religion (such as McCain referring to America as a Christian nation), then that kind of crosses the line for me. If government really should be free of religion, as you implied, then religion should not even matter when it comes to picking a candidate.
As far as atheism being a religion, I'd have to disagree, but this is more an opinion thing that we could argue back and forth forever. Religion, in my opinion, is defined as such because they are based on a belief system with no real "proof" to back up such beliefs. Atheism is quite different from that. But again, this is very much an opinion thing since there is no definitive denotation to any certain word.
The rest I feel would be to lengthy for me to comment on, so I'll just cut it off here.
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