What religious rights, if any, are currently being eroded in the USA?

For the record I was not actually requesting a change of title, just suggesting the most appropriate topic focus for subsequent posts. Still and all, the new title helps this focus, and I trust it makes all my previously commentary moot, and allows a return to substance. Stranger things have happened. Not often, I grant; but hope springs eternal.Thank you linesmen, thank you ballboys. Over and out -- Sylas

I sthere any prospect of addressing the issues raised in the original post or to the somewhat related question, although more encompassing than the Americocentric focus of the initial post, which I raised in message #9?

By taking note of the fact that other nations without a U.S.-like First Amendment seem to be much more secular, I am reminded of observations by Jefferson, Madison, et al, where they noted that by keeping religion out of government and government out of religion, both would be stronger, and better served.Another obserevation of mine is that I don't agree that granting full rights to homosexuals, e.g., the right to marry whoever they choose in any way erodes the rights of xians. After all, many of these homosexuals are xian. I don't see that as a religious issue at all.As a U.S. citizen, my impression is that any erosion of religious rights of late comes out in the favor if xianity and against the rights of the secular community and people of other religions. I am especially put off by comments coming from what I have come to call "The First Pulpit" lately. IMO a political leader, at least in the U.S., is more than free to practice his religion, if any, in private. But he should be religiously neutral in his capacity as President. We are not getting that from our current leader and I will do my darndest to help defeat him. I shudder at the thought of Dubya getting to appoint a SCOTUS justice.An upcoming SCOTUS decision (Newdow vs. Elk Grove school dist.) will give us a clear barometer of whether we are truly open to across-the-board religion, and no religion; or if xianity has maintained this McCarthy era incursion into our lives.Getting back to my opinion that a President should be religiously neutral in his job as President, I made a comment in another forum that in a recent speech, I heard Bush say that "freedom is a gift from the Almighty". I took issue with this, stating that I think our freedom has been earned by the blood of our fallen soldiers and that his comments were a direct slap in the face of our past and present troops, and nothing but his throwing at us his religious opinion. He should keep comments like this in his home or church.I hope this is back on the original topic.Verzem

What person who knows anything about the nature of government could possibly imply that the State protects rights ?The State, by nature, exists to strip rights under various well intentioned reasons. The only barrier to prevent the loss of rights is the Constitution and its enforcing entity the Judicial Branch.The topic title implies that the State somehow exempts religious rights from being chipped away at. The title also implies that religious rights are not being eroded. It is not a matter of opinion: All rights are the target of erosion by the State.The Constitution is a CONTRACT and it was created to place the State on a very short leash, a leash that the Judicial Branch keeps making longer, and the longer the leash - the more rights are eroded.Crashfrog quote:
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What WT won't clarify to me and Dan Carroll is exactly what rights he feels are threatened, specifically by gay rights groups, which he seems to associate with the phenomenon.
______________________________________________________________________What I said that evoked this comment was that gays will not fight for religious rights and in so doing, inadvertedly, their rights are affected. I could of inserted the media in place of gays and the generic truth remains.Personally, I do not blame gays for not being so enthusiastic in defending religious rights. The fundementalists have relentlessly persecuted gays without question.Religious rights are being ajudicated out of the Constituition by the religion of atheism and its congregants in the public and private sectors. This country was founded by deists/theists, of whom all owned Bibles with the New Testament in it, and these Founding Fathers never intended their efforts to be interpreted as anti-christian.
Government was never intended to be hostile to the Divine/God, yet the collective efforts of God senseless persons have MADE the contract say what they want it to say and thus have changed the terms of the contract under the guise of rightly interpreting the Constitution.Separation of Church and State is nowhere to be found in the Contract, it is an invention of atheists who robbed a theist (Thomas Jefferson) of his words and twisted their meaning to suit their objectives.This country is experiencing total betrayal by the Judicial Branch.
God-hating judges are interpreting the Constitution to say a Bible, or a Cross on public lands, or a generic prayer to be an EDORSEMENT of religion and thus a violation of Church and State.Pure bullshit. There is no endorsement to Christianity, that is the subjective personal animosities of atheism being embraced by hijacking the Constitution and making it say that these expressions are unconstitutional.Atheism is a religion, it is against theism. It seeks to force its philosophy and morals onto a christian nation via this ridiculous changing of the contract. I could reference thousands of examples of Founding Fathers and government papers that are strewn with references to the Divine which proves that this current pro-atheist judicial favoring is outlawness.As in scientism, and in the media, and in Higher Education, Law is populated with God/christianity hatred, which is the state of those who have had their God sense removed for premeditated rejection of God.As a theist/christian it boils my blood to see the light that produced this country (theist light) be used to quench light under the guise of what the Constitution "really" says thanks to "enlightened atheists".I take comfort though, knowing, that this anti-God success is actually, and inadvertedly caused by God when He removes God sense and delivers those who oppose Him into the hands of demons who hate the freedom that the Constitution makes possible.The United States is the only country in the history of the world to have a system where the Rulers and the ruled must bow to the contents of a piece of paper instead of a capricious king/monarchy. Demons hate this fact, and as we move towards Armageddon and Anti-christ the Constitution must go.The war on terror has Congress crafting laws to get Islamic religious organizations who funnell money to terrorists. These laws will eventually be used to go after the Church. Idiot John Ashcroft, a theist, is too stupid to envision the damage he is doing in his zeal to nail terrorists.My introduction is over.

Interesting introduction, Willowtree, and the actual rights being eroded section should be even more interesting. Two things though:

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Atheism is a religion, it is against theism.

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Atheism is not a religion. Oh this might be fun and controversial to say, and it really gets the atheist’s blood boiling, but I am afraid it just isn’t the truth.Religion is defined as (taken from Dictionary.com)1)
a. Belief in and reverence for a supernatural power or powers regarded as creator and governor of the universe. Well, obviously since atheists do not believe in a supernatural power, this definition doesn’t apply.b. A personal or institutionalized system grounded in such belief and worship. There are no atheist churches and no one to worship anyway, so this definition doesn’t work. Besides which, disbelief in God means there is no belief at all.2) The life or condition of a person in a religious order. I hate it when people use a word in a definition of a word. Anyway, there are no atheist monks or priests, so no atheist orders.3) A set of beliefs, values, and practices based on the teachings of a spiritual leader. No spirituality in atheism, thus no spiritual leaders.4) A cause, principle, or activity pursued with zeal or conscientious devotion. Ah HA! Here it is, here is the definition that makes zealous atheism a religion. Unfortunately, it also makes covering one‘s mouth during a sneeze a religion.Basically, come up with a vague enough definition of religion that would cheapen all religions, and then you have a definition that atheism fits into.

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The United States is the only country in the history of the world to have a system where the Rulers and the ruled must bow to the contents of a piece of paper instead of a capricious king/monarchy.

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Just a historical tidbit, you make it sound like this country was the first to have a document to which even the government was bound. Read about the Magna Carta.

willowtree, I disagree with you on both points. It is merely your opinion that the topic title implies either of your premises. You read too much into the mod's and/or Sylas'use of the words "if any". Perhaps they don't think there has been any erosion of rights. Perhaps they are open to having you point any erosions out to them, which is what I think was implied. You could ask them if anything was meant besides the actual words.As Cynic1 has ably pointed out to you, atheism is not a religion.This country may have been founded by many theists/deists, but they went out of their way to keep their religion out of the new government. So what if they owned Bibles? I own a Bible. That doesn't make me a xian.How would you presume to know how the FF wanted their efforts to be interpreted? Say what? This is nothing more than opinion. It is accurate that the actual words "separation of church and state" is nowhere to be found in the Constitution. But the first Amendment is most definitely a separation between religion and government. It keeps the government out of religion, and religion out of government. Or, at least, it is supposed to. It is funny how some Jefferson quotes taken out of context are sometimes used by people like you to bolster your arguments; yet you try to claim some of his quotes that present xianity in a negative view have been altered.Those judgements by the judicial branch you referred to are very much correct decisions. How could you possibly deny that a cross on public land is an endorsement of xianity? Do you deny that the cross has any special relationship or symbolism to xianity?And you need to cut the bullshit. This is NOT a xian nation. Where the hell did you ever get that riduculous idea from?So what if you can find myriad references to some deity or another from the FF? When it came down to actually making the contract (as you prefer to call it) they most certainly made it GODLESS.You imply a god/xianity hatred where none exists. How could anyone hate anything that they don't think exists?We seem to agree on John Ashcroft, though probably for different reasons.

WILLOWTREE thunders:

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Separation of Church and State is nowhere to be found in the Contract, it is an invention of atheists who robbed a theist (Thomas Jefferson) of his words and twisted their meaning to suit their objectives.

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No, Thomas Jefferson's comments came from his Letter to the Danbury Baptists in which he likens the first ammendment to a "wall of separation between church and state". So it was indeed Jefferson who used these words to sum up the intent of the first ammendment. Atheists (and some Christians) use this phrase in precisely the same way Jefferson did, so in fact you are the one twisting meanings here.You'll note, if you trouble yourself to read the letter, that Jefferson is expressing agreement on this point with the Danbury Baptists. That is because the idea of this separation was first promoted by Baptists (it might even go back as far as the Anabaptists, I've forgotten and don't care to look it up at the moment).

So then your answer is "no rights at all," then? Because I didn't see where you listed any specific rights erosion at all, only more assertions that it was happening.Could you be specific about specifically which rights religions used to have that they don't now?

The topic title does no such thing.It is an honest question. It was worded specifically to avoid implications about the answer, or a presumption that there are or are not rights being eroded.I gather that you believe certain religious rights are being eroded; but I still do not know what rights you mean. The discussion of the establishment clause is interesting; but does not identify any rights that are being eroded.Crashfrog asks a fair question.If the growing secularisation of society is not actually eroding any rights, then let's be clear that erosion of rights is not the issue here. That's my perception. I think society is becoming more secular and that religion is losing influence in some areas; but I don't think there is any associated erosion of rights.On the other hand, if there is an erosion of rights, then we ought to be able to identify the rights in question.Cheers -- Sylas[This message has been edited by Sylas, 04-26-2004]

Since not everyone who reads the site is an American, I thought it might be wise to quickly recap relevant sections of the US Constitution, the document currently under scrutiny.The First Amendment to the Constitution reads, in part:

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Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;

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aka the Establishment clause.Also relevant are the Ninth and Tenth Amendments:

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Amendment IX - Construction of Constitution.

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The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.

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Amendment X - Powers of the States and People.

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The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.

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which prevents the Bill of Rights from being used as a rationale for denying rights to the people. WT is essentially correct; the Constitution is not a document that bestows rights on people, it's a document that limits the rights of government.Back to your regularly scheduled thread. As far as I can tell, religions enjoy greater rights today than they have at any time in the past, especially religions that don't have the advantage of numbers. If Christianity has lost rights in the modern era, they're rights that they had not as a religion, but as a majority - rights therefore that are not subject to religious protection.

I am beginning to think that WILLOWTREE just threw that out without much prior thought, hoping that noone would notice. Unfortunately, WILLOWTREE is too self-righteous to admit that he has no way of backing that up. I guess that's the way it goes with a lot of these people.

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The Laminator

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You think that worries you? Check out this. I am beginning to think that there is a sustained effort, most notably by this administration and its allies, to really limit the powers of the judicial branch which many of them see as being too liberal. Constitution Restoration Act of 2004What stands out to me the most is this (specifically in bold):"Notwithstanding any other provision of this chapter, the Supreme Court shall not have jurisdiction to review, by appeal, writ of certiorari, or otherwise, any matter to the extent that relief is sought against an element of Federal, State, or local government, or against an officer of Federal, State, or local government (whether or not acting in official personal capacity), by reason of that element's or officer's acknowledgement of God as the sovereign source of law, liberty, or government.'."NOW with Bill Moyers had an enlightening interview with the attorny general of N.Y. (Andrew Spitzer? sp? too lazy to look it up) who talked about the lengths the administration is going to to block states rights, etc.Check out NOW's website for more info. NOW

Perhaps, if WT ever chooses to specify which religious freedoms are being eroded, he could also detail whether this is affecting all religions equally or whether it is discrimatory to protestantism, catholicisn, islam, hinduism or any other.

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Religious rights are being ajudicated out of the Constituition by the religion of atheism and its congregants in the public and private sectors.

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Willowtree, please... specific cases.When has it happened? Who was affected?Specifically what religious rights are being taken away?

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God-hating judges are interpreting the Constitution to say a Bible, or a Cross on public lands, or a generic prayer to be an EDORSEMENT of religion and thus a violation of Church and State.

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"Public lands" would be the key point here, wouldn't it? If the land is owned and maintained by the government, then yes... putting up a cross is a tacit government endorsement of Christianity, just as hanging a cross on my front lawn would be a tacit Dan endorsement of Christianity.

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I take comfort though, knowing, that this anti-God success is actually, and inadvertedly caused by God when He removes God sense and delivers those who oppose Him into the hands of demons who hate the freedom that the Constitution makes possible.

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I don't know about you, but my God sense is tingling.I think the Green Goblin is going to throw Jesus off the George Washington Bridge.[This message has been edited by Dan Carroll, 04-26-2004]

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"As the days go by, we face the increasing inevitability that we are alone in a godless, uninhabited, hostile and meaningless universe. Still, you've got to laugh, haven't you?"
-Holly

While there is certainly still religious rights here in the US, there are also those such as Judge Roy Moore that are working hard destroy those rights and to turn this into the Theocracy of America.He is no different than the Imams of the Taliban. Why he was not tried and convicted as a vriminal I will never understand.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion