Posted on 09/05/2005 7:32:04 PM PDT by Jacob Kell
The American Atheists organization says President Bush should stop urging prayer for Hurricane Katrina victims because it violates the Constitution.
Ellen Johnson, president of the group said Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco and Bush "should not be violating the Constitution by telling people to pray for the victims of Hurricane Katrina. It's unconstitutional for government officials to be promoting religion; and besides, judging from the speed of some relief efforts, officials should be busy working instead of preaching."
(Excerpt) Read more at worldnetdaily.com ...
he should tell them to "go to hell"
I know that very well.
But don't let the facts get in the way of your fantasy life, bucko.
Screw you. Don't get carried away over semantics. We probably agree on this, but you seem to have some issues of your own.
Isn't it odd how bloody smart we are today? Not one of the Founding Fathers, including Mr. Thomas Jefferson, Saint of the Left, ever objected to prayers starting Congress, or prayers starting the Supreme Court, or children learning how to read and write from prayerbooks and the McGuffy Reader, which used Scripture to teach the same basic skills. None of the Founders ever did anything to suggest that prayer and Scripture in the schools or the government was wrong. But this gentleman of questionable intelligence is SOOOOO much smarter than they are, that he can reverse-engineer the Constitution so it proves something that would have sounded like the most abject nonsense to everyone who put their names to the Declaration, or worked to create the Constitution.
He should thank the God he wants to banish from our shores that those brave men created a country where this kind of bull pucky is given twelve lines in a newspaper. Bonehead!
And again, to take that arguement, you need to go back in time as far as 1776 to explain to our various Presidents where they are in error. I've got to side with Washington, Lincoln, FDR, Truman, Nixon and others, all who endorsed prayer. The early ones had the guts to say we should pray to Jesus, but I'll still back the later ones who just recommended we pray to God, and left the actual specifics up to the rest of us.
I'm pro-separation of church and state, too, but, in this case, American Atheists, as usual, goes too far.
Ask her that question after she goes through a cat 4 hurricane and 10 foot floods of a toxic brew.
Interestng, isn't it that a word like "Muezzin" would be used, which from a search on-line means someone who offers an islamic prayer. (I love it when I learn a new word!)
presbyrev, President Bush did not order you to pray, he did not tell you when to pray, he asked for you to pray. If you don't want to, don't. If you do, pray.
yes, your point?
I'm so sick of you people stepping on MY religious freedoms and the religious freedoms of the political leaders in America. If you don't pray...then don't pray! Nobody ORDERED you to do so.
Oh...and you might want to actually READ the Constitution of the United States of America. There IS NO separation of church and state and there never was. And the president did not take an oath to check his Christianity at the door when he took office.
Just because you do not WANT to see church and state intermixed does not mean that you can misinterpret the Constitution to say something that isn't there. When the government starts to make laws about religion, then you can jump up and protest. In the mean time, do not step on my right as a US citizen to hear my president express his religious freedom.
you don't have to time travel to 1776, just do some googling, cut and paste -- and you will see plenty of opinion on the side of keeping and maintaining a strict separation between the sphere of state and the church. To wit Madison's quotes (I assume he counts as a founder?)....
"Is the appointment of Chaplains to the two Houses of Congress consistent with the Constitution, and with the pure principle of religious freedom? In the strictness the answer on both points must be in the negative. The Constitution of the U. S. forbids everything like an establishment of a national religion. The law appointing Chaplains establishes a religious worship for the national representatives, to be performed by Ministers of religion, elected by a majority of them; and these are to be paid out of the national taxes. Does not this involve the principle of a national establishment, applicable to a provision for a religious worship for the Constituent as well as of the representative Body, approved by the majority, and conducted by Ministers of religion paid by the entire nation?"
The establishment of the chaplainship to Congs is a palpable violation of equal rights, as well as of Constitutional principles: The tenets of the chaplains elected [by the majority shut the door of worship agst the members whose creeds & consciences forbid a participation in that of the majority. To say nothing of other sects, this is the case with that of Roman Catholics & Quakers who have always had members in one or both of the Legislative branches. Could a Catholic clergyman ever hope to be appointed a Chaplain! To say that his religious principles are obnoxious or that his sect is small, is to lift the veil at once and exhibit in its naked deformity the doctrine that religious truth is to be tested by numbers or that the major sects have a right to govern the minor."
"If Religion consist in voluntary acts of individuals, singly, or voluntarily associated, and it be proper that public functionaries, as well as their Constituents shd discharge their religious duties, let them like their Constituents, do so at their own expense. How small a contribution from each member of Cong wd suffice for the purpose! How just wd it be in its principle! How noble in its exemplary sacrifice to the genius of the Constitution; and the divine right of conscience! Why should the expence of a religious worship be allowed for the Legislature, be paid by the public, more than that for the Ex. or Judiciary branch of the Gov." (Detached Memoranda, circa 1820).
"I observe with particular pleasure the view you have taken of the immunity of Religion from civil jurisdiction, in every case where it does not trespass on the private rights or the public peace. This has always been a favorite principle with me; and it was not with my approbation that the deviation from it took place in Congress, when they appointed chaplains, to be paid from the National Treasury. It would have been a much better proof to their constituents of their pious feeling if the members had contributed for the purpose a pittance from their own pockets. As the precedent is not likely to be rescinded, the best that can now be done may be to apply to the Constitution the maxim of the law, de minimis non curat [i.e., the law does not care about such trifles].
There has been another deviation from the strict principle in the Executive proclamations of fasts and festivals, so far, at least, as they have spoken the language of INJUNCTION, or have lost sight of the equality of ALL religious sects in the eye of the Constitution. Whilst I was honored with the executive trust, I found it necessary on more than one occasion to follow the example of predecessors. But I was always careful to make the Proclamations absolutely indiscriminate, and merely recommendatory; or rather mere DESIGNATIONS of a day on which all who thought proper might UNITE in consecrating it to religious purposes, according to their own faith and forms. In this sense, I presume, you reserve to the Government a right to APPOINT particular days for religious worship. I know not what may be the way of thinking on this subject in Louisiana. I should suppose the Catholic portion of the people, at least, as a small and even unpopular sect in the U. States would rally as they did in Virginia when religious liberty was a Legislative topic to its broadest principle." (Letter to Edward Livingston, July 10, 1822)
Jefferson, Madison And Jackson On Prayer Proclamations
Thomas Jefferson and James Madison opposed governmental proclamations for days of prayer and fasting. As president, Jefferson flatly refused to issue them. Madison issued such proclamations under pressure from Congress during the War of 1812 but later said he wished he hadn’t. Andrew Jackson, the nation’s seventh president, also refused to issue religious proclamations.
Here is what Jefferson, Madison and Jackson had to say on the subject:
Thomas Jefferson: On Jan. 23, 1808, Jefferson replied to a minister named Samuel Miller who had asked him to issue a religious proclamation. Denying the request, Jefferson wrote, “I consider the government of the US. as interdicted by the Constitution from intermeddling with religious institutions, their doctrines, discipline, or exercises.…. I do not believe it is for the interest of religion to invite the civil magistrate to direct its exercises, its discipline, or its doctrines; nor of the religious societies that the general government should be invested with the power of effecting any uniformity of time or matter among them. Fasting & prayer are religious exercises. The enjoining them an act of discipline. Every religious society has a right to determine for itself the times for these exercises, & the objects proper for them, according to their own particular tenets; and this right can never be safer than in their own hands, where the constitution has deposited it….[E]very one must act according to the dictates of his own reason, & mine tells me that civil powers alone have been given to the President of the US. and no authority to direct the religious exercises of his constituents.”
James Madison: In an undated essay historians believe was written between 1817 and 1832, Madison listed five reasons why presidents should not issue prayer proclamations. “The members of a Govt as such can in no sense, be regarded as possessing an advisory trust from their Constituents in their religious capacities,” Madison wrote. “They cannot form an ecclesiastical Assembly, Convocation, Council or Synod, and as such issue decrees or injunctions addressed to the faith or the Consciences of the people.” Madison also criticizes prayer proclamations because they “imply and certainly the erroneous idea of a national religion.” For more information, read the relevant passage from the full essay.
Andrew Jackson: Jackson considered religious proclamations a violation of the First Amendment. Asked to approve a proclamation setting aside an official day of fasting and prayer in response to a cholera epidemic, he refused and in 1832 wrote, “I could not do otherwise without transcending the limits prescribed by the Constitution for the President and without feeling that I might in some degree disturb the security which religion nowadays enjoys in this country in its complete separation from the political concerns of the General Government.”
Words have meaning, and the Constitution means what it says, not what you'd like it to say. You're wrong when you say it's only a debate over semantics.
You were wrong to begin with, and it's not even a close call.
One entry found for religion.
Main Entry: re·li·gion
Pronunciation: ri-'li-j&n
Function: noun
Etymology: Middle English religioun, from Latin religion-, religio supernatural constraint, sanction, religious practice, perhaps from religare to restrain, tie back -- 4 : a cause, principle, or system of beliefs held to with ardor and faith
This is from Merriam Webster. I thought I heard recently that atheism was declared a religion. I could be wrong so someone help me here. Nevertheless, atheism is a set of beliefs. It is just a set that choses not to believe in God so it should technically qualifies as a religion. In which case, eliminating God from public life is an endorsement of a religion. Now what?
Ok, I just heard a great joke from a freeper I love that is appropriate for this thread!
An atheist was taking a walk through the woods.
What majestic trees!
What powerful rivers!
What beautiful animals!" he said to himself.
As he was walking alongside the river he heard a rustling in the bushes behind him. He turned to look. He saw a 7 foot grizzly charge towards him.
He ran as fast as he could up the path. He looked over his shoulder and saw that the bear was closing in on him. He looked over his shoulder again, and the bear was even closer. He tripped and fell on the ground. He rolled over to pick himself up but saw the bear right on top of him, reaching for him with his left paw and raising his right paw to strike him.
At that instant the Atheist cried out: "Oh my God!..."
Time stopped.
The bear froze.
The forest was silent.
As a bright light shone upon the man, a voice came out of the sky: "You deny my existence for all of these years, teach others I don't exist, and even credit creation to a cosmic accident. Do you expect me to help you out of this predicament? Am I to count you as a believer?"
The atheist looked directly into the light, "It would be hypocritical of me to suddenly ask You to treat me as a Christian now, but perhaps could you make the BEAR a Christian?"
"Very well," said the voice.
The light went out.
The sounds of the forest resumed.
And then the bear dropped his right paw, brought both paws together and bowed his head and spoke:
"Lord, bless this food, which I am about to receive from thy bounty through Christ our Lord, Amen."
You are good at cutting and pasting everyones opinions. Could you please cut and paste the part of the Constitution about separation of church and state for us?
The Atheist Taliban enforcing their religion on the rest of America.
There is nothing more annoying than a born again athiest.
Personally, I think it is great whenever anyone encourages others to pray.
Try reading, perhaps very slowly, the First Amendment to the Bill of Rights. It is the reason religion has flourished in the U.S. while the state churches of Europe have died out. Jefferson and other founders intended that religion, specifically the Church, not become an arm of the State --- nor in turn coerce or control the State. Jefferson and Adams looked for the day when the states, especially those of New England, would follow the lead of the South and leave off state sanctioned churches - whether one or several denominations.
Praying is great. I simply don't need the President, Congress or Supreme Court suggesting or telling me to engage in religious devotion.
The occupants of the boat which was about to sink with Jonah in it, were more broad minded than this. They called upon their gods and roused Jonah to call upon his. Then they drew lots (in a PAGAN ceremony, mind you) and it correctly singled out Jonah as the reason for the problem.
I say if those pagans in the boat with Jonah could be guided by God to His favor through a pagan ceremony, then we have no reason to expect that Christians can't or won't in America through a Christian proclamation. All the constitutions in the world can't stand against the Word of God, and those who would claim they do are trying to nullify the Word of God, to suppress the truth in unrighteousness, to take counsel against Him.
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