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Court rules atheism a religion
WorldNetDaily ^

Posted on 08/20/2005 12:11:11 AM PDT by Lexinom

A federal court of appeals ruled yesterday Wisconsin prison officials violated an inmate's rights because they did not treat atheism as a religion.

"Atheism is [the inmate's] religion, and the group that he wanted to start was religious in nature even though it expressly rejects a belief in a supreme being," the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals said.

(Excerpt) Read more at worldnetdaily.com ...


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Front Page News; News/Current Events; Philosophy; US: Wisconsin
KEYWORDS: 7thcircuit; atheism; isthistheonion; religion; religionofatheism; ruling; truth; worldview
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To: timydnuc
"There is no separation of the church in THIS state."

Let's force everybody to live as a Non Sectarian Christian. Freedom is slavery!

"It was founded under the belief in God."

Which god? Yahweh? Allah? Marduk?

"The irony is that the communists and leftists want so badly to bring this county down that they just shoot the wrong bird."

Contrasting with the irony of claiming to have a free society yet discouraging all other forms of religion except Non-Sectarian Christianity

They (leftists) are really not as formatable as we feared. They are idiots, pure and simple. Let them froth at the mouth and bite at the air, I could care less. They just lost this battle, beer for everyone!

That's wishful thinking. What's shooting the left in the foot right now is that the mainstream of Atheists are ravenous anti-religious lunatics rather than tolerant, mainstream Americans. Take a cue.

41 posted on 08/20/2005 2:19:18 AM PDT by TypeZoNegative (Future Minnesota Refugee)
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To: Just mythoughts

your surprise is based on the assumptions you have made in the blindness of your bias, not upon anything you have read of my public commentary.

As I've stated, explicitly, many a time: I am no atheist, and in fact have come to believe in God.

Perhaps, now, you have cause to credit these statements?


42 posted on 08/20/2005 2:19:54 AM PDT by King Prout (and the Clinton Legacy continues: like Herpes, it is a gift that keeps on giving.)
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To: King Prout
That makes it a religion.

Sorry.  I did not understand that post.

Would you mind simplifying it for me?

I.e., in your view, what makes a religion?

43 posted on 08/20/2005 2:25:32 AM PDT by Racehorse (Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.)
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To: Racehorse

a belief system based upon dogmatic faith in completely unverifiable core tenets = religion


44 posted on 08/20/2005 2:28:07 AM PDT by King Prout (and the Clinton Legacy continues: like Herpes, it is a gift that keeps on giving.)
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To: King Prout

"Perhaps, now, you have cause to credit these statements?"


I have seen little in any of your posts to cause me to credit your belief in God. Actually this is the first time, of course I cannot claim to have actually read all your posts that would land me the accusation I was stalking you.

While you claim title of King Prout, I am a mere student of the WORD and that gives me discipline to take you on about evolution as the answer to human life.


45 posted on 08/20/2005 2:29:40 AM PDT by Just mythoughts
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To: Just mythoughts

I cannot help it that you are so ill-read as to fail to know the provenance of my UserID


46 posted on 08/20/2005 2:30:58 AM PDT by King Prout (and the Clinton Legacy continues: like Herpes, it is a gift that keeps on giving.)
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To: King Prout
"I cannot help it that you are so ill-read as to fail to know the provenance of my UserID"


LOL, actually it was the high IQ that led me astray.
47 posted on 08/20/2005 2:33:14 AM PDT by Just mythoughts
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To: Lexinom
There is the "level playing field". Don't look on this as a defeat, it's a victory. Now they (the atheists) are a religion, just like us. Punch away
48 posted on 08/20/2005 2:35:08 AM PDT by timydnuc (I'll die on my feet before I'll live on my knees.)
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To: Just mythoughts

IQ and literacy do not equate.
try again

or, better, don't. this is neither the time nor the place for me to thrash you all over again.


49 posted on 08/20/2005 2:39:01 AM PDT by King Prout (and the Clinton Legacy continues: like Herpes, it is a gift that keeps on giving.)
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To: peyton randolph

I've thought that before.

The government should get out of the religion business altogether. Just let free speech flow and everything will work out.

It's a lot easier NOT to have to deal with all of those court cases and all of those twists and turns. Just let everyone speak out full and free and the government will save a lot of time and energy.

If folks don't realize there are lots of different religions out there, then simply tell them to grow up. If they don't realize there are some religions with more members than others, then tell them to grow up.


50 posted on 08/20/2005 2:39:20 AM PDT by xzins (Retired Army Chaplain and Proud of It!)
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To: Lexinom

bookmark


51 posted on 08/20/2005 2:39:51 AM PDT by GiovannaNicoletta
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To: King Prout
dogmatic faith

Thank you.  That helps.

Dogmatic is a word with . . . arrogant . . . connotation.

I know the meaning given in your context, a proper one, and I still choked on it.  :-)

52 posted on 08/20/2005 2:42:35 AM PDT by Racehorse (Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.)
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To: Racehorse; All

dogmatic, in this context, simply means axiomatic, handed down as if from higher authority, not open to challenge or debate.

I'm certain you know this. I am simply clearing up a possible point of confusion.


53 posted on 08/20/2005 2:48:30 AM PDT by King Prout (and the Clinton Legacy continues: like Herpes, it is a gift that keeps on giving.)
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To: King Prout

You do seem to get off on believing you thrash, such a "Godly" attribute.

You are not the first to insult my intelligence and I do not expect you to be the last. But of course I do not need man's acceptance it lasts but a short fleeting time in the scheme of things.


54 posted on 08/20/2005 2:49:43 AM PDT by Just mythoughts
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To: Just mythoughts

something you really oughtta add to your understanding, child:

don't START nothin', won't BE nothin'

and, with that, I bid you fair morning and good day.


55 posted on 08/20/2005 2:52:30 AM PDT by King Prout (and the Clinton Legacy continues: like Herpes, it is a gift that keeps on giving.)
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To: King Prout

"don't START nothin', won't BE nothin' "


I will of course follow your lead.


56 posted on 08/20/2005 2:54:12 AM PDT by Just mythoughts
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To: Lexinom
Brian Fahling, senior trial attorney for the American Family Association Center for Law & Policy, called the court's ruling "a sort of Alice in Wonderland jurisprudence." "Up is down, and atheism, the antithesis of religion, is religion," said Fahling.

Atheism is a purely faith-based belief about the nature and existence of a supreme being, and as such qualifies as a religion. I have made this point many times on FR.

57 posted on 08/20/2005 3:04:46 AM PDT by Maceman (Pro Se Defendant from Hell)
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To: Lexinom
You are confusing private beliefs with the laws of a society. Atheism is an example of the former. The latter govern public behavior and are compromises which allow people of different beliefs to live together peacefully (hopefully).

You also blur the distinction between laws which forbid certain behaviors and those which allow - but don't impose - them. Specifically, laws which permit various forms of birth control are quite different from those which forbid them.

58 posted on 08/20/2005 3:05:25 AM PDT by liberallarry
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To: Lexinom
"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof. . . "

Accepting the above without reservation or interpretation then would make the following moot:

Nowhere did the founders give any indication that mere theism constituted a religion.

Since Congress is prohibited from establishment of or prohibition of free exercise thereof, does it matter what constitutes a religion?

59 posted on 08/20/2005 3:13:04 AM PDT by varon (Allegiance to the constitution, always. Allegiance to a political party, never.)
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To: Maceman
Atheism is a purely faith-based belief about the nature and existence of a supreme being, and as such qualifies as a religion.

Would nihilism also qualify as a religion?

60 posted on 08/20/2005 3:17:51 AM PDT by Racehorse (Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.)
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