Where should there be "The right to refuse service"?

Yet more falsehoods from you it seems Faith. What anti-Christian hatred is seen at EvC? Can you give us links to the messages since I have never come across any.

Isn't it hateful to tell Christians they can not be bigots in the marketplace? Isn't it hateful to tell Christians that we don't care if they hate gays we are going to allow them to marry anyway? Isn't it hateful to tell Christians that the facts of history attest to the US Constitution being a secular document? Isn't it hateful to feed Christians to the Catholics?The answers are yes, of course. Just ask a Christian.This, also, illuminates the reasons why the Ancient Romans wanted to feed them to the lions. Christians are such a whiny lot. But if you feed one to a lion then, after the initial screaming, they get really quiet.

I haven't seen a post yet that isn't anti-Christian.But I think I'll ask it as a question: Does it make any sense that the original extremely Christian colonies with their Christian laws could possibly have intentionally designed a secular Constitution that would eventually allow the anti-Christian attitudes expressed now at EvC? Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

There aren't anti-Christian attituded being expressed here.Ignoring that -- yes it makes sense. The original colonies did not all agree on theology. Having a secular constitution would allow them to set those disagreements aside "in order to form a more perfect union."

In fact it does. Surely you are aware that the Christian colonies included colonies with religions that you denounce as non Christian. Is it beyond reason that people were aware of the danger of having one sect gain control of the reins of government and making life unlivable for the rest of the country. I cannot imagine the mess people like you would make of this world with your seeing demons behind every bad thing that happens and your admiration for the actions of King James. The result is pretty much the antithesis of freedom.There were certainly plenty of early examples of such things for the founding fathers to be fearful of. A lot of you pilgrims came here and immediately went about creating hell on earth. I'm quite sure that the provisions in the Constitution that deal limit such things are no accident.In my experience, people who manage to escape tyranny don't manage to avoid becoming tyrants when their time on top comes. I am fascinated by the ability of the founding fathers to avoid that trap. Absolutely amazing.Edited by NoNukes, : miscellaneous additions.

That's pretty f'ed up. Christians don't have to be whiny, hateful, people. The Bible does not describe Jesus as advocating whiny, hate filled, stone casting behavior. If "Christian" actually meant people who try to emulate Jesus, something I insist on, then I think you'd find Christians to be nothing short of amazing, although you might still find us a bit of a meddling bunch.I understand that the term Christian has been co-opted by some pretty hateful folks, but I am not willing to cede them the dictionary.

Uh, weren't the reformers proven wrong about that? History seems to show that all those popes who were supposedly the anti-Christ are now dead, and yet our Savior has not yet returned. Not a one of them accomplished anything along the lines of the actions set out in Revelations. When Pope Francis dies, will you at that point acknowledge that he is not the anti-Christ? Or will you just lock into his successor?Surely some superstitions are readily exposed as just that. But this particularly belief is beyond moronic. No respect whatsoever ought to be accorded such BS.

Yes.And there was no "extremely" about their Christianity. It was quite normal, intolerant, spiteful, hateful and (among the 13) contradictory. Just the kind of crap you would want to avoid if you were all going to crawl into the same bed. Has everyone forgotten the Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union? How they all played so well together?So, yes, they ditched the religious stuff by not acceding to any of it in the Constitution.Edited by AZPaul3, : No reason given.

I bow to your more tolerant view of "Christian" than Faith's TrueChristian^TM. Yeah, but fuuunnny!

I realize it has been years since I've posted, but I see Faith is still at it.

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Banning people from political office for their faith is indeed contrary to the whole idea of freedom of religion. And that is what you have proposed.

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It's what the original American colonies did, and since they were original, how can anyone imagine they would have seen things any differently when it came to establishing a federal government. Attempts to reconcile denominational differences failed to anticipate the ultimate destruction of the colonies' original Christian worldview.

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When you appreciate how thoroughly Protestant the original colonies were in their constitutions and politics, it's really absurd to think an anti-Christian secular society could have resulted from any of their efforts except by some very strange misunderstandings that are today's revisionist interpretations.

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And yet, somehow that is exactly opposite of what happened. For someone who claims to know so much history, Faith, you seem to have forgotten to start with the very document that those people produced.Article VI from the Constitution states directly: The very thing you are insisting upon is expressly forbidden by the Constitution. Your claim that somehow they were enamored by a vision of a "Christian nation" is simply not true. The Constitution mentions religion exactly twice, both times to expressly forbid the machinations of religion to be involved in the functioning of government.

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It's what the original American colonies did, and since they were original, how can anyone imagine they would have seen things any differently when it came to establishing a federal government. Attempts to reconcile denominational differences failed to anticipate the ultimate destruction of the colonies' original Christian worldview.

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I guess that if we had no knowledge of the history that might sound reasonable. But, why would sects persecuted in the original colonies want to be denied a part in the Federal government? How could anyone ignore the role of Enlightenment thinking? Or that the Revolutionaries were fighting for liberty? Or the fact that many of the Founding Fathers were hardly orthodox Christians - including George Washington himself.

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When you appreciate how thoroughly Protestant the original colonies were in their constitutions and politics, it's really absurd to think an anti-Christian secular society could have resulted from any of their efforts except by some very strange misunderstandings that are today's revisionist interpretations

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Maryland was founded as a refuge for Catholics. It only became ProtestAnt after they made the terrible mistake of inviting the Puritans in. Read up on the history, Faith

Yes. I'd have to check sources but the argument is that they had Christian denominations in mind and never any idea of other religions, because that's how Christian the nation was at the time. But the point I was making was that the Constitution was such a departure in many ways from the laws of the colonies that it's hard to fathom how they could have supported it if they understood it to mean what you all here think it means. There was a general agreement to encourage a general Christianity or worldview and to avoid anything specifically denominational, and there was also a specific mention in somebody's (Washington?) interpretation of freedom of religion that included Islam and other religions, but any idea that they were seeking an all-inclusive or secular government just does not fit with the mentality of the colonies, and there were people who protested the Constitution as a betrayal of the Christian foundations of the nation. There were also repeated attempts to get a Christian Preamble to the Constitution appended. It failed so that says something but I'm not entirely sure what.

I listed five founders who were Deists and not Christians. But most of the company of the founders WERE Christians. Enlightenment thinking was considered anti-Christian, it infected many in those days but Christians rejected it.The sects persecuted in the colonies of course would want to be part of the Federal government, that's one of the reasons a generic Christian perspective was sought. Generic Christian, not secular.The Revolutionary War was promoted powerfully by Christian preachers who based the seeking of liberty on the Bible. There were some who argued against it but the majority were for it.Sorry, I forgot about Maryland. Yes I know I need to read more and get all this straight. Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

It was the papacy as a system that was identified as Antichrist by Luther for sure but others as well, with or without an idea of a Final Antichrist who would embody all the biblical specifics in one person. Yes the idea fell out of favor and some strenuously argued against it, A W Pink for instance on the ground that it IS a system and not a man, but the Reformers' reasoning is very compelling. There were other dissidents before the Reformation that saw the papacy the same way. And I think it very sad that this understanding has been lost while so much of evangelicalism is waiting for some unknown person to rise to world power out of nowhere. I know I'm bad at keeping track of information.

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I listed five founders who were Deists and not Christians. But most of the company of the founders WERE Christians. Enlightenment thinking was considered anti-Christian, it infected many in those days but Christians rejected it.

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And yet even your quote from Sam Adams cites Locke. And his view lost.

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The sects persecuted in the colonies of course would want to be part of the Federal government, that's one of the reasons a generic Christian perspective was sought. Generic Christian, not secular.

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In reality the secular view won, which is why the Constitution is not a Christian document.And really, how would you construct an idea of "generic Christianity" to exclude Catholics and include Deists?(To go back to Maryland the Catholics passed a law that gave religious freedom to all Christians - including Catholics, of course. The Puritans repealed it. Twice.)

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The Revolutionary War was promoted powerfully by Christian preachers who based the seeking of liberty on the Bible. There were some who argued against it but the majority were for it.

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Let us not forget that the Revolutionary War was fought against a Christian country, where the Head of State was the head of the established Church. Or that there were Christians who argued against Government support for religion.You ought to read up on the Virginia [url=www.virginiamemory.com/online_classroom/shaping_the_constitution/doc/religious_freedom]Act for Establishing Religious Freedom[\url] too, especially Madison's Memorial and Remonstrance.And I mean REALLY read up on it. You have an embarrassing habit of missing or ignoring or quickly forgetting anything inconvenient your sources might say.