Do you think that religion and government should mix? Should we have "In god we trust" on money(although that will never change). Should we mix god and government???
If you dig deep into history, you will find that this nation's founding fathers were religious men. I dedicated an entire post to this topic several months ago. If I find it, I shall bring it back up. As far as stating, "In God we trust", on our currency is a nice thought, however, money, the root of all evil, stating the Lord's name is an oxymoron.
No, it doesn't. The establishment clause simply means that the FEDERAL government cannot create a state run religion (like the Anglican church). The fact is, religion defines how we relate to God. Through that relationship, we determine how we relate to other people (another word for this is morality). Law is nothing but the codified regulation of morality. Without having religion, it could be argued, there is no basis for morality, without morality, there is no basis for law. We WANT men and women of exceptional moral character leading our nation. Many of these people are religious and their religion shapes their decisions. This is okay. Also note that, as Epiphany said, the founding fathers were religious men. Their status as "Christians" can be argued, but to deny that they were at least deist is to deny recorded history. It is right, good, and proper to acknowledge the foundation of our moral and patriotic ideals. That is why things like "In God We Trust" and the Ten Commandments which are engraved into the walls of the Supreme Court of the USA are not breaches of the establishment clause, they are recognition of the very foundation of our ideals. Our nation has a religious heritage, do you think that the government should not acknowledge that?
Like I said, religion in government contradicts freedom of religion. Your whole little rant there didn't address my statement at all. How could one feel free to practice any religion if the government has a bias? The founding fathers also did not want a tyranny to develope, and a religious based government is ripe ground for that to occur.
Okay, how does saying "In God We Trust" somehow establish a state religion? I guess I missed what you meant, so could you please define what you mean by "religion in government"? How does acknowledgement of God somehow mean the government is biased? No, a religion run by the state or the state being run by the religious leaders is ripe ground. A government FOUNDED on religious principles, though, does not necessarily have a propensity for tyranny. That is more likely influenced by the type of government. A republic is less likely to fall to tyranny than a monarchy. However, there are weaknesses for a republic that do not exist within a monarchy. Anyway, it depends on what you mean by "religious based government." If you mean "a government that runs the church or the church that runs the government" then I would tend to agree with you. If you mean "a government founded on religious principles that continues to honor those principles and acknowledge their source" then I would have to disagree.
No, they shouldn't mix. Government/politics corrupts religion. Religions are supposed to be there to help people find God in their lives, but when it gets political, it starts to cause religious leaders to use their spiritual power to get involved in earthly matters. So not only does government corrupt religion with it's politics and earthly matters, once this occurs, government becomes corrupted by religion, as leaders use spiritual authority against the people whom they were supposed to represent. This is mainly only true in democracies, as totalitarian governments are bad either way. But in a democracy, one needs a secular government to remain truly representative. Otherwise, you get leaders claiming morality or "God's will" as the reason for their actions...and who can say no to God? It leads to abuse of power, they can do whatever they want claiming the moral high ground or attributing it to commands from God.
I also think that religion should have no place in gov't, but I could care less about "in god we trust" being on the money.
As far as stating, "In God we trust", on our currency is a nice thought, however, money, the root of all evil, stating the Lord's name is an oxymoron jesus never said that - money is the root of all evil... he said that "the love of money is the root of all evil"... there is a difference there, mmmmkay? ~ & as for "established religion" ... that would be like the gummint saying "everybody must be an episcopalian (or lutheran , whatever) in order to worship with state approval... & the state will fund only churches & pastors approved by the state (& you rascally methodists can get the heck outa here...) hey, it happened in england back in the day... & the founding fathers didn't want that sorta setup in their newly independent confederation of former colonies (some of which colonies also had had a tradition of state-approved denominations: massachusetts for seperatists (ummmm, "pilgrims" & "puritans") from CoE (anglican), maryland for catholics, virginia for CoE, etc... pennsylvania was founded so that quakers & anybody else could practice whatever flavor of religion (or even no religion at all! altho that was generally frowned upon - ben franklin was very careful about what he uttered in public so that he would not be branded an atheist!) they wished...) yaddayadda
Obviously money itself cannot possess a spirit being that it is inanimate. I suppose I should have placed quotations around, "root of all evil." I shall make sure that next time I word the sentence more articulately.
no... i dunno... when quoting saying attributed to the carpenter rabbi yeshua bin yusef, i think that it is important to get the nuance down right... & "money is the root of all evil" would suggest that having (excess amounts of) money is bad in itself... while "the love of money is the root of all evil" would be closer to advice against worshipping mammon, dontcha think? shalom have a wonderful easter (the secret sacred password will be "christ is risen indeed!")
Our Founding Father fled restictions imposed on personal values. They believed they should be free to worship their God as they saw fit. When things got very large, the issues involved more than just themselves. They opted for self-rule; fought the British, wrote their laws, and achieved autonomy. Not every founding father was especially religious - Franklin, Jefferson, and Paine come to mind. But the laws they wrote were based in their religious beliefs and spiritual convictions. Therefore, we may easily see that our laws concerning murder stem from the Ten Commandments. As I said, they originally fled restrictions - when they sought separation of churrch and state (our coinage, not theirs) their intent was that elected government could not restrict the free practice of personal faith and worship(see - Article 1: 'Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof') but, their intent as seen in the very nature of the original flight was that a faith-based society could exercise self-rule: which means sage and righteous people in elected office.
government and religion do not mix. People cannot tell others WHAT to believe. Even if they are government. However, when the antiChrist comes, which he will,(at a time when it seems we need a world leader the most), he will bring a false sense of peace to the world, and then it will seem as though religion and government have merged. Once he has the world under His thumb, 3 years later, that is when all hell will break loose and the end begins. We will have to choose between getting the mark of the Beast, or not being able to buy sell or trade. We will have to be martyrs for Christ if we do not accept the one world order the AntiChrist will enforce.
I just wanted to throw this in before anyone tries to say the "wall of seperation" is not in the Constitution (which it of course isn't). "Do not separate text from historical background. If you do, you will have perverted and subverted the Constitution, which can only end in a distorted, bastardized form of illegitimate government." ~James Madison So it may be true that the "wall" isn't written in the Constitution itself, if one recognizes the historical context (seen in letters and essays as well as general history including religious freedom as a reason to come to america), you can clearly see the intent was to keep religion and government strictly seperate.
