posted
Freedom of religion has as an explicit requirement the separation of church and state. This is not to say that the individuals involved with the government should give up their beliefs, or strip their actions of religious influence. What it does mean, however, is that the government as an organization at no time and in no circumstance must represent itself as affiliated with any particular religion. This exclusion includes religious ceremony; and contrary to popular belief, non-demoninational christian services do not constitute non-affiliation or non-exclusion.
In the end, Freedom of Religion expressly protects a citizen's rights of Freedom from Religion.
Posts: 74 | Registered: Aug 2006
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quote:So, because I am an atheist and by definition without any belief in *any* religion, then obviously I base my values on something that is contrary to "our" deepest beliefs about the universe...? Or, maybe I don't have any values at all!
No, just because you are an atheist doesn't mean you have no religion. It just means your religion includes no gods. But you still have beliefs about what the universe is, where it came from, and what matters within it.
quote:Should non-religion be visible to those around us, and be expressed? And influence our voting? Do you believe that my philosophy on life is less valid than yours? Why or why not?
Atheist beliefs should be visible, influence voting, etc. just as much as other religious beliefs are.
quote:But how to dislodge church "control" over parties? Is it even possible? ...or likely? I wonder....
I think it would be better to try to dislodge parties' control over the government. The only trouble is that the people in government, a.k.a. members of political parties, are the ones who can make laws to fight political party power.
quote:What are the downsides of secularization?
I think there exist worldly things and spiritual things in our lives. Religion, whether it be a mainstream church or an atheist's personal beliefs, is the thing that allows understanding of the spiritual components. In a totally secular society, you cannot discuss religion in public, thus we are left alone to try and find answers to spiritual questions. Some can find answers through introspection, but I think most who are left spiritually alone end up turning to worldly things.
This is a problem because value itself exists nowhere physically in the world - it is spiritual by nature. And thus we should or should not do in life is a spiritual question. But beyond that, human beings are spiritual beings - we have bodies, but we also have souls, identities, minds, etc. that are not fully described through any purely worldy description.
For this reason, secularization tends to impair our ability to understand ourselves and understand what matters in life. It places us on our own to try to figure out these things, because it discourages the public discussion of them. It does prevent the conflicts that inevitably arise from discussing such important matters, but at a high cost. Without religious and spiritual understanding, I think we would tend towards a shallow culture and would find outselves lacking meaning in our lives. For this reason, I think secularization should be used with some degree of moderation.
Posts: 8120 | Registered: Jul 2000
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quote:Religion, whether it be a mainstream church or an atheist's personal beliefs, is the thing that allows understanding of the spiritual components....In a totally secular society, you cannot discuss religion in public, thus we are left alone to try and find answers to spiritual questions.
Hm. I disagree almost completely with both these assertions.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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What is understanding of the spiritual components of the world, if not religion?
And what is a totally secular society if not one in which questions regarding such spiritual components are excluded from the public sphere?
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posted
You're right. I neglected to include various qualifiers such as 'sincere' and 'serious' and 'mutual'.
Posts: 17164 | Registered: Jun 2001
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quote:I think we have too much secularization regardless of the response to it.
Why? What are the downsides of secularization?
Aren't so much downsides as it strikes me as just plain silly. We weren't created as a secular society, we didn't function that way for the first almost 200 years, and now all of a sudden to some people it's the most important thing that everything individual about religious folk be stamped out when it comes to public life, or that all references to god be stamped out in public view.
I don't know specific downsides, but I also don't like an organized whitewashing. It feels too much like we're erasing our roots, heritage, history, character, etc. It's who we are, why hide it?
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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posted
I assume your 'we' means the US, so let me just point out that 'you' were also founded as a slave-owning society.
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quote:all of a sudden to some people it's the most important thing that everything individual about religious folk be stamped out when it comes to public life
Hm. I don't see this attitude at all. Where are you picking up the idea that some people want to remove the individuality of the religious?
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posted
Obviously I mean the US, we're talking about the secularization of America.
There were divisions over America's slave ownership since BEFORE the Declaration of Independence was signed. The end of the slave tried was signed directly into the Constitution, and the institution was defeated less than a century later. There was no such division over secularization when the nation was founded.
quote:Hm. I don't see this attitude at all. Where are you picking up the idea that some people want to remove the individuality of the religious?
I don't mean the individuality of religions, as in all religious people are the same, but there IS an attitude in this country, from some anyway, whether it be vocal minority or not, that any exercise of the word 'god' even is a violation of some sort. Kids can't pray in school, even to themselves, before a test, can't pray before the big game, the President is criticized for using religious rhetoric in his speeches, and it goes on and on.
I'm surprised you DON'T see the drive for a secularized face on public life.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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What I do see is a bunch of conservatives looking for the next Satan to fight. When there is a Satan to fight, the folks disregard the weaknesses of their political leaders and the shortcuts they have taken, and they obey.
So in the 50's that Satan to fight was Communism. In the 60's it was the Hippies. Recently it has been family-threatening gays, mad-scientist evolutionaries, and secularists.
This despite the fact that there are not many family threatening gays, mad-scientist evoltionaries, or people wanting to destroy all religions.
What few there are, to my experience, have been people who have been put through h$$$ by some religious group, and are wrongly backlashing against them all.
I have said it before and will again. Disregard the Wolf in Shepherds Clothing (Religious leaders who wish they were politicians), and the Centurian in Temple Garb.(Politicians who wish they were religious leaders) They preach that the way to heaven is to fight Satan. It certainly is easier than living a Christ-like life.
Posts: 11895 | Registered: Apr 2002
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posted
Dan_raven: While I mostly agree with you, I submit that you are perhaps downplaying too much the threat of of those who are too radical.
Are you suggesting that the right has nothing to fear but the radicals that are among them, who portray boogie men that DONT exist. Whereas there is not a single radical liberal that should be feared?
Its kind hard to tell group A they only enemy is within their ranks and that group b (on the opposite end of the spectrum) are all righteously seeking a eutopia for all.
Posts: 14316 | Registered: Jul 2005
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No, we were created as a nation with secular laws.
quote:There was no such division over secularization when the nation was founded.
There sure was. Ever read Thomas Paine's "The age of Reason"? I can give you a rather long list of founding father quotes calling for secular government, as well as quotes from others at the time disagreeing.
I keep hearing this repeated lie: That separation of church and state is a lie. It's not. The constitution makes zero mentions of God (with the exception of the dating convention "the year of our Lord"). It forbids religious tests for public office. Every call for an oath is backed up by the option of "affirmation" rather than oath.
All this was in place before the 1st amendment was written. All of this was quite intentional, and it was discussed. Try reading the annals of Congress, or the Federalist papers.
Oh, and by the way, secular doesn't mean anti-religious. It merely means without reference to religion.
Posts: 3735 | Registered: Mar 2002
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quote:Kids can't pray in school, even to themselves, before a test, can't pray before the big game.
You have been the victim of right wing propaganda that is absolutely untrue. The supreme court has repeatedly reaffirmed the right of students and all others to pray as individuals to themselves in every situation. Under the first amendment, students have the right to pray to themselves in school and in all public places. This has been repeatedly affirmed in the courts. The only thing that is prohibited is the use of public school (i.e. tax payer) resources for prayers.
Posts: 12591 | Registered: Jan 2000
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posted
I still think the overarching theme plays out.
Glenn, your point doesn't negate mine. We ARE a nation of secular laws, but I'm not talking about law. I'm talking about public image I guess, so much as anything else.
I'm NOT religious, I don't care to have religion shoved in my face. But I also don't think "In God We Trust" should be removed from money. I don't think god should have been added to the pledge of allegiance in the first place, so I don't mind it being removed. I'm picky, and choosey, too bad, I'm allowed to be. But just because I'm not religious doesn't mean that I think we should all be publicly secular. If the president wants to lead the nation in a prayer, let him. If politicians want to use religious rhetoric, it's their right.
If the president wants to lead the nation on a Crusade in the name of God...well then I draw a line, as he is clearly serving his own religious interests, and not those of the nation.
But the whole fight is giving me a headache, especially since I view it as an extension of the extremes of both parties. The Extreme Left is trying to remove religion from public life, and the Extreme Right reacts by injecting it everywhere feasible, and not feasible, and both scream bloody murder when it doesn't work.
Dan -
I agree with you about the next big Satan to fight...but I think part of the problem there is that many of them view the next big Satan as LIBERALS, which just feeds into the problem. Ann Coulter is their Shepard in many ways, and when she does things like call Liberals Godless, and when Orson Scott Card says they aren't godless, after all, their religion is Global Warming, it only makes everything worse.
Everyone in the middle suffers, whilst the wings play out a culture war.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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What I do see is a bunch of conservatives looking for the next Satan to fight.
I've see both things - a lot of each. I also see a lot of the less extreme people on both sides downplaying the extent of what the other side is doing, with some people downplaying those trying to establish a near-theocracy and some people downplaying those trying to drive almost last vestige of religion from the public square.
Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
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Rereading the thread, I guess you were reacting to this:
quote:And what is a totally secular society if not one in which questions regarding such spiritual components are excluded from the public sphere?
And I was actually agreeing with you. I just didn't know it. Our society isn't secular, our laws are. But people keep repeating that ditty about separation being a lie, and atheism being a religion, in an attempt to make it the truth.
quote:The Extreme Left is trying to remove religion from public life, and the Extreme Right reacts by injecting it everywhere feasible,
Maybe it's a subtle difference, but I see it as exactly the opposite. The fact that religion is the dominant social force that it is makes it seem that "secularism" is the rebellious force attacking the establishment.
But the founding fathers created a secular government, and the religious right (or whatever is was called at the time) has been trying to undo that ever since, starting with congressional chaplains (one of the things that they argued about very shortly after the constitution was ratified). George Washington's oath of office had "so help me God" added to it by Washington Irving, The Gettysburg address had "under God" inserted by an editor, "In God we Trust" was put on money over U.S. Grant's objections, and of course there's "under God."
The fact that atheists are asserting our right not to be forced to pray is a reaction to religion being injected into our lives. We didn't start it.
Posts: 3735 | Registered: Mar 2002
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posted
I guess maybe it just doesn't bother me as much. But then sometimes it does. I'm fickle. Giant Ten Commandments displays annoy the hell of me, it's silly and seems a melodramatic attempt by the person putting it there to pretend that our laws are more a product of Christian laws than they are anything else. You might as well put up a stone monument with a recitation of Drakonian law on it, it predates Christianity by several centuries.
On the other hand, it doesn't bother me to have the President lead the nation in prayer. It doesn't bother me to hear speeches where FDR talks about "crusades for liberty" and "righteous might." The fact that we were founded as (in society I mean, not law) a Christian nation isn't a secret, and it's not something to hide, just as it isn't something we need emblazoned on a banner somewhere.
Somewhere in the middle we need to find a balance. That balance doesn't include monuments to Bible law, and it doesn't involve the silencing and removal of everything remotely religious from the public sphere.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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quote:But I also don't think "In God We Trust" should be removed from money. I don't think god should have been added to the pledge of allegiance in the first place, so I don't mind it being removed.
What do you see as the distinction between these things? Is it that one is more ostentatious than the other, and at heart you're not bothered by the meaning of something as much as you are by a showy display?
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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quote:On the other hand, it doesn't bother me to have the President lead the nation in prayer.
That doesn't bother me either. He's not creating a law, or policy, so we are not compelled to obey the way children are in class. I do object to declaring "a national day of prayer," however. It may not be a law, but it has the gravity of an official proclamation.
Posts: 3735 | Registered: Mar 2002
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posted
Would you feel better if he asked a Cardinal to declare a national day of prayer? I see a national day of prayer applying to me in the same way that Secratary's Day does. I'm not religious, nor am I a Secretary, so it doesn't really bother or effect me one way or the other.
Tom -
Honestly? I really don't know what the difference is. But if I had to take a stab at it, and like I said, I'm fickle, I don't really have a distinct policy on the subject, but I like the originals. I don't like things being altered after the fact just for the sake of religion, be it to add it or subtract it. Maybe it's the Historian in me, but I hate seeing things altered like that just for the sake of some ulterior motive, especially things that have been around for a long time.
I don't know if that's a satisfactory answer or not, but it IS how I feel. It's the best I can do.
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