Sapper Redux said:

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Bob Lee said:

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Sapper Redux said:

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Quote:

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in parts of the country where it's practiced unanimously

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Please find me a place with zero non-Christians to include agnostics and atheists. We are not a theocracy. We are not a Christian nation. Never have been. The only mention of religion in the entire Constitution is to forbid religious tests and forbid the establishment of a state religion.

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I have no idea where that would be. I'm saying that's true in principle. I don't advocate for a state religion, but as a matter of fact there were established state religions post-Constitutional convention.

I don't know what you mean by Christian Nation.

Is posting the commandments in TX classrooms enough to establish a state religion?

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There were. They were already on the way out as largely dead laws that were gone by the 1830s and unconstitutional under the 14th amendment. And yes, posting a creed important to one or two faith traditions by law on state property is the state promoting those faiths over others. Using the numbering and translation of Protestant Bibles further narrows the promotion.

This is the sort of thing that led Catholic parents to sue in the 1850s on over the use of Protestant Bibles and theology in schools. Those lawsuits helped establish the extent of the separation of church and state.

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kurt vonnegut said:

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FIDO95 said:

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First of all, the posting of the 10 commandments in the classroom is going to convert as many people to Christianity as the images of Christmas trees during the "Holyday" season.

Secondly, it astounds me that educated people are under the delusion that we were never a Christian nation founded on Judeo-Christian principles. I'll just leave this here:

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I think that if we want to put stock in the idea we are a Christian nation on account of state Constitutions, founding principles, or the beliefs of the time, then we are also a white supremist nation. And a sexist nation.

Of course, none of us feel that our country ought to be held hostage by all of the beliefs of our founders. We have no issues in divorcing what our founders believed from what we 'ought' to do today on some topics. Why should religion be any different?

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FIDO95 said:

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kurt vonnegut said:

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I think that if we want to put stock in the idea we are a Christian nation on account of state Constitutions, founding principles, or the beliefs of the time, then we are also a white supremist nation. And a sexist nation.

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If you are going to use that myopic lens to paint our founding, why not throw in slave nation founded in 1619. Isn't that also part of the progressive trope?

Are Irish white? Italians? Spanish? French? How did those "white" groups fair in this "white supremist nation" you paint? It would be accurate to say "WASP" as predominate descriptor for our founding fathers. And yes, women had limited rights and there were black slaves (as well as black slave owners). The ideas of "sexism" and slavery were not unique to the US. What was unique was that this nation, along with other European nations, moved in a direction that would eventually allow for womans suffrage and the abolition of slavery. That should be celebrated and pointed out but it gets in the way of people that hate this nation. Importantly, the reason these nations moved in that direction is because of Judeo-Christian values. If you separate those Christian ideals, then there is no moral reason to maintain those principles.

William Wilberforce - Wikipedia

Of course, no one taught about Wilberforce because it doesn't fit the narrative.

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dermdoc said:

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kurt vonnegut said:

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FIDO95 said:

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First of all, the posting of the 10 commandments in the classroom is going to convert as many people to Christianity as the images of Christmas trees during the "Holyday" season.

Secondly, it astounds me that educated people are under the delusion that we were never a Christian nation founded on Judeo-Christian principles. I'll just leave this here:

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I think that if we want to put stock in the idea we are a Christian nation on account of state Constitutions, founding principles, or the beliefs of the time, then we are also a white supremist nation. And a sexist nation.

Of course, none of us feel that our country ought to be held hostage by all of the beliefs of our founders. We have no issues in divorcing what our founders believed from what we 'ought' to do today on some topics. Why should religion be any different?

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One of my truths of life is that only liberals can define sexism and/or racism.
So who is defining sexism and/or racism in your mind?
To me, saying you have a majority of citizens who identify as Christians then you are a majority Christian nation. I am not saying that means you get special rights or preferential treatment. I am just saying it is a fact that we are a majority Christian nation.
Sexism and racism depends on who is defining it.

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kurt vonnegut said:

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FIDO95 said:

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kurt vonnegut said:

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I think that if we want to put stock in the idea we are a Christian nation on account of state Constitutions, founding principles, or the beliefs of the time, then we are also a white supremist nation. And a sexist nation.

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If you are going to use that myopic lens to paint our founding, why not throw in slave nation founded in 1619. Isn't that also part of the progressive trope?

Are Irish white? Italians? Spanish? French? How did those "white" groups fair in this "white supremist nation" you paint? It would be accurate to say "WASP" as predominate descriptor for our founding fathers. And yes, women had limited rights and there were black slaves (as well as black slave owners). The ideas of "sexism" and slavery were not unique to the US. What was unique was that this nation, along with other European nations, moved in a direction that would eventually allow for womans suffrage and the abolition of slavery. That should be celebrated and pointed out but it gets in the way of people that hate this nation. Importantly, the reason these nations moved in that direction is because of Judeo-Christian values. If you separate those Christian ideals, then there is no moral reason to maintain those principles.

William Wilberforce - Wikipedia

Of course, no one taught about Wilberforce because it doesn't fit the narrative.

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I think this skips past the point that American values have shifted since its foundation. I'm simply saying that I don't think this must be a bad thing and that we need not idolize the specific values of our founders. Great as they were, they were still flawed.

I can see some argument for attributing the move away from slavery to Judeo-Christian values, but I think its gray. After all, who was arguing to keep slavery or to keep women from voting? Was it the secularists? Muslims, Jews, Hindus? Who? The shift away from slavery was a shift within Christianity . . . not a shift from non-Christian to Christian.

And if you separate Christian ideals, there is still moral reason to promote equality in races in gender. You may not agree with those reasons. And no one is saying you have to. But, I would like to point out that people with different values can and do justify abolishing slavery using different moral reasoning.

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kurt vonnegut said:

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dermdoc said:

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kurt vonnegut said:

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FIDO95 said:

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First of all, the posting of the 10 commandments in the classroom is going to convert as many people to Christianity as the images of Christmas trees during the "Holyday" season.

Secondly, it astounds me that educated people are under the delusion that we were never a Christian nation founded on Judeo-Christian principles. I'll just leave this here:

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I think that if we want to put stock in the idea we are a Christian nation on account of state Constitutions, founding principles, or the beliefs of the time, then we are also a white supremist nation. And a sexist nation.

Of course, none of us feel that our country ought to be held hostage by all of the beliefs of our founders. We have no issues in divorcing what our founders believed from what we 'ought' to do today on some topics. Why should religion be any different?

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One of my truths of life is that only liberals can define sexism and/or racism.
So who is defining sexism and/or racism in your mind?
To me, saying you have a majority of citizens who identify as Christians then you are a majority Christian nation. I am not saying that means you get special rights or preferential treatment. I am just saying it is a fact that we are a majority Christian nation.
Sexism and racism depends on who is defining it.

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I suppose some of that is fair, although I did not expect your objection to my post to be about whether or not slavery was rooted in racism or that withholding rights to women was based in sexism.

If you believe that racism and sexism did not play a role, then I am open to hearing your definitions of those terms.

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Yes, we have a majority of Christians in the country. I have no issues saying that from an examination of American demographics, we are a majority Christian nation.

When people say that Iran is a Muslim nation, it has a different meaning than 'majority Muslim nation'. Iran is explicitly a Muslim nation with its laws being directly in support of Islam. Iran might be the best modern day example of a theocracy. An objection from me to America being described as a 'Christian nation' is just an objection to the idea that we are (or should be) a Christian theocracy. I don't think any description by you of America as a Christian nation is an advocation for theocracy.

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Bob Lee said:

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kurt vonnegut said:

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FIDO95 said:

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kurt vonnegut said:

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I think that if we want to put stock in the idea we are a Christian nation on account of state Constitutions, founding principles, or the beliefs of the time, then we are also a white supremist nation. And a sexist nation.

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If you are going to use that myopic lens to paint our founding, why not throw in slave nation founded in 1619. Isn't that also part of the progressive trope?

Are Irish white? Italians? Spanish? French? How did those "white" groups fair in this "white supremist nation" you paint? It would be accurate to say "WASP" as predominate descriptor for our founding fathers. And yes, women had limited rights and there were black slaves (as well as black slave owners). The ideas of "sexism" and slavery were not unique to the US. What was unique was that this nation, along with other European nations, moved in a direction that would eventually allow for womans suffrage and the abolition of slavery. That should be celebrated and pointed out but it gets in the way of people that hate this nation. Importantly, the reason these nations moved in that direction is because of Judeo-Christian values. If you separate those Christian ideals, then there is no moral reason to maintain those principles.

William Wilberforce - Wikipedia

Of course, no one taught about Wilberforce because it doesn't fit the narrative.

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I think this skips past the point that American values have shifted since its foundation. I'm simply saying that I don't think this must be a bad thing and that we need not idolize the specific values of our founders. Great as they were, they were still flawed.

I can see some argument for attributing the move away from slavery to Judeo-Christian values, but I think its gray. After all, who was arguing to keep slavery or to keep women from voting? Was it the secularists? Muslims, Jews, Hindus? Who? The shift away from slavery was a shift within Christianity . . . not a shift from non-Christian to Christian.

And if you separate Christian ideals, there is still moral reason to promote equality in races in gender. You may not agree with those reasons. And no one is saying you have to. But, I would like to point out that people with different values can and do justify abolishing slavery using different moral reasoning.

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This is belied by the fact the Church has consistently condemned it since before our country's founding, and from before the protestant revolution. It has never endorsed chattel slavery. The practice was ubiquitous worldwide The fact it's no longer practiced is owed entirely to Christianity. Any defense of American slavery using Christianity is a distortion of Christian teaching unless you can point to a shift in the official teaching of the Church away from endorsing it toward condemning it.

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Bob Lee said:

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You don't think Constantine favoring Christianity had anything to do with it?

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kurt vonnegut said:

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dermdoc said:

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But how can anyone disagree with the moral Commandments?

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So, lets put up posters that say: "Don't cheat, lie, murder, or steal." The packaging of the morals is important. Those that passed this law have precisely zero interest in those morals and are only concerned with promoting the superiority of their faith.

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94chem said:

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"If a law like this persuades anyone, it will more likely persuade them that Christianity is just another tool of political power, rather than the radical hope that it actually is."

You made a great post, but you need to understand that this is what they WANT people to believe. They don't want converts. They don't want to experience the power of the Holy Spirit. It would terrify them if some fruit that happened outside the boundaries of their own control were evident. God is their bludgeon, not their source. Their power comes from themselves, wielded by human intellect, human force, human talent, human resolve. These 10 Commandment plaques are there not to point anyone toward the God of the Bible or the life of faith, but to remind us who is running things. It is merely statism repackaged to appease the dull.

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94chem said:

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"If a law like this persuades anyone, it will more likely persuade them that Christianity is just another tool of political power, rather than the radical hope that it actually is."

You made a great post, but you need to understand that this is what they WANT people to believe. They don't want converts. They don't want to experience the power of the Holy Spirit. It would terrify them if some fruit that happened outside the boundaries of their own control were evident. God is their bludgeon, not their source. Their power comes from themselves, wielded by human intellect, human force, human talent, human resolve. These 10 Commandment plaques are there not to point anyone toward the God of the Bible or the life of faith, but to remind us who is running things. It is merely statism repackaged to appease the dull.

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The Banned said:

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94chem said:

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"If a law like this persuades anyone, it will more likely persuade them that Christianity is just another tool of political power, rather than the radical hope that it actually is."

You made a great post, but you need to understand that this is what they WANT people to believe. They don't want converts. They don't want to experience the power of the Holy Spirit. It would terrify them if some fruit that happened outside the boundaries of their own control were evident. God is their bludgeon, not their source. Their power comes from themselves, wielded by human intellect, human force, human talent, human resolve. These 10 Commandment plaques are there not to point anyone toward the God of the Bible or the life of faith, but to remind us who is running things. It is merely statism repackaged to appease the dull.

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Wasn't it statism that yanked the 10 commandments and the bible out of schools to begin with? They used to be everywhere, by the choice of the people, and those people were forced to remove them. I'm not really taking a side on whether or not this is a good law or bad one, but the government wielding power isn't a one way street. Maybe if the anti-Christians had just let schools decide for themselves all those years ago, we wouldn't be dealing with this today.

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The Banned said:

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94chem said:

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"If a law like this persuades anyone, it will more likely persuade them that Christianity is just another tool of political power, rather than the radical hope that it actually is."

You made a great post, but you need to understand that this is what they WANT people to believe. They don't want converts. They don't want to experience the power of the Holy Spirit. It would terrify them if some fruit that happened outside the boundaries of their own control were evident. God is their bludgeon, not their source. Their power comes from themselves, wielded by human intellect, human force, human talent, human resolve. These 10 Commandment plaques are there not to point anyone toward the God of the Bible or the life of faith, but to remind us who is running things. It is merely statism repackaged to appease the dull.

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Wasn't it statism that yanked the 10 commandments and the bible out of schools to begin with? They used to be everywhere, by the choice of the people, and those people were forced to remove them. I'm not really taking a side on whether or not this is a good law or bad one, but the government wielding power isn't a one way street. Maybe if the anti-Christians had just let schools decide for themselves all those years ago, we wouldn't be dealing with this today.

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94chem said:

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The Banned said:

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94chem said:

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"If a law like this persuades anyone, it will more likely persuade them that Christianity is just another tool of political power, rather than the radical hope that it actually is."

You made a great post, but you need to understand that this is what they WANT people to believe. They don't want converts. They don't want to experience the power of the Holy Spirit. It would terrify them if some fruit that happened outside the boundaries of their own control were evident. God is their bludgeon, not their source. Their power comes from themselves, wielded by human intellect, human force, human talent, human resolve. These 10 Commandment plaques are there not to point anyone toward the God of the Bible or the life of faith, but to remind us who is running things. It is merely statism repackaged to appease the dull.

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Wasn't it statism that yanked the 10 commandments and the bible out of schools to begin with? They used to be everywhere, by the choice of the people, and those people were forced to remove them. I'm not really taking a side on whether or not this is a good law or bad one, but the government wielding power isn't a one way street. Maybe if the anti-Christians had just let schools decide for themselves all those years ago, we wouldn't be dealing with this today.

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Who cares? If I had a dollar for every time a slump-shouldered, grammar-challenged, 45-year-old-who-looks-70, east Texan told me that it "all went to hell when they took prayer outta schools," I'd have enough money to buy Super Bowl tickets. Meanwhile, my kids have been meeting at the flagpole weekly for years to pray before school, blissfully unaware of the tyrannical "they."

My own mother has told me how much better the schools were before integration, as if that's some kind of argument against integration, and not a shameful consequence of owning human beings for 200 years and shafting them for another 100.

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Sapper Redux said:

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The Banned said:

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94chem said:

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"If a law like this persuades anyone, it will more likely persuade them that Christianity is just another tool of political power, rather than the radical hope that it actually is."

You made a great post, but you need to understand that this is what they WANT people to believe. They don't want converts. They don't want to experience the power of the Holy Spirit. It would terrify them if some fruit that happened outside the boundaries of their own control were evident. God is their bludgeon, not their source. Their power comes from themselves, wielded by human intellect, human force, human talent, human resolve. These 10 Commandment plaques are there not to point anyone toward the God of the Bible or the life of faith, but to remind us who is running things. It is merely statism repackaged to appease the dull.

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Wasn't it statism that yanked the 10 commandments and the bible out of schools to begin with? They used to be everywhere, by the choice of the people, and those people were forced to remove them. I'm not really taking a side on whether or not this is a good law or bad one, but the government wielding power isn't a one way street. Maybe if the anti-Christians had just let schools decide for themselves all those years ago, we wouldn't be dealing with this today.

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Rights aren't up for popular vote. Americans have a right to not have the state force one religion on them.

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