"You would like to reduce the government's role and reduce it to legalities and properties and such-- making us even more secular than we already are. As though acknowledging God is a bad thing."
Yes, I would reduce the government's role the way you describe and see absolutely no conflict between that and my own religious beliefs. Acknowledging God is not a "bad thing"; it is - for those who believe, as i do - the greatest thing there is. But true acknowledgment of the supreme creator can only come from individual persons, not the political institutions that represent them, and must be given freely... when the institutions of coercion (ie government) become involved, that acknowledgment rings hollow... even to the point of blasphemy.
I don't know if this is a subject worth discussing even, important as it is, because most people already know where they stand on it and will not be moved by any logical or emotional appeal. Suffice to say (and I reiterate from another post on another topic) that the separation of church and state is a good and necessary thing, from BOTH sides of that coin, ESPECIALLY from the "church" side... Secularists and sophists point out the dangers of religion creeping into politics (with the Taliban as an extreme example) but not enough people recognize the corollary dangers of politics creeping into religion... Politics are the principles upon which the individual interacts with other individuals and with society in aggregate. Religion is the method thru which the individual interacts with God.
"...making us even more secular than we already are."
I don't believe that our laws and our government define WHO WE ARE as a people, and certainly not WHO I AM as a person. They are simply the basic necessities of civilized society, for the believer and non-believer alike; the rational, mutually agreed-upon MEANS for achieving a free, non-aggressing society within which each individual member is likewise free to worship and manifest the Divine as (s)he sees fit. A secular political system means greater religious freedom, without which religious belief becomes pointless.
I find this comment of yours interesting:
"I don't believe that our laws and our government define WHO WE ARE as a people",
Brilliant men with abiding faith and trust in God wrote the Declaration of Independence and The Constitution of the Untied States.
Those God fearing men defined our nation and defines us as a people--Americans. We as a people and nation have acknowledged God and sadly through the years our laws and our corrupted anti-Constitution government officials have taken away that very definition.
Though we disagree, I'm glad you are here at Free Republic and I welcome you.