RoR: Forum

Post 0

Tuesday, December 6, 2005 - 6:58am

Link

Edit

As long as the government does not endorse or establish a religion, I don't care how many statues of saints, sinners, satyrs, godesses, commandments or codes they erect. I can ignor them or admire them, find them tacky or artistic at my pleasure.
(Edited by Robert Davison on 12/06, 6:59am)

Post 1

Tuesday, December 6, 2005 - 7:22am

Link

Edit

A good article, nicely and suculantly written - not exactly what to expect from MoJo...

Post 2

Tuesday, December 6, 2005 - 7:38am

Link

Edit

Ditto to Robert Malcom. I was impressed.

Ditto to Robert Davison. We have statues of Justice in every courthouse and no one seems concerned that we tout pagan "gods" or "idols." In Cleveland, the old courthouse has Jefferson and Hamilton out front as the two representatives of the conflicting and supporting theories that define our government. Have we deified the men?

Objection to Robert Davison: That said, we would be dangerously naive to claim that posting the Ten Commandments is some kind of concretization of the abstract expression of Law qua Law. In other words, some religious symbols are religious symbols.

Regarding the Jacoby article, "Original Intent" I had forgotten about the provision for "no religious test." I recently read Theodore Sorenson's biography of John Kennedy. Somehow in 1960, people forgot that. I believe that Billy Graham himself told his parishoners not to vote for Kennedy because as a Catholic, Kennedy would vote as he was told by his church. Of course, contradictions never really bother Christians, so the contradiction in expressing freedom of religious by posting the Ten Commandments would not occur to them.

Post 3

Tuesday, December 6, 2005 - 9:55am

Link

Edit

Michael,

I don't see the distinction between some statue of the code of Hammerabi or the Ten Commandments and a pagan godess. They don't impower anyone they are just hunks of rock. Some find them attractive others see them as clutter, the courts pay them no attention. They simply bear testiment to the fact that man has always had laws.

I am the Lord thy God. Thou shalt not have strange gods before me.
Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain
Remember thou keep the Sabbath Day.
Honor thy Father and thy Mother
Thou shalt not kill.
Thou shalt not commit adultery.
Thou shalt not steal.
Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor.
Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's wife.
Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's goods.

5 and 7 are the only two that are part of our legal system, which makes any memorial to them a historical curiousity and irrelevant.

Post 4

Tuesday, December 6, 2005 - 1:31pm

Link

Edit

Robert Davison wrote:

5 and 7 are the only two that are part of our legal system, which makes any memorial to them a historical curiosity and irrelevant.

You must not watch much television or read many newspapers or talk to many Christians. These religious zealots consistently point to these monuments, along with phrases like "In God We Trust" on currency and "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance, as "evidence" that the United States is a "Christian nation." From that faulty premise, they argue that laws enforcing religious codes against homosexual acts and other "violations of God's law" be enforced.

No, I will not give these people one inch of moral ground with my tax dollars. Bring down the monuments!

Post 5

Wednesday, December 7, 2005 - 4:43am

Link

Edit

Many of the arguments in Jacoby's article are similar to those made in the book by Moore and Kramnick, The Godless Constitution.

Much research on the first amendment has tended to show that part of its goal was to leave religion with the states since many states had established churches at that time.

http://www.leaderu.com/common/godlessconstitution.html

This question is a little more complex than either the religious right or its critics would have it.

Post 6

Wednesday, December 7, 2005 - 5:54am

Link

Edit

Luke,

This is clearly a religious nation, although certainly not a christian one. Because the founders faced that reality, they were insistent upon separation of church and state.

Rand was not militantly atheist. She knew as the men of the Enlightenment did, that the enemy was not some vague spirit of benevolence that did not interfer in the lives of men. Instead, she sharpened her focus to rage against the specific targets of altruism and religious superstition.

Post 7

Wednesday, December 7, 2005 - 1:53pm

Link

Edit

Robert:

And also against government-enforced compliance with the dictates of false, religion-based "morality:" see her answers on, e.g., abortion, in the Q&A book.