Posted on 09/23/2003 3:41:03 PM PDT by presidio9
The recent outcry about the monumental Ten Commandments in an Alabama courthouse illustrates how absurd the controversy about church and state has become. It is difficult to understand how the presence of the commandments might influence what goes on in courtrooms. Judges and lawyers are most unlikely to change their habits and procedures, and criminals, having violated the commandments, will pay little attention to them.
Applied logically, the "wall of separation between church and state" should ban military chaplains, the motto "In God We Trust" and prayers before the meetings of both houses of Congress and even of the Supreme Court itself.
The high court thus permits for itself what it does not permit for children at public school graduations or football games.
Prayers at public school events are not exactly my cup of tea. However, if people want to have such prayers, there is nothing in the history of our republic that suggests it is illegal for them to do so.
The court decisions of the past 50 years are raw exercises in legislative power. Judges don't like prayer in schools, and therefore they legislate against the practice. Since their power is virtually unlimited (as we saw in the theft of the 2000 presidential election), they can do whatever they want. Only impeachment or a constitutional amendment or a change in legal fashions can repeal the court's legislation. The court as a third and unelected legislature has absolute power. Absolute power, as we know, corrupts absolutely.
The First Amendment's clause on religion is a delicate balancing act. It prohibits the American government from interfering with the free exercise of religion or establishing an official religion, as the Church of England is established in England.
The court decisions of the last half-century have twisted the establishment part of the clause beyond recognition and have notably interfered with the free exercise of religion. The justices have used clever little arguments that lawyers so dearly love to justify the establishment of unbelief as the official religion of America.
The underlying conviction that motivated these decisions back in the 1950s was that religion is really not a good thing and should not be permitted to interfere with the ordinary processes of American democracy.
With some exceptions, the legal theorists at the elite law schools of the country who support the "wall of separation" and their journalistic supporters are agnostics or atheists. Like any religious group, they want to establish their own religion, and they have done so.
The sure sign that they are hypocrites is that they repeat the "wall of separation" cliche as a magic formula, though they know the phrase is not a direct quote from the Constitution but rather words Thomas Jefferson penned in a letter. It has become the approved mantra for preventing freedom of school choice for poor parents. Almost all the members of the Senate exercise such freedom of choice because they can afford to pay tuition for elite private schools. But the poor people of the District of Columbia are denied such freedom because it would violate the "wall of separation."
What an exercise of phony piety.
Even a stopped clock is right twice a day . . . . on the other hand, perhaps this was written by a different Andrew Greeley.
Besides saying "baloney" I will not grace that foolish remark with any other comment.
Typical Protestant silliness. If you had an intelligent comeback, why didn't you make it?
Agreed, as long as they're not Protestants.
Assuming, of course, that it has any money left after the pederasty trials.
In any case, the Roman Catholic Church in America is hardly the Pope's Church. If you don't think so, ask yourself this: How come they finally let a Priest do the prayers in Congress?
And first referred to by SCOTUS in the 1870's, I believe.
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