Thou Shalt Not ...
"'This case is not about a monument, it's not about religion,' (Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore) said. 'It's about the acknowledgment of Almighty God.'"
- Reuters News Service, 25 August 2003
[And how is that not about religion?]
Christianity is not under attack.
America - and something called "american values" - is not under attack.
If we allow that this is a "Christian nation," what style of Christianity should prevail? Fundamentalist bible-based conservative theology nominates itself wherein people memorize scripture (almost exclusively in the four hundred year-old language of the King James version) but seem not to understand the words - or their context.
Christianity is the offspring of Judeaism. The Christ was about refoming the Jewish status quo of his day and establishing new laws and traditions." So why don't we declare ourselves a Judeo-Christian nation? It is, after all, the "old testament" - talmudic tradition - which the neo-Christians are wont to embrace in defense of many prejudices.
Michael Savage states: "They tell me that if, somehow or another, I don't respect this doctrine of the 'separation of church and state,' I am disrespecting the Constitution. I sat down again the other day. ... I scoured it. I looked through it once, I looked through it twice. I looked through it a dozen times. I didn't find a single mention of this 'separation!'"
He is absolutely right! It's not there in the body! It is, however, the first phrase of the 1st Amendment:
"Article I - Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances."
This is a perfect illustration of my grievance with the style of Michael Savage and his ilk: they parse like their despised ex-president Clinton and rant at great length and with high emotion based on their simplistic interpretation of facts, events, history, or public documents.
Main Entry: sim·plis·tic
Pronunciation: sim-'plis-tik
Function: adjective
Date: circa 1881
1 : SIMPLE
2 : of, relating to, or characterized by simplism : OVERSIMPLE <adequate, if occasionally simplistic, historical background -- Harlow Robinson>
Simplistic - oversimple: incomplete.
Then become vehement in opsition to whatever it is based on the simplistic analysis. Wilfully-simplistic in this case as the gentleman claims a PhD. One would think that someone who has earned a doctorate could read at least the first sentence of the "Bill of Rights" which was, itself, definitely not a casual afterthought:
"Virginian George Mason, author of Virginia's 1776 Declaration of Rights, was one of three delegates to the Constitutional Convention who refused to sign the final document because it did not enumerate individual rights. Together with Patrick Henry, he campaigned vigorously against ratification of the Constitution by Virginia. Indeed, five states, including Massachusetts, ratified the Constitution on the condition that such amendments be added immediately."When the first Congress convened in New York City in September 1789, the calls for amendments protecting individual rights were virtually unanimous. Congress quickly adopted 12 such amendments; by December 1791, enough states had ratified 10 amendments to make them part of the Constitution. Collectively, they are known as the Bill of Rights."
Outline of American History - Chapter 4
"... Puritan and Pilgrim were not synonymous terms. The Puritans ... were those who sought to purify the English Church and to modify its forms, while remaining within it. The word "Pilgrim," while it has acquired a religious meaning, was not an eccelesiastical term. It was applied only to the Separatists or Independents who settled at Plymouth because of their migration, first to Holland and later to America. But eventually the Puritans became Independents, not only in America, but also in England, and from them have grown the great religious denominations of the English-speaking world--the Congregationalist, the Baptist, the Methodist,3 and to a great extent the Presbyterian." source
Reading the whole of the second source noted above, one can begin to gain an understanding of the paramount importance of the "seperation of church and state" and why it is stated so elegantly in the first ten words of the Bill of Rights.
If you think that the answer is simple, then you don't understand the question.
Thus endeth this rant.
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