Mock, Paper, Scissors

The worst part may be that they gave the survey in the first place.

Mandatory U.S. Army Survey Says: Non-Believers Unfit To Serve

….

Now, getting back to the Army’s “Soldier Fitness Tracker” survey …

After taking the survey, and finding out that, as a non-believer, the Army considers him unfit to serve, Sgt. Griffith sent out an email to all the organizations and individuals involved in Rock Beyond Belief, and people sprang into action. MRFF has a prominent law firm on it, and several of the bloggers among the recipients of the email immediately posted about this jaw droppingly outrageous “religious test.”

One of these blog posts, written by Al Stefanelli, has now gone viral. Al’s post, which begins, “Did you know that the United States Army is concerned with the spiritual well-being of their soldiers? Did you know that if you choose not to believe in the supernatural that the United States Army can consider you unfit to serve?,” can be found here, and a follow-up post here.

….

—TexBetsy

Tonight’s WTF moment inspires us to consider blogging against theocracy on a weekly or even daily basis.

A mother is angry about a trip led by the head football coach at Breckinridge County High School. The coach took about 20 players on a school bus late last month to his church, where nearly half of them — including her son — were baptized.

via USA Today

Tell the superintendent, right? That’s what I would do! Oh wait. Hrmmmm.

From the same source:

But Superintendent Janet Meeks, who is a member of the church and witnessed the baptisms, said she thinks the trip was proper because attendance was not required, and another coach paid for the gas.

Meeks said parents weren’t given permission slips to sign but knew the event would include a church service, if not specifically a baptism. She said eight or nine players came forward and were baptized.

Can we please go back to separating church and state? At least within county lines?

One parent said:

“They have no right to take my son on a school bus across county lines to be a church to be baptized,” she said.

(This post comes to us from our great friend and Scissorhead Jimmy Dean’s Fucked-up Cousin Clyde. JD’s etc. has been a long time supporter of the Blog Against Theocracy and always contributes a thought-provoking and creative post. He did it again for us in 2009! Rgds, T.G.)

Who rules in religion?

The God or Gods do.

God is The ruler. And the people are subservient to God’s laws.

Most religions follow this template. Granted, spiritualism has as many manifestations as possibly there are devotees, so there is not only one pattern which describes all, but… most organized religions follow this basic one of God the Ruling Force Of The Universe, God The Superior, Man Inferior (this is not a sexual position, unless you count the Missionary One, then . . . maybe, but probably only in the context of a patriarchy), God The All Powerful, etc.

God, as we understand the philosophical entity, may exist in either a state of formlessness—-an omnipresent Spirit, at once the eternal background matrix for all arising manifestations in the material world and equally distinct from those manifestations much as the sky is only a canvas (green screen, modern parlance) for the movie of the clouds, or as the existent manifestations themselves —-inseparably creation itself, in every form imaginable.

God as the ruler is either then a remote lawgiver, one beautifully likened in 16th Century-think to the clockmaker who has built the clock and who winds it but who is also busy with other projects somewhere else in the shop, or the craftsman and the clock and the shop and the winding all in a package.

There is a wee problem here.

IF God is remotely a creator, then the physical laws are ones pertinent to the creation. Indeed, this has been the explorational busy work of the physicists and chemists and mathematicians as long as we know such thinkers to have existed. The discovery of these laws and the refinement of the search to the least minutiae goes on at this moment. These boundary-defining statutes establish what can and cannot occur. Since they apply to the physical material realm they lend themselves to testing and proofs. Bit by bit, these laws are being revealed to man.

But IF God is the creation itself, everything changes. It is no longer simply a discovery of the laws by which creation manifests, but the creation itself revealing itself to itself, God singing “Getting To Know Me.”

The wee problem is this:

Laws created by politicians are not laws governing the material workings of the cosmos. (I will acknowledge that the State policeman with the radar gun who is waving at me as I sail past him at 75 in a 55 zone does have a beatific appearance . . . but maybe it is only oxygen deprivation since I stopped breathing when I saw him too late).

They are not laws governing physics, but people’s actions. And they are not God’s laws, but laws of people, issued by people, for people. God doesn’t make these laws anymore than people make the laws of electromagnetism.

But this is not clear to everyone.

Let me say it again: people make the laws governing people, and God makes the laws governing the physical universe.

Let me flip this one more time so it is painfully clear how wrong it is when Believers become (rulers) legislators and confuse who and what they are:

• GOD makes the laws governing people,
  and PEOPLE make the laws governing the physical universe.
• GOD says who can vote,
  and PEOPLE say what gravity ought to be.
• GOD says what tariffs there should be on foreign steel,
  and PEOPLE say what the binding force between water molecules should be.
• GOD says who can marry,
  and PEOPLE say what ultraviolet radiation should be.
• GOD says how much the states can tax the use of tobacco,
  and PEOPLE say how galaxies rotate about an axis.
• GOD says what boundaries exist between adjoining nations,
  and People allow a plant to grow from a seed.
• GOD says what the speed limit in rural Ohio should be,
  and PEOPLE say how fast or how slow universe expansion should be.

When God and people become used interchangeably, it’s a theocracy, or rule by GOD/PEOPLE, and the limits separating religion and government no longer exist.

No longer is it clear what laws are laws affecting the physical workings of the universe, and what laws are laws made by people affecting other people.

No longer clear is it what belief is, and what knowledge is.

The boundaries between science and dogma become hazy and uncertain.

No one knows what’s real, and what isn’t. And the rulers can justify anything they do, with the claim they have the divine right.

Rulers love this.

Tengrain — and if you think I was going to put my usual signature somewhere in those four quadrants, you’re crazier than I am!

In my line of work, we get these sorts of “magic quadrant” analysis of where our products are compared to the competition. Some people find them useful.

UPDATE: According to Theocracy Watch, the theocratic governments of the world are Israel, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Vatican City.

I know, I know, I know… but imagine if the news shows filled up a few minutes here and there with sightings of Mohammed, or Buddah. Why is it always Jesus’ image on the stain in the news?

You see, it’s not just the three branches of government we need to be vigilant about, the fourth estate is already well on the way to being a theocratic media.

Via email, I’ve been asked to explain myself, how I could “perverse” such an iconic image as the Rosenthal photograph of the planting of the flag on Iwo Jima. The writer suggest a few things I could do with the flag pole, but I’ll save that for another time.

When Blue Gal and I were plotting and planning this year’s blog swarm, she asked me to do something with the Rainbow Flag. We agreed that this year, the theocrats were targeting gays, what with fights all over the country on same sex marriage, and gay civil rights in general. One of us said it was like a war on gays.

And then the image dawned on me. You see, the Marines who fought so bravely in the South Pacific in World War II (Hi Dad!) fought for all of us, not just some of us. Their heroism is not limited to just one group of Americans over another group. They did not fight and die to preserve and protect the US Constitution only to have theocrats come in and destroy it in the name of their god.

So here’s the way I see things: just as the Marines fought for all of us, we have to fight to preserve and protect our Constitution from the theocrats who would replace it with a Bible, and we have to fight for all of our citizens to be equal. Religion has no place in our governance.

Regards,

Tengrain

(Cross-posted for my favorite religious lady and friend, FranIAm, who proves to me daily that you can be a Christian and cool. Rgds, T.G)

(Despite my calls for action for Blog Against Theocracy weekend (Also available at MockPaperScissors) I seem to have run out of time without writing a post. To that end I am submitting and posting this post from my blog, from early March. The post was about the film Constantine’s Sword and is interwoven with a case of campus proselytizing of the worst sort a the Air Force Academy. I was inspired to do this by the fine posting I just read at Happy Jihad’s House of Pancakes written by the inimitable Bing McGhandi.

For those who read this at Ten’s or at BG’s BAT site and do not know me… I am a very religious person who is deeply committed to keeping church and state separate. As a person of deep faith I do not want to tell you what to do or how to believe, nor do I want to be forced into anyone else’s ways of being. Peaceful coexistence is my goal.
————————————————————————————————————

I have not been utilizing my Netflix subscription very much lately that I recently sent a movie back after meaning to write about for weeks and then not doing so! I am so out of touch with my queue that I did not know what would arrive next.

As I am studying church history this semester and have been obsessed with Constantine (not in a good way), I hit the Netflix/Grad school jackpot when Constantine’s Sword arrived a few days later.

Currently I am immersed in church history as that is what I am studying this semester. And I am really struggling with how and why Christianity and government/power got intertwined by Constantine’s declaration that Christianity would be the religion of the Empire. “In hoc signo vinces” (“in this sign you shall conquer,”) or the IHS you often see above Jesus’ head on crucifixes.

And this film – Constantine’s Sword, uses that point in history to explore parallels between church, state and military that exist to this day.

I really liked the film; it was not the greatest, but it was interesting. It did a good job of pulling together the story more quickly, but be warned it is without all the historical detail and data the book offers. If you don’t know the history, it might not be as clear.

As a former Catholic priest, Carroll does have a bit of an axe to grind. However, make no mistake – Carroll has clearly called out the truth about anti-Semitism and the Roman Catholic Church, which needs to be called out and called out loudly and clearly.

Especially lately.

(Not to go too far afield, but many of you have heard me say this on the phone, I do not think that I have said it here… It is NO excuse for any of the awful things of late – especially the SSPX situation, but I do not believe that Pope Benedict is a Nazi or a virulent anti-semite. He is many things, but not that, as I see it. Want to talk with me (or fight with me) about that? To discuss it, email me please. I would be curious about your viewpoint and willing to share mine, but I will not likely blog about it. That said, B16′s words and actions inspire those who do reject the Jews.)

Back to the film… It does an excellent job of exploring not only the anti-semitism fueled by the RC Church, but it truly brings forth and weaves the relationship between ultra-right conservative Christianity, the US government and also the military. The real focus for this is the Air Force family of Mikey Weinstein and how Weinstein pushed back hard against the proselytizing at the US Air Force Academy.

You are likely aware that Colorado Springs is the home of this place and this place and this place. (i feel dirty just googling and publishing those links. ick… On a former business travel related note, I used to go to Colo Springs all the time. I always found the place physically beautiful, but slightly creepy… I used to say it was Apt Pupil meets Red Dawn. *shudder*)

Anyway, the movie goes back and forth between the relationship between Constantine’s toxic mix of war, power and faith and the current similarities. Now this film was released in 2007, that sick era of Bush-shit.

Especially creepy were scenes where Carroll interviews Ted Haggard, like this one. (it is only 21 creepy seconds long…)

(Is that smile insincere and soul-chilling or what???)

This movie covers a lot of historical ground as it encapsulates the history of the church and the toxic mix of church and state that began with Constantine in 312 and mentioned above. Prior to this, the religion of the empire was pagan. The question will always remain – did Constantine really convert or was this his evil exercise of unifying power? I always tend towards the latter on this.

So you go from what was once the counter-cultural group of outsiders, that is those who followed Christ, to the forced religion of the empire. Add to that the struggles already extant in the growing Christian faith, many of whom never thought of themselves as anything other than messianic Jews. There were already forces at work in the various communities of that time that were sowing seeds of anti-Semitism.

Bring that into the context of the war against Iraq (think GWB and the use of the word “crusade”) and the power of the religious right in this country during his presidency.

Carroll’s own history matters here too… His parents were of Irish descent and working class at that. Yet his father became a General and played a major role in government. Carroll lived a privileged life and became a Catholic priest in the Vatican II era. He embraced peace and social justice only to discover how conflicted his work was.

Carroll was vehemently anti-war and an activist priest during the Vietnam era… and his father worked at the Pentagon.

Church, state and war are always an intoxicating mix for those who love power and domination. This is why they should never go together, but always do.

This movie is worth a watch just to see how ugly it can all get. I realize that for a 90 minute movie, there is so much to write about and I have barely captured any of it.

Let it suffice to say that Carroll travels to Colorado Springs and to Rome; he journeys to Krakow and Auschwitz as well. He does a good job of presenting the sometimes complicated role of the Catholic Church and some very dark chapters of history with clarity. His segments on the Jewish community of Rome were especially excellent.

I recommend this film if you have an interest in this history… and in how dangerous it is for the forces of the military, the government and religion to mix.

(Our good friend and Scissorhead, Travelling Man, submitted this post by email – we are very glad and proud to present it here at Mock, Paper, Scissors. Rgds, T.G.)

With the election of Barack Obama, the influence of the Religious Right may have diminished, but it has not disappeared.

Those of us who are committed to retaining the separation of Church and State must continue to be vigilant against the encroachment on our freedoms by those who would subvert the Constitution and replace it with a system of laws founded on various religious texts. Just recently, a new advertisement for the “defense of marriage” advises us that there is a “gathering storm”. At the inauguration of President Obama, The Christian Defense Coalition and others anointed the doorposts through which the then President Elect would pass on his way to being sworn in to office. The Obama administration continues to fund Faith Based Initiatives begun in the Bush administration.

None of these examples should be construed as being somehow opposed to Christianity. There are instances of the encroachment by ultra-conservative members of other faiths to restrict freedom ranging from Muslim taxi drivers refusing to carry passengers carrying alcohol, to a Jewish group that supported California’s Proposition 8 to restrict the rights of homosexuals to marry.

What none of these groups can understand, or will understand, (which is an entirely different matter), is that while they have every right to adopt restrictions on their behavior according to their religious beliefs, they do not have the right to force those restrictions on others. That is the basis of this blogswarm. These groups refuse to acknowledge that others are free to live their lives as they see fit as long as that lifestyle does not impinge on the rights of others. Those of us who wholeheartedly support the separation of Church and State do not wish to stop others from living according to the dictates of their conscience. We merely wish to be accorded that same right without them shoving their religious agenda down our throats.

Since the change in administrations this year, conservative religious groups do not have the same access to the corridors of power that they once did. This doesn’t mean that the struggle to maintain our freedom is over. Far from it. Now, these groups have adopted the language of their opponents and accuse others of being intolerant. Somehow, not giving them special permission to dictate what we drink, who we love, and how we worship or do not worship is being “intolerant”. They adopt the language of the victim while victimizing others. This is the new paradigm and we should develop effective means of countering that specious argument.

First and foremost, we need to remind them that none of the ideas we advocate deny them the right to live as they choose. We deny them the right to dictate how others should live and that is a true defense of freedom. Perhaps we should also remind them that if their Deity is as omnipotent as they claim, said Deity can effect the changes they seek with no help from them whatsoever.

I would like to close with a quotation from Robert Ingersoll from 1879:

“Churches are becoming political organizations….
It probably will not be long until the churches will divide as sharply upon political, as upon theological questions; and when that day comes, if there are not liberals enough to hold the balance of power, this Government will be destroyed. The liberty of man is not safe in the hands of any church. Wherever the Bible and sword are in partnership, man is a slave.
All laws for the purpose of making man worship God, are born of the same spirit that kindled the fires of the auto da fe, and lovingly built the dungeons of the Inquisition. All laws defining and punishing blasphemy — making it a crime to give your honest ideas about the Bible, or to laugh at the ignorance of the ancient Jews, or to enjoy yourself on the Sabbath, or to give your opinion of Jehovah, were passed by impudent bigots, and should be at once repealed by honest men. An infinite God ought to be able to protect himself, without going in partnership with State Legislatures. Certainly he ought not so to act that laws become necessary to keep him from being laughed at. No one thinks of protecting Shakespeare from ridicule, by the threat of fine and imprisonment. It strikes me that God might write a book that would not necessarily excite the laughter of his children. In fact, I think it would be safe to say that a real God could produce a work that would excite the admiration of mankind. Surely politicians could be better employed than in passing laws to protect the literary reputation of the Jewish God.”

Those are the stakes. The Radical Religious Right isn’t going away.

But then, neither are we.

Traveling Man

…is like arguing with teh crazy.

These are actors, by the way, they are reciting actual words that the fundies have said. I have to admire them for not breaking character as they say some of these things.

…can be found at Wee Mousie’s most excellent Cinema Burlesque. I laughed, I cried, it is the feel-good Friday post of, well, Good Friday.

To everything
There is a season
And a time for every purpose, under heaven

No more April Fools mischief for us here at Mock, Paper, Scissors. The time has come for us to put away our childish things, to become serious, and to address the theocratic issues of the day, carefully, thoughtfully, and straight forwardly. We cannot forever sit back and mock the short-fingered vulgarians. We must do more than merely spitball the pontificating poltroons. Enough jokes, enough tomfoolery. It’s high time we told the world not just what repels and astounds us, but what we are for.

I’m thinking.

Alright, here’s one: We are for condoms.

arlier this year, the Pope while visiting Africa (which looks to be a great opportunity for expanding his franchise), suggested that access to condoms leads to the spread of HIV disease and AIDS. The pope told reporters, “You can’t resolve it [the spread of HIV and AIDS, presumably] with the distribution of condoms.” He then added, “On the contrary, it increases the problem.”

Actually, the lack of condoms increases many problems, besides HIV and AIDS (which is a tragedy of epic proportions as it is) such as unwanted children.

Turn, turn, turn…

hildren seem to be a lot in the news lately, and MPS is firmly of the belief that children should be seen and not heard from until they are old enough to make a decent martini. However, we do believe that children should be wanted.

Perhaps solving the glut of unwanted children is at our fingertips: allowing gay couples to adopt. Christian groups however say that gay people are “now pursuing symbolic gains and holding up children as trophies for their own agenda.” Tell that to Frank Gill, a plaintiff in a pending lawsuit aimed at repealing the Florida adoption ban. Gill said that he and his partner have been foster parents for 10 children but when a South Florida circuit judge granted their request to adopt two boys, the state immediately appealed under the law forbidding adoption by gays.

According to Minnesota’s member of Congress, Michelle Bachmann, the gay community is targeting children and that “our children are the prize for this community.”

We at MPS are all for prizes, and we think that Michelle Bachmann and the theocrats of the Christian right win the prize for ignorance and bigotry.

Turn, turn, turn…

ut as long as we are discussing condoms as contributing to a problem (as the Pope says), we logically arrive at abstinence as sex education.

The narrative that we get from the Christian Right is that sex is the dirtiest, nastiest and most evil thing that you can do (Ed: only if you do it right — T.G.), and that is why you must only do it with someone you love.

Works well, doesn’t it?

Turn, turn, turn…

n sex education, we did learn about the sperm and the egg, and how babies are made (though it took a few years before we learned about Tab A and Slot B). We saw nifty black and white movies showing the moment of conception, and oddly there was no one from the GOP-Christian Right with a voter registration card.

The theocrats across the country are again in the throes of protecting the fetus and frying the felons. And interestingly enough, the right to medical care has become an issue amongst the Rapture set:

Carl and Raylene Worthington were indicted for manslaughter and criminal mistreatment, after their 18 month old daughter died of what officials are calling medical neglect. They are members of the Followers of Christ Church, whose members have a history of treating gravely ill children solely via prayer, instead of with medical attention. The state medical examiner’s office has said that she could have been treated with antibiotics. Just a few weeks later, a 16 year old cousin in the same community died from a urinary track blockage.

As we’ve said before, the theocrats motto is The Right to Life Ends at Birth

Turn, turn, turn…

ere’s another thing we are for: intelligence, but not intelligent design. The Texas Board of Education earlier this year proposed a new science curriculum that is designed to challenge the guiding principle of evolution. The proposed curriculum would prompt teachers to raise doubts that all life on Earth is descended from common ancestry.

Texas school board chairman Don McLeroy wants the texts to make the case that individual cells are far too complex to have evolved by chance mutation and natural selection, an argument popular with those who believe an intelligent designer created the universe.

The most incredible thing I believe is the Christmas story. That little baby born in the manger was the god that created the universe.

– Don McLeroy, Texas school board chairman

Please ignore the logic and continuity issues with being born and then creating everything. As the Pope says, it increases the problem.

Scissorheads –

Welcome to the third year of the Blog Against Theocracy.

As is our tradition at Mock, Paper, Scissors, we begin with an invocation from our late and much loved Xristi M, who passed away in December of 2006. This is a poem she left in a comment for us. Xristi used her incredible intelligence as a sword and shield, but she let her Christian faith guide her. She would have loved the Blog Against Theocracy.

CHANGE OF ADDRESS
Dedicated to the Absolutely Sure of Absolutely Everything
From Someone Who Isn’t
(c) XristiM 1998-2006

Into their Lazarus mouths they pop
God like round peppermint lozenges,
and with their resurrected teeth
grind Him small,
roll the bits with their tongues,
flooding them with saliva and
the exhalations of digestion.
Then they amble forth
to perform the work for which
they have anointed themselves
and each other,
breathing the judgment of an angry God strongly
into the nostrils of others.

We can hear them at a distance,
from close enough can detect the stench
of self-righteousness.
And a wary eye can detect them in our midst,
with coats that show glossy fronts,
but on their backs,
hidden from their view
and from ours
unless we trouble ourselves to look,
reveal scraps and patches
like bandages over festering sores.

We may protest, draw back in distaste,
alarmed to have God thrust upon us
smelling so pungently of mint
and the charnel house,
but they are relentless in pursuit
of fleeing souls.
They paralyze us with their certainty
that God lives in their mouths.

For myself, I think the God has filed
His change of address:
He resides
not in the mouth, but in the heart.

I cannot recall how many people I’ve spoken with, either via blogs or in-person, who reacted with the word “But nobody wants a theocracy in America” whenever I bring the subject up. And indeed, until recently, there wasn’t really a specific push to alter our Constitution in any formative way, and the only reason the American public has come to recognize that there are some minority movements in that direction is because of the thankfully-failed presidential campaign of Mike Huckabee. Thanks to his “charming” southern style and disarming smile, however, even given the suddenness of the our coming to understand that conservative fundamentalists DO want to turn this nation into a Christian Nation, many still don’t realize the true threat that impetus represents. And since nobody in that campaign ever used the term “theocracy”, these very same people who were “a bit put off” by Huckabee’s stance on altering the Constitution still don’t believe that anyone is creating, or has ever made any attempt to create, a theocratic state.

Head in the sands, their worldview is written on the backs of their eyelids, and its name is sciolism. But I’ve already spoken enough about that.

When the Buddha was destroyed in Bamyan by the Taliban back in 2001, everyone here in America seemed taken aback. But at least on the part of some of us, that incredulity was largely feigned. After all, we already live in a society which unapologetically and unabashedly forces galleries and museums not to display works of art that are uncomplimentary to the Christian Deity and Its Holy Progeny. We already live in a society which disallows admittance to certain schools to those who are openly homosexual, refuses military service to the same and withholds benefits to service men and women whose homosexuality becomes known. We already live in a society where religious-sponsored abstinence-only education is taught in public schools, where religious-sponsored “alternatives” to centuries-established science are required to be taught alongside the scientific curriculum, and where educators must mark as correct responses from students whose religious doctrine define the Universe as a 6,000-year-old mechanism created and overseen by the Christian Deity. We already live in a society in which the government sets up programs exclusively available to religious organizations, and subjectively requires candidates for political office to publicly hold at least some form of religious belief that is not Muslim, Wiccan, Satanist, or Pagan.

In many ways, America is already not very far removed from being a theocratic state. Hence this blogswarm and the absolute important it holds to those of us who recognize the potential impact of the things I detailed in the paragraph above. And of other things, I’m sure. One of the things that frightens me the most about the permissiveness with which religious bigotry is handled in our society is the impact it has on our children. Even in what has become a largely progressive society on many levels, these children still grow up thinking that only members of their religious denominations will share the “Kingdom of Heaven”—in some cases, only members of their particular congregation. Children are being home-schooled in higher numbers, and this only produces more insularity, more misunderstanding, and a greater sense of that misplaced entitlement that is already so pervasive in our world today. I do honestly look upon this treatment of our children as a form of child abuse. They are not prepared for the world at large whenever they do leave home, and that is the gravest error any parent can make: worse even than the rote teachings of intolerance, bigotry, self-righteousness, and duplicity they are given before they leave the house. And as adults, these children live in a society in which their intolerance and bigotry is tolerated, even encouraged, by the news media, by politicians, and of course by the company they keep in their insular segments of the society. In turn, those who do not eventually see the silliness (or perhaps the abject cruelty) of their ways, will start the cycle all over again with their own children.

What the Taliban did to Buddha in March of 2001 in one brazen act is no different than what conservative fundamentalists in America do each day to our nation as a whole through a measured, implacable series of legislation. The reason why we blog against these acts is to make people more aware that they even exist. Since ours is a society largely defined by convenience, attempting to recognize the patterns left behind by the religious fundamentalists takes work, and work is awful inconvenient. Even those who recognize these issues largely feel that anything they could do about them would be too limited, too small of a scale, to have any impact. That’s not true.

This is just the third blogswarm on the topic of theocracy, and if I’m not mistaken, sometime during yesterday, we surpassed the number of posts from the last one. We blog, people read, people begin to understand. We are not helpless in our fight against theocracy, for our readers begin to recognize that the theocratic movement has many faces, many subtle nuances, and the most recent public expression of that desire was probably communicated out of sheer ignorance on behalf of Huckabee. The fundamentalists like to work in the dark, behind closed doors, sending hand-picked groups out into the open to whine and complain and argue and fight, knowing that they cannot be trusted to reveal the true mission, couching it instead in the simple terms of “Freedom of Expression”—the very same Freedom, in fact, they would hope to deny so many others.

So, over this weekend we have blogged again. But we are reaching a point where blogging, helpful as it is, is by no means enough. I believe it is time to do more than blog. I believe it is time to actively, even proactively, fight the elements of theocracy in our courts, our schools, our universities, and yes, even our churches, synagogues, and mosques. Religion has no formative place in our government. We can be proud of the fact that many religious people fought and died to earn this country its independence without having to hold every election under a cross. We can celebrate this country’s Judeo-Christian roots without turning every courtroom into a prayer service. And we can remind our friends and neighbors who have no problem with the efforts to make this a Christian Nation exactly where such ideas got the people of Afghanistan. Help them envision what life would be like without the Freedom of choice, the Freedom of expression, the Freedom of Art.

Here are some helpful questions you can ask those who don’t think this is a real issue:

1. Would you love your God if the Law said you had no other choice but to do so?
2. Would you want your children to attend a public school where Baptism was the first pre-requisite?
3. Would you be excited to go to Church on Sunday if you were required to sing praises at work each day?
4. Would you uphold the Law and stone your child to death for disobedience?
5. Would you want to live in a Democracy where all the candidates were ministers? or priests? or rabbis?
6. Would you want to live in a society where “choice” amounted to whether you go to mass on Saturday or Sunday?

Our freedom is at stake. Let’s not just leave it to a collection of postings once or twice a year.

Technorati Tags:
1. blog against theocracy
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cross-posted to the otherwhirled

I believe it is relatively clear that our European allies, especially Great Britain, live in more secular societies than we do here in America. Especially where Great Britain is concerned, there’s a significant amount of irony involved in such progressivism: our founding families fled such places because of religious oppression at great personal risk, and a couple of hundred years later elements of our own government desire a steadfast adherence to religious edicts, and already have systems in place by which non-Christian business and organizations are disallowed participation in certain government-sanctioned areas of business. It’s ironic, and of course from my perspective, it’s considerably depressing. I believe the story of the American Revolution—pretty much all the stories of the American Revolution, in fact—is a grand tale of personal commitment, courage in the face of imminent threat, and indeed, the fundamental precepts of honor, perseverance, and integrity.

Of those, it is integrity which bothers me in this seemingly continual struggle for religious domination of our government. For the desire for religious domination is promoted as Americanism when it is, in fact, one of the most extreme of un-American acts that can be perpetrated on the populace outside of mass murder. The lack of self-integrity that it constitutes is also troubling for me, because the individuals who promote the redefinition of America as a “Christian Nation” are those who set themselves as examples of good behavior to the rest of us. Setting aside the fact that dogmatic belief in biblical stories is a nefarious form of delusion (and self-delusion, to boot), they cherry-pick their own religious doctrine in the attempt to make their desires real.

I once considered running for a local political office. After two days of discussions with local Party officials, I was finally contacted by the State Democratic Party and told in no uncertain terms that they would not support me as long as I refused to attend church. In other words, unless I was willing to violate my sense of self-integrity, I wasn’t a solid enough candidate in their minds to support. I lacked the personal funds (and the time, to be honest), to aggressively compete against the individual who sponsored the anti-abortion legislation that was so controversial on the national circuit (South Dakota’s Proposition 6), and even though the state party abhorred both the policy and the man, they simply weren’t willing to fight him from the opposite religious extreme. And as an already-established dynamic member of my community, heaven forbid that I would have brought some logic, critical thinking, and personal insight to the matter (the personal insight being that I was adopted and had a child placed for adoption and was in contact with my daughter from a previous relationship, whom i didn’t get to raise).

While I found this personally offensive, the concept wasn’t hard to understand. Even a cursory view of politics today shows how intrinsically it is tied to religion. Political candidates take great pride, it seems, in opportunities to speak at churches, and are generally careful to show themselves as supposedly-honorable members of their religious communities. Beyond that, in many locations, voting is done at the local church, although I don’t protest this too much, for in many small communities, the local church also serves as the community center, and hosting elections there is a more than just a matter of convenience or even preference. And yet, as a self-proclaimed agnostic atheist (I don’t view atheism as a religion, in other words, nor do “practice” atheism dogmatically), one of the things that I wish candidates wouldn’t do is pander to this presumed need. There are, after all, over 30,000 separate Christian denominations in the world. Pandering to one offends another, and I think, shows a that a supposed leader is incapable to effectively lead, resorting instead to the appearance of conformance to a relative minority of the voting public.

If candidates approached this issue logically, I don’t think they’d stoop to the church-hosted photo-ops. To the critical-thinking crowd (many of whom, in certain terms, actually exist in the religious crowd, too), the demonstration of a limited world-view, a relatively intolerant mindset, and a dependency on rote superstition should be quite unattractive. As well, the explicit deference to a minority (and active, participating Christians ARE a minority in this country) should be no more acceptable to the logical mind than the undue influence by any other political lobby. And the critical-thinking crowd shouldn’t be afraid to ask pointed questions to their candidates. Why should we allow such candidates to lead us? Why must we invest our own forms of faith in the good behavior and ethical conduct of those who show, time and time again, the willingness to defer to delusional thinking? Should we ever have to define the “best” candidate in terms of the admirable qualities that they lack? In many ways, those are unfortunately rhetorical questions. The status quo, after all, is a difficult thing to circumvent, let alone redefine. But I fear that if we do not manage to do some day, that even under progressive or liberal control, we will find ourselves living in a Christian State, rife with intolerance and dedicated on converting the world. And when that day comes, we will have no one to blame but ourselves.

And to bring this back to the title, the real problem with this is basically just visual. On the left side of the political aisle, you know these aren’t the types of people hell-bent on changing the Constitution to make this a Christian Nation, or even personally dedicated to “saving” all the people of the world. But as such, the very appearance of their deference to these ideals, the very appearance that they take the teachings of their religions seriously, creates a logical disconnect from which it is almost impossible for the likes of me to step aside. I respect and even admire their personal faith, but the mere appearance of a need to even make religion an issue in today’s world is simply silly to me. Even when I was a steadfast, devout conservative Christian (yes, I was, once upon a time), I still had many questions and problems voting for candidates whom I didn’t think I could trust to uphold our rights and protect our freedoms simply on the basis of our citizenship, which is exactly how it’s supposed to be.

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cross-posted to synthaetica.com under my other pseudonym, “Synthaetica”. coming up next: Easter celebrations in the otherwhirled!

This is my second year of participation in Blog Against Theocracy, hosted by Tengrain. This article will be cross-posted there. I hope to follow it up with articles tomorrow and Sunday as well. I am proud to be a participant and encourage you to visit Tengrain’s blog to read other articles posted there by many other bloggers.

First, let my state my own perspective. I am a Christian. While you might ask why I’m not on the other side of this issue, I believe that opposition to theocracy is the true Christian perspective, as my Christianity is based on faith, not dogma. That faith empowers progressive values, not the intolerance, greed and bigotry that has sadly come to be associated with Christianity through the actions of a powerful minority.

Next, exactly what is it that I am opposing here? Lets turn to Webster:

.

.

Main Entry:

the·oc·ra·cy

Pronunciation:

\thē-ˈä-krə-sē\

Function:

noun

Inflected Form(s):

plural the·oc·ra·cies

Etymology:

Greek theokratia, from the- + -kratia -cracy

Date:

1622

1 : government of a state by immediate divine guidance or by officials who are regarded as divinely guided 2 : a state governed by a theocracy

Next, why should theocracy be opposed? Were only the very first part of the first definition operative, I’d have no problem with it. After all, could God be a worse President than the Grand Inquisitor of the Texas Taliban? But governance by God is not at issue here. The problem is that religious right fundamentalists, whom I call theocons, are seeking to impose their dogma and piety codes on others, claiming that they are divinely guided. Are they? Consider this:

The 2001 edition [World Christian Encyclopedia], successor to his 1983 first edition, which took a decade to compile, identifies 10,000 distinct religions, of which 150 have 1 million or more followers. Within Christianity, he counts 33,830 denominations.

Inserted from <Adherents.com>

What we have here is 33,830 different interpretations of what Christianity is. Assume, just for the sake of argument that one of them is correct. In that case, 33,829 are wrong. The likelihood that the theocons have a handle on truth, given all these alternate interpretations, is infinitesimally small.

Fortunately, our Constitution is the first line of defense in opposition to the theocons. The First Amendment reads as follows:

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.

A law respecting an establishment of religion would be any law that gives preferential treatment to any religion over any other religion. In my opinion, the only manner whereby this may be accomplished is a complete separation of church and state, a legal doctrine that has been the status quo for most of our nation’s history. The theocons oppose this principle with two arguments. First, they claim the phrase means something else and that the separation of church and state was never the intent of the founders. Second, that argue that, since the US is a “Christian nation”, founded on Christianity, that the term refers to different denominations of Christianity, not to other religions. Thus, as long as a law favors Christianity in a non-denominational way, it’s fine. Both arguments are false.

Regarding the founders’ true intent, I found the following quotes at About.com.

From Thomas Jefferson:

“Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between man and his God, that he owes account to none other for is 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. Adhering to this expression of the supreme will of the nation in behalf of the rights of conscience, I shall see with sincere satisfaction the progress of those sentiments which tend to restore to man all his natural rights, convinced he has no natural right in opposition to his social duties.” [emphasis added]

And from James Madison:

“The civil Government, though bereft of everything like an associated hierarchy, possesses the requisite stability, and performs its functions with complete success, whilst the number, the industry, and the morality of the priesthood, and the devotion of the people, have been manifestly increased by the total separation of the church from the State.” [emphasis added]

Regarding the notion that the US is a “Christian nation”, the following is the 11th Article of the Treaty of Tripoli, read aloud and unanimously approved by the US Senate on June 7, 1797. President John Adams signed it into law.

As the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion; as it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion, or tranquillity, of Mussulmen; and, as the said States never entered into any war, or act of hostility against any Mahometan nation, it is declared by the parties, that no pretext arising from religious opinions, shall ever produce an interruption of the harmony existing between the two countries. [emphasis added]

Simply put, these theocon claims to justify their attempt to establish an unconstitutional theocracy in order to impose their dogma on those who disagree are based on lies.

In this article, I have demonstrated why we must oppose this assault upon our liberty from a secular perspective. In my next, I shall do so from a Christian perspective.

Cross-posted at Politics Plus