America needs an intervention, big time

Here's the deal. I'm tired of having Jesus crammed down my throat. It is difficult to be an atheist in a country when a man running for President (old man Bush) actually made the following a part of his campaign:

Sherman: What will you do to win the votes of the Americans who are atheists?

Bush: I guess I'm pretty weak in the atheist community. Faith in god is important to me.

Sherman: Surely you recognize the equal citizenship and patriotism of Americans who are atheists?

Bush: No, I don't know that atheists should be considered as citizens, nor should they be considered patriots. This is one nation under God.

Sherman: Do you support as a sound constitutional principle the separation of state and church?

Bush: Yes, I support the separation of church and state. I'm just not very high on atheists.

Really. I'll let your pick your jaw off of the floor. If Christianity or deism ever becomes the official state position, I'm screwed. I will no longer be an American.

I like this country. I like it a lot. After this guy's least worthy son became president for the second time, my other non-patriot non-citizens and I sat around and bemoaned the state of our country. It's not that we hate the country. We love it like we love a family member with a substance-abuse problem; you don't want to enable its self-destructive behavior, but once it comes to its senses you are willing take it back unconditionally.

In recent weeks, I have been haunting a website called Worldview Weekend. It's a site with a decidedly anti-separation take on the Constitution, and they unabashedly drape every single political argument (and it's mostly political) in the Bible. The most stunning thing that I have come across on that website was a response to Steven T. Voight's commentary on a German judge's decision to cite the Koran in proceedings to decide whether or not to expedite divorce proceedings--the woman in the case claimed that she was being beaten, and for some reason it appears that the judge said that it was traditional in Morroco for men to beat their wives. Petition denied. Really, an amazing lapse of judgment.

Anyway, Voight seized on this and wrote:

Nonetheless, in this instance, the German court's socialist zeal to display inclusiveness toward all cultures and practices, no matter how barbaric, caused the court to effectively sacrifice its own values at the courthouse door.

We can expect to see more similarly disturbing rulings. Law in all western nations will become more and more obsessed with Sharia if the population of fundamentalist Islamicists continues to expand and simultaneously pressures lawmakers to alter existing legislation so that it will more closely conform to Sharia. [...]

As a final matter, we must acknowledge that this incident in Germany is shocking to us as Americans and as Christians only because our sense of morality springs from Christianity, just as the Christian faith is the cornerstone upon which our civilization was built and today rests. [...]

May we never surrender our closely held values – honor, respect, love – for a moral relativism of the socialist elite that has at its endpoint only despair and destruction.

My well-reasoned and perceptive reply (by which I mean I am a neurotic fact-checker...and I'm arrogant) on the message board is posted below. I am always stunned how open to broad interpretation notions of lying and willful omission are when there is a religious and political point to be made:

"This article leaves out one VERY important point: THE JUDGE HAS BEEN REMOVED FROM THE CASE and there is talk of disciplinary proceedings. This suggests to me that THE SYSTEM WORKS. The judge, and I can not explain how she thought that the Koran applied to a legal proceeding, seems to have been hearing whether or not the divorce proceedings merited exceptional expediency because of a threat of corporal punishment. This is, in the scheme of things, a fairly clear story of a stupid judge getting punished. How would you have felt about the judge citing the 10 commandments or possibly the Bible? hj"

A fellow from PA (I assume it was a male...Christian women are the rare exception on this website) replied as follows:

I disagree with the feedback. Whether or not the judge was discplined misses the fact that this occurred. Europe will likely see more of these unprecedented rulings and disturbing legislation as well. As for public officials citing to the Bible, I would actually find that rather refreshing, frankly. We Christians must not fear to say why it is that we have hope.

I can jump up and down all day and scream it from the rooftops, but this guy will never ever see what a blatant hypocrite he is. This is how I hop up and down online:

"I disagree with the feedback. Whether or not the judge was discplined misses the fact that this occurred. Europe will likely see more of these unprecedented rulings and disturbing legislation as well." BUT IT WAS STOPPED. And, presumably that will always happen. You need to tell me why it won't be stopped in the future.

"As for public officials citing to the Bible, I would actually find that rather refreshing, frankly. We Christians must not fear to say why it is that we have hope." Wow, I didn't think that anyone would bite on that one. How is a judge citing the Bible ANY different from a judge citing a Koran? I can't account for your failure to see the screaming double standard here. How is it not? hj

The reply I got was basically "Read David Barton's Original Intent." I asked for someone to explain the argument to me because I could not find the Barton's book listed in one of the largest academic libraries in the midwest--which does not say much about his reputation among scholars. Nor does the fact that he is not peer-reviewed in any of the humanities databases. Barton is the darling of the homeschool movement because he feeds those who would demolish the wall between church and state the precise fairytale they need in order to justify their misguided assault on the Constitution. They never seem to have heard that among the most fervent initial supporters of the separation of church from state were...wait for it...fundamentalist Christians. Really. They were afraid that Anglicanism, should it become the official religion of the state, would make their small sects outlaw. Of course, the establishment of what is essentially an unregulated free market of religion ultimately served these loud little groups well, and the loudest of them have risen to political ascendancy.
And they want more power.

Tomorrow we will talk about their assault on the judiciary. There may be space monkey, but I make no promises.

http://www.firstfreedomfirst.org

HJ