1st and 2nd amendments, athiest Bolsheviks have a long history of gulags and enslavement.
Religious wars: With the Christian right on the offensive, activists are fighting back
- Thread starter Kenneth Griffin
- Start date
Christians don't all believe the same things. Christians, Muslims and Jews believe in the same God. Which Christians are we talking about here? Baptists, Catholics, Episcopalians, Protestants, Methodists, etc.?
It doesn’t matter it’s just a bigoted hateful smear of all Christians. Intolerance on display
Are they doing anything remotely close? If 9/11 is a 10 on a 10 scale, where do you rate Christians?
As opposed to your tremendous contributions.
I'm not a deeply religious person, but I think the separation of church and state issue is way overblown. If the government isn't telling me who to worship, making me do things against my will, punishing me for not being part of any particular religion I don't think it's that big of an issue. If a church wants to rent a public school gym for an event, who cares as long as they pay the bill?
Forcing pharmacists to carry prescriptions which they oppose the use of. Not allowing people to refuse to sell custom made items with recognizeable words and symbols which give off a message which they oppose.
Having religious freedom means more than just being able to pick your house of worship. It means within reasons being able to practice your faith in your life outside of that house of worship unless there is a compelling government reason against that. In these cases there just flat out isn't. Not unless you can show that said pharmacy is the only one within a 50 mile radius.
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You do understand that the government making you do things based on their religious beliefs is exactly what they are trying to do, right?
If you pay taxes, you are paying taxes to advance religion. All kinds of subsidies, grants, vouchers, tax breaks....
And then there are provisions in various laws that are only there because of religion trying to impose its rule on people (especially on women). Abortion and birth control laws and rules being the obvious examples.
And then we have the laws and rules that say workers don't have to do their job even if it's clearly part of their job and even if others may be harmed if they can contort their religion to claim it is against their religious values. Such as issuing marriage licenses. Or filling contraceptive sales requests.
And religion drives harsh sentences, media censorship of language and nudity, and more and more.
We are mostly used to these things, but that doesn't make them right.
I am for people being able to live out their religions and morals the way they choose. And renting out a public school gym is not an issue for me as long as it's available to any group (within reason) to do.
But I would also say we've seen so many attempts in the past to favor one religion over the others and that aggravates me, even as a member of the favored religion. Court houses are not the place for the 10 commandments or other obvious religious symbols.
To me that would potentially be like the refs showing up to the Superbowl in Chief's jersey's.
On the other hand I think when public money for something like schooling no matter in the form of loans or grants is put into the control of the student and or his/her family to choose to use where he/she would like to, it should not mean that the government now gets to come in and control how you run the school and who you admit. The government gets to make sure the academics are up to snuff but that's it.
However if money was going to the school or organization directly (and not tied to the choices of a student.) then they are bound to accept anyone as law requires.
Primarily pay for other people's religions.
But your original post was short-sighted. The constitution doesn't just say you don't have to practice a particular religion by "making you do" certain things. The constitution says our government should not support any specific religion.
When tax dollars are used to support a religion, the constitution has been ignored. It's true that a lot of people don't care - apparently you included - but it does matter and in fact the constitution in many ways is designed the protect those who do care, even if they're in the minority.
No public money should go to religious schools directly or semi-directly, such as via vouchers to parents.
How is doing that not an obvious constitutional violation?
Religious schools do get the benefit of lots of public spending. They get to use the same roads and power grid and police and so on as everyone else. We aren't cutting them out of society or public life. When we create something like public education, religious folks can choose to use it or not - but if not, they need to pay their share for public schools, and the full share for whatever alternative they choose.
I'm happy to help pay for every Christian kid to attend public schools, and I want those schools to deliver world class education to every kid without regard to their religion. But I should not have to pay a single cent to send any kid to a religious school, or to be taught religion in any context.
I think where I differ from most on this subject is what I consider 'support'.
As for tax dollars, it's hard to get upset when taxes are spent/wasted on so many thing I don't think they should be spent on anyway. A rew religous expenses thrown in too doesn't get me any more upset than the other nonsense that the government wastes our money on.
There are things the founding fathers got wrong or on which the world has passed them by.
This isn't one of them.
Because it doesn't create an establishment of religion, the student may choose the school with the religious views of his or her own choice be they Christian, Muslim, Jewish, Hindu, etc. They can even choose secular private schools
Constitution doesn't say no public money to religion. It says no establishment religion, which can be broadened out to say that you can't favor one religion over the other. In this case it's not the government who is deciding, it's the student and his/her family.
In your opinion are college students not permitted to use federal or state grants or loans to attend a religious school of their choice?
Lol you're such a whiny baby. Every thread all you do is whine, complain, & give terrible opinions (especially on sports).
And these are based on accepting Jesus Christ as a savior how? You get that's what being argued don't you? The democracy is being threatened by those who really love Jesus. Abortion doesn't really have anything to do with Jesus. It has to do with whether or not you think abortion is murder. A concept that most think is bad regardless of their faith.
So again...how are these legislatures using their faith in Jesus to pollute, attack unions and mess with healthcare?
I come from a family of pharmacists who owned their own pharmacies.
In your example I can see that if the pharmacist owned their own pharmacy then they should be able to choose not to offer certain drugs that may be contrary to their beliefs. In this scenario the pharmacy owner should advertise this fact so people know not to shop there as there is a limited inventory on hand which would be inconvenient to customers who mistakenly go to this pharmacy for certain prescriptions. Although you made the "other options" argument, I know first hand that this could be a major problem especially in rural communities where there aren't nearby options. Also, if someone is a pharmacist working for a chain pharmacy or a family pharmacy (not an owner) then it is not their decision on what can and cannot be sold and if that bothers them then they should quit and find a job somewhere that believes with their view of the world (good luck on that one). Personally I think someone like this is in the wrong occupation where they have a science based career while holding conflicting religious beliefs....maybe prayer-based healing would be a better suited career for them.
BINGO! Absolutely hit it out of the park.
I 100% support the idea of Parochial/Christian school education in the USA.....But not one cent of anyone's publicly collected tax money should go towards their financing. Not one damn red cent.
These folks have made a conscious decision to "go it on their own"....let them go it alone!
This is kind of a dishonest argument. The last I checked, in the United States a vast majority of private schools are religious and a vast majority of those schools are Christian (Not Muslim or Jewish). So it's pretty safe to assume that someone using school vouchers will attend a Christian based private school thus promoting Christianity and it's teachings.
As someone who is all for public education and pays into it, I'm cool if kids go to a public school on my dime.....if someone decides that they would prefer their kids to go to a private school (most likely religious based) it should be their dime.
So essentially parents and students are not allowed to have any sort of choice as to what best fits their student's educational needs?
Sorry I disagree, too many of your great public schools are failing and too many kids are forced to go to these public schools. You know what they call a failing private school? Defunct.
So since I don't have kids does this mean that I get a voucher for not having kids? This voucher system is just plain stupid. It's public or nothing as it should be.
I'm ok with that.
As I said the only pharmacy in a 50 mile radius
Actually the law says that employers are required to make reasonable accommodations for their employee's religious belief. Obviously that doesn't mean the employee can stop them from selling something. But it generally means they can assign other employees to handling and selling the products they oppose.
Wow what bigotry.
To be clear we are not talking about someone who thinks that prayer is a better treatment for an infection than say antibiotics. I would agree that if someone doesn't believe in the effectiveness of antibiotics than they probably shouldn't be a pharmacist.
What we are however talking about is someone who doesn't believe that the use of certain medications is moral.
That's not opposing science, that's believing there should be limitations on how science is used.
No. But the state provides certain funds for every student to attend school. It makes sense that the parents should within certain guidelines be able to decide how to best make use of those funds. No one is making your kids attend a religious school, the voucher system is just an acknowledgement that the parents of children should have some ability to choose how their children are educated and use the state funds set aside for their student for that purpose.
When you make all the public schools good schools you can talk to me about limiting choices to public schools. And I'm all for sending extra money to fix broken schools. As for now, too many of them are complete crap. But you seem perfectly ok with dooming the futures of children now, just as long as no kids learn about that scary religion thing.
Your attributing 9/11 entirely the cause of religion is off the charts. Think about it, and think about why and how an attribution like that forms and sticks.
No, the bigotry in this situation is someone taking it upon themselves to deem what they think is best for other people based upon faith and not much else. To give you a little story, my father got rid of selling cigarettes at his pharmacy because of the overwhelming health implications cigarettes has on people. Since it was his pharmacy, it was his choice to do so. Although a devote Christian, it never crossed his mind to get rid of medication (birth control, etc.,.) based upon his faith as that is the choice of the consumer. This is the way it should be because the minute you allow faith to control someone's ability to limit things like filling prescriptions then anyone can create any sort of crazy religion (it's not that hard) and use that as a basis to not fill prescriptions for any medication.
Additionally, what I find funny is that some of the articles I've read over the years where pharmacists refused to fill a prescription for birth control, at the cash register of their chain pharmacy someone can buy all the cigarettes they want. I suppose forcing someone into an unwanted pregnancy is more important to these concerned pharmacists then preventing a horrible habit that can lead to nasty cancer.
Isn't refusing to sell cigarettes also deciding what is best for someone else? I mean seriously how can you talk about how your dad refused to sell cigarettes and than talk about how he would sell these other medications because he "didn't want to decide what was best for others." HE JUST DID THAT WHEN HE STOPPED SELLING THE CIGARETTES.
Or is it as I would counter, a way of saying that you are not going to help that person do something that you find morally objectionable. . . that would be destroying their health.
That's what this is. A local pharmacist can't stop you from getting your prescriptions filled somewhere else. But they can say they arn't going to personally take part in whatever they object to.
I guess you didn't understand the distinction between a faith based decision and decision based upon overwhelming evidence of health implications. These are two very different things.
Who cares that they are different? Law says people can smoke and they can pop abortion pills.
Morally I don't want to take part in either one. I don't want to help you abort your child nor do I want to help you destroy your health and those of the people around you.
Now I can't stop you, I'm just not going to help you.
His religious beliefs where questionable at best.
In a 1996 interview, McVeigh professed belief in "a God", although he said he had "sort of lost touch with" Catholicism and "I never really picked it up, however I do maintain core beliefs."[90] In McVeigh's biography American Terrorist, released in 2002, he stated that he did not believe in a hell and that science is his religion.[93][94] In June 2001, a day before the execution, McVeigh wrote a letter to the Buffalo News identifying himself as agnostic. However, he took the Last Rites, administered by a priest, just before his execution.[95][96][97][98][99][100] Father Charles Smith ministered to McVeigh in his last moments in death row.[101] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timothy_McVeigh
Also I think it's strongly worth pointing out that his motives where not in any way religious in nature. He hated the government. And none of his reasons for hating the government can really logially be tied back to religion.
The only thing you could say is that McVeigh may have had some Christian views as he took last rites. Even than does taking last rights make up for 2 different public statements he made saying he was agnostic?
That's hardly the same as people who are specifically flying planes into buildings in order to kill infidels and screaming "God is Great" on their way onto their deaths.
There are some Christian terrorists out there but they have mostly conducted small scale attacks. Nothing large scale like 9/11 or Oklahoma City.
I guess this one is kind of determined by various perspectives. What I know is, throughout history, and continuing today, people are murdered over their religion. Millions have been murdered for their religious beliefs and that's pretty sick.
I agree his religious beliefs were questionable. One of his motives was the treatment of the Branch Davidians another fringe religious group. My point is extremists from all religions use their beliefs as motivation to commit acts of terrorism. I don't blame all Christians for the Oklahoma City Bombing anymore than I blame 9/11 on all Muslims.
They do but his anger about how the Branch Davidian's where being treated doesn't mean he accepts their faith or any faith for that matter.
I'm mad as hell at how Muslim's are often treated in this country. I'm mad that a guy in New Zealand went into a Mosque and murdering them in cold blood. That doesn't make me a Muslim. Just makes me a person with empathy.
I'm not equating the Muslims and the Davidians. Just saying his concern for them doesn't equate to him holding religious beliefs or even a religious motive.
In terms of the fringe elements though I would say that the point of the post was to point out that the Christians that you might find most worrisome are nothing in comparison to the Muslims you would find most worrisome. I mean the Muslim extremists where able to completely take over large sections of two different countries held territory for years despite the fact that their ideology put them at war with pretty much the entire world. You can call me when an armed group of Christians in the modern day takes over large sections of a country (much less multiple countries) and starts murdering everyone, including other Christians who don't fall in with their specific views.
McVeigh said one thing about religion, but seemed to practice a radicalized form aligned with white nationalism.
That is one of the things that scares me the most, the rise of white nationalism, intertwined with a radical Christian identity movement.
If this country ever falls it will not be from external forces. It will be from within. It will be by people who see violence as justified by religion, and by people convinced that government should be used as a tool of their religious views. Look at what is going on in Iowa now. An abortion fight that about 30 percent of the population really, really wants.
That is one of the things that scares me the most, the rise of white nationalism, intertwined with a radical Christian identity movement.
If this country ever falls it will not be from external forces. It will be from within. It will be by people who see violence as justified by religion, and by people convinced that government should be used as a tool of their religious views. Look at what is going on in Iowa now. An abortion fight that about 30 percent of the population really, really wants.
No armed group is likely to ever take over parts of the United States, but when a religion gets laws passed that regulate other people's behavior based on that religion's beliefs it is in effect taking over the government. Americans are more likely to be ruled by "Christian" laws than any other religion.
I hear you, but isn't murder pretty sick regardless of motivation?
Money, love/jealousy, anger, power, country, religion, race....does it really make a difference as to why people kill each other? Shit, people are violently attacked because they served cold french fries at a drive through in this country.
That's not what we are talking about and not the point. More people have been killed over religion in this world's history than for any other reason.
There are people in other countries who hate Christians, with good reason, and it goes back centuries.
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