as for there being nothing inherently wrong with religious leaders influencing policy as long as it does not lead to establishment of a state church, note from my previous post that i’m not sure i believe that the establishment of religion is what was intended by the so-called establishment clause. for religious leaders to have any say in the making of policy is, by my interpretation, very wrong…that being said…yes! everyone has a valid voice. and no-one should be expected to leave their faith at the door because, as you said, it’s part of who they are. to separate the two inside an individual is impossible. to separate the two in policy is trickier, but not unworkable: make sure that the laws made do not inherently exclude any moderate member of society from achieving the right to liberty based on any lifestyle choice or biological characteristic.
the problem i have with any voice that comes too close to implementing religious law as legislative law is much the same as what lil said: when their policies force religious tenets onto the people who may or may not adhere to said tenets. and i would also argue that if the government can not do as good a job as a church in re to social services, then it is time to start changing the bureaucracy, not throwing money at the churches. private and secular orgs. can do the job just as well. this opinion also comes from a person (me
) who thinks it’s a bunch of crap that our local school taxes are used to bus local kids to parochial schools. i am, i admit, a separationist.
a good and timely example of such legislation would be gay marriage. sacred is often a word bush - and others who oppose it - uses when defending his stance on the subject and furthering his push for an amendment to the constitution to limit the definition of marriage to mean a union between a man and a woman. we could argue that the definition of sacred could just mean venerable or exclusive, but we must admit that the connotation of the word and its generally accepted definition tie it to religion and faith immutably. if he meant exclusive or venerable, he should have said so. i think the use of the word sacred is very telling in and of itself. hence, we have legislation that has a root in religion.
and, yup, you are correct to assume that i have eschewed the original article in favor of a more general debate on religion in politics inclusively, but – to beat a dead horse
- i could argue that whether the reason for the split-up of a family was for religious or bigoted reasons, the root cause is the same. religion, whether it was intended to or not, causes people to become intolerant: intolerant of other religions, intolerant of other races, intolerant of other lifestyles. many hatreds arise from religion and a zealot’s interpretation of that religion. religion is regularly used to incite war, terrorism, and genocide.
i am beginning to sound like an atheist, although i’m not that extreme.
but when people start doing things in the name of or on behalf of religion or ethnicity, i can’t help but think of the crusades, the massacres in rwanda, the bombing and assassination of abortion clinics and their doctors, the hate-drunk westboro church, the ongoing fight between isreal and the palestinians, darfur, the fighting in northern ireland, al qaeda, bosnia…the list is endless.
so seeing a trend in this country that seems to be moving toward more religious policy, i worry. can it be reversed? if laws ar changed, the constitution changed, will we be able to change it back? how fast? one believer, one church … not usually a problem, they do much good for this world, but get a lot of like-minded people together with righteous credence on their side, and you get a mob. or one religious zealot with the power to mold men's minds and you have another jim jones.