Well, I suppose if you provide strong evidence for it, it will.Originally posted by Phydeaux
Your right. So does this mean that if I find some proof that God made the world then it will be put in schools?![]()
Well, I suppose if you provide strong evidence for it, it will.Originally posted by Phydeaux
Your right. So does this mean that if I find some proof that God made the world then it will be put in schools?![]()
Originally posted by Kilroy
Hey Phydeaux, you live in the Bible Belt, right? How about you guys just secede again and you can perform whatever backwards quasi-religious social experiment you like until the whole area either sinks into the ocean or becomes Cuban territory?
Originally posted by Quasar1011
Seems to me the separation of church and state, is discriminatory. After all, I don't hear any cries of "separation of mosque and state" or "separation of synagogue and state". Why single out Christians as objects of government oppression?
Originally posted by WillJ
I just realized I never answered the question that this thread is about, and heck, I live right in the area of discussion.
The first ammendment has NOTHING to do with not being able to put the Ten Commandments on public property. Here is the first ammendment:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
Making a display of the Ten Commandments is not establishing a law. However, someone said earlier that the Alabama constitution doesn't allow display of religious symbols on public property, and I don't know whether that's true or not.
Personally, I see nothing wrong with displaying the Ten Commandments. I mean, how could anyone be offended by them? Go ahead and throw in the Four Noble Truths of Buddhism for all I care. No one's forcing me to live by them.
Originally posted by GerrardCapashen
Is this a joke? The term "separation of church and state" refers to a separation, originally envisioned to be as solid and unyielding as a brick wall, between the government and religion.
Originally posted by GerrardCapashen
The reason the word church is used is because Christianity is the predominant Western religion, and also because it is usually the Christians who are more successful in getting their religious icons/symbols into government buildings.
Point taken, but so what if it displays that Judeo-Christianity is the preffered religion of the government? The government isn't establishing any sort of official religion, and it is my opinion that the people in government can express their religious feelings however they want. When the governor of Alabama decides to establish an Inquisition, THEN we've got a problem.Originally posted by GerrardCapashen
A display of the Ten Commandments may not be legally binding, but it does gives the impression that Judeo-Christianity is the preferred religion of the government. It implies that Judeo-Christianity is the one religious grouping that is accepted enough by the government that they get to display their code of behavior, as is not the case with Hinduism, Buddhism, Islam, Shinto, Taoism, and all the other religions that I can't think of at the moment. If you include one, you must include all so as to show no preference. Including all is unfeasible, as government buildings should use their space to serve the taxpayers, not to host an impromptu museum of religious symbols.
Anyway, my point was that any government sanctioned display implied government endorsement of that particular religion, and so I think that the 1st Amendment is perfectly clear as to who is in the right in this case. (I also think the same about money and the Pledge of Alliegiance) Please, don't anybody (not talking about you WillJ, more about people like Zarn) make some lame comeback like "If you don't want your money because of "In God We Trust ", give it to me."
Here ya go:Originally posted by GerrardCapashen
I've never heard of the Four Noble Truths of Buddhism; I always thought it was the Eightfold Path. Perhaps you could explain this, because I would be interested to learn more about it.
Originally posted by Quasar1011
Why single out Christians as objects of government oppression?
Originally posted by Vrylakas
This is an aspect of American society that mystifies me; American religious zealots have this convoluted logic that says they should be able to put their religious symbols anywhere and everywhere they want, disregarding the Constitution and local laws, and if they can't impose their religious views in this way on others then it is an abridgement of their religious rights. Since their religion says they must prosyletize, any attempt to stop them from doing so, all laws be damned, is against their rights. WTH? That's circular logic.
Originally posted by Quasar1011
I think you are trying to re-write history! Our founding fathers made dozens of statements indicating the moral foundation of our American government, was rooted in Judeo-Christian values.
The so-called separation of church and state does not exist in our founding documents. The term arrived via a personal letter written by Thomas Jefferson, well after the Constitution was framed.
Thank you for making my point for me. As you said, the separation was "originally envisioned to be as solid and unyielding as a brick wall, between the government and religion".
Why not call it separation of religion and state then? That way, all religions would be treated the same. To separate the church from the state, while making no mention of other religions, is intolerant and discriminatory.
Originally posted by Pontiuth Pilate
How is the government oppressing you, Quasar?
Actually, the people from my area of the world wanted to do away with slavery, considering I am a Yankee transplant in the south. Northern Christians went by the idea of "loving another as yourself", and even "think of others as being higher than yourself", which would obviously preclude owning slaves. My area of the world is Sylvania.Originally posted by Pontiuth Pilate
The founding fathers decried slavery, and many wanted it permanently done away with, although people from your area of the world prevented that.
I neither need nor want sympathy. Symbols I do not have. If CFC be a public podium, then so be it. So far, I am getting what I want, which is the right to express my views without interference.Originally posted by Pontiuth Pilate
Yours, where you pretend to be wounded and oppressed in order to garner sympathy for pushing your religious symbols onto the public podium.
Judge Roy Moore had no official duty to the nation, only to the State of Alabama. But even with regards to the U.S. Constitution, the judge was follwing the law, not violating it. Judge Roy Moores own words:Originally posted by Pontiuth Pilate
2. That Alabama judge's, in which his wonderful faith carried him away so much that he forgot to do his duty to the nation and SUPPORT & ENFORCE THE LAW.
Originally posted by Quasar1011
I think you are trying to re-write history! Our founding fathers made dozens of statements indicating the moral foundation of our American government, was rooted in Judeo-Christian values.
Adams signed the Treaty of Tripoli (June 7, 1797). Article 11 states:
The government of the United States is not in any sense founded on the Christian religion.
From a letter to Charles Cushing (October 19, 1756):
Twenty times in the course of my late reading, have I been upon the point of breaking out, this would be the best of all possible worlds, if there were no religion in it.
From a letter to Thomas Jefferson:
I almost shudder at the thought of alluding to the most fatal example of the abuses of grief which the history of mankind has preserved the Cross. Consider what calamities that engine of grief has produced!
Additional quotes from John Adams:
Where do we find a precept in the Bible for Creeds, Confessions, Doctrines and Oaths, and whole carloads of trumpery that we find religion encumbered with in these days?
The Doctrine of the divinity of Jesus is made a convenient cover for absurdity.
...Thirteen governments [of the original states] thus founded on the natural authority of the people alone, without a pretence of miracle or mystery, and which are destined to spread over the northern part of that whole quarter of the globe, are a great point gained in favor of the rights of mankind.
Jeffersons interpretation of the first amendment in a letter to the Danbury Baptist Association (January 1, 1802):
Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between man and his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legislative powers of government reach actions only, and not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, thus building a wall of separation between church and State.
From Jeffersons biography:
...an amendment was proposed by inserting the words, Jesus Christ...the holy author of our religion, which was rejected By a great majority in proof that they meant to comprehend, within the mantle of its protection, the Jew and the Gentile, the Christian and the Mohammedan, the Hindoo and the Infidel of every denomination.
Jeffersons The Statute of Virginia for Religious Freedom:
Our civil rights have no dependence on our religious opinions, more than on our opinions in physics and geometry. . . .
Jeffersons Notes on the State of Virginia (Query 17, Religion):
The legitimate powers of government extend to such acts only as are injurious to others. But it does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods, or no god. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg. . . .
Reason and persuasion are the only practicable instruments. To make way for these free inquiry must be indulged; how can we wish others to indulge it while we refuse ourselves? But every state, says an inquisitor, has established some religion. No two, say I, have established the same. Is this a proof of the infallibility of establishments?
Jeffersons letter to John Adams, April 11, 1823:
The day will come when the mystical generation of Jesus, by the Supreme Being as his father, in the womb of a virgin, will be classed with the fable of the generation of Minerva in the brain of Jupiter.
Additional quotes from Thomas Jefferson:
It is error alone which needs the support of government. Truth can stand by itself.
They [the clergy] believe that any portion of power confided to me, will be exerted in opposition of their schemes. And they believe rightly: for I have sworn upon the alter of god eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man.
In every country and in every age the priest has been hostile to liberty; he is always in alliance with the despot, abetting his abuses in return for protection to his own.
Fix reason firmly in her seat, and call to her tribunal every fact, every opinion. Question with boldness even the existence of a God; because, if there be one, he must more approve of the homage of reason, than that of blindfolded fear....Do not be frightened from this inquiry by any fear of its consequences. If it end in a belief that there is no God, you will find incitements to virtue on the comfort and pleasantness you feel in its exercise and in the love of others which it will procure for you.
...that our civil rights have no dependence on religious opinions, any more than our opinions in physics and geometry.
Memorial and Remonstrance Against Religious Assessments:
Religious bondage shackles and debilitates the mind and unfits it for every noble enterprise....During almost fifteen centuries has the legal establishment of Christianity been on trial. What have been its fruits? More or less, in all places, pride and indolence in the clergy; ignorance and servility in laity; in both, superstition, bigotry, and persecution.
Additional quote from James Madison:
Religion and government will both exist in greater purity, the less they are mixed together.
From Franklins autobiography, p. 66:
My parents had given me betimes religious impressions, and I received from my infancy a pious education in the principles of Calvinism. But scarcely was I arrived at fifteen years of age, when, after having doubted in turn of different tenets, according as I found them combated in the different books that I read, I began to doubt of Revelation itself.
From Franklins autobiography, p. 66:
...Some books against Deism fell into my hands....It happened that they wrought an effect on me quite contrary to what was intended by them; for the arguments of the Deists, which were quote to be refuted, appeared to me much stronger than the refutations, in short, I soon became a thorough Deist.
From The Age of Reason, pp. 89:
I do not believe in the creed professed by the Jewish church, by the Roman church, by the Greek church, by the Turkish church, by the Protestant church, nor by any church that I know of....Each of those churches accuse the other of unbelief; and of my own part, I disbelieve them all.
From The Age of Reason:
All natural institutions of churches, whether Jewish, Christian, or Turkish, appear to me no other than human inventions, set up to terrify and enslave mankind, and monopolize power and profit.
From The Age of Reason:
The most detestable wickedness, the most horrid cruelties, and the greatest miseries that have afflicted the human race have had their origin in this thing called revelation, or revealed religion.
From The Age of Reason:
What is it the Bible teaches us? rapine, cruelty, and murder.
From The Age of Reason:
Loving of enemies is another dogma of feigned morality, and has beside no meaning....Those who preach the doctrine of loving their enemies are in general the greatest prosecutors, and they act consistently by so doing; for the doctrine is hypocritical, and it is natural that hypocrisy should act the reverse of what it preaches.
From The Age of Reason:
The Bible was established altogether by the sword, and that in the worst use of it not to terrify but to extirpate.
Additional quote from Thomas Paine:
It is the duty of every true Deist to vindicate the moral justice of God against the evils of the Bible.
From Religion of the American Enlightenment:
Denominated a Deist, the reality of which I have never disputed, being conscious that I am no Christian.
The so-called separation of church and state does not exist in our founding documents. The term arrived via a personal letter written by Thomas Jefferson, well after the Constitution was framed.
Thank you for making my point for me. As you said, the separation was "originally envisioned to be as solid and unyielding as a brick wall, between the government and religion".
Why not call it separation of religion and state then? That way, all religions would be treated the same. To separate the church from the state, while making no mention of other religions, is intolerant and discriminatory.
Originally posted by Phydeaux
Alot of it can be disproved and some of it can be used for suporting creationisom. Creationisom looks for things that mach up with the bible like a fast creation of the world.
Originally posted by Phydeaux
Send the flat earthers into space and see what the say.
Originally posted by Phydeaux
Send the flat earthers into space and see what the say.
Originally posted by FredLC
It will probably be something like "our eyes cannot capture the work of God; earth is flat, it just seens round because the light reflected is distorted by a misterious energy that science haven't explained yet".
That's what creationists do about fossil record and genetic evidence, so I don't see why flat earthers can't also rely on plain denial.
Regards.
Originally posted by Phydeaux
If God made the earth then there would be evidence of Him doing so right?
Originally posted by Phydeaux
None of the facts in the bible on how the world was made has ben proved wrong
Originally posted by Phydeaux
and we have found evidence that God made the world.
Originally posted by Phydeaux
Evolution is just another way of looking at how the world was put into place.
Originally posted by Hamlet
No, not neccesarily. It would depend on what you meant by 'Creationism.'
As far as I understand the term, it would imply that you simply believed that god created the Universe and everything in it. And unless he leaves a tree with 'GOD WAZ ERE' on it, then there shouldn't be any direct scientific evidence for that.
As I said, evolution is the most reliable theory for explaining natural development. It's probably not without holes in it in some areas - but it's the best analysis based on the avalible data.
How exactly do you suppose evolution came to be so widely accepted by people and scientists, anyway?
He who suggests must prove.
As I said, Creationism is not a scientific theory. It's a belief; it can't be proved one way or the other.
Really? Or have you merely found discrepencies within evolution?
Evolution/science is based on physical understanding. In this, it differs totally from creationism in the classical sense, which relies in the infalibility of scripture for legitimacy as a belief.
The fact that some creationists feel compelled to compile some sort of evidence or pseudo-evidence is, in fact, a tacit admission that the classical basis for creationism is flawed. It's an adoption of the scientific method in an attempt to prove something that can't, ultimately be proved. I
find that rather amusing, tbh.