Liberal Atheists are at it again.

[Cow Poke]

Just like teachers who compel students to attend prayers have no legal authority to back up their actions. Right? Teachers can't just go around doing what they want.

That's not really a working parallel, Roy. Teachers have broad discretion in maintaining order in the classroom. Much less than in the past, of course, because I was raised with the attitude "the teacher is always right!"

And if I argued that at all, my parents would apply the board of education to my seat of learning.

[Zymologist]

You get a free amen!

Free? I earned that Amen, doggone it.

[Cow Poke]

Free? I earned that Amen, doggone it.

OK, you get another. But don't push it!

[Mountain Man]

It's interesting to me the number of atheists who recognize the inherent depravity and hopelessness of their worldview and try to address this deficiency by borrowing from Christianity despite its incompatibility with atheism.

Thats because you're very shallow there MM. One can find both wisdom as well as nonsense in the Bible, the same as one does in a fairy tale.

I'm sorry MM, but I have no sense of "inherent depravity and hopelessness". I'm sure you wish I did and then you could give me the 'good news' of living eternally with Jesus.

It’s the other way around. Religion borrows from the evolved characteristics shared by all humans such as cooperation, reciprocity, altruism and conformity to the rules of the community. These qualities evolved as a method of restraining individual selfishness and building more cooperative groups and developed before religion did.

Woah, doggy, did that strike a nerve.

But, seriously, is "I know you are but what am I!" really the best you guys can do?

The problem for atheism, and I know you guys are aware of this because we've discussed it before, is that if we follow it to its logical conclusion then we have no moral obligation to be cooperative or altruistic or whatever -- remember Hume's "you can't derive an ought from an is"? The very notion that we have any sort of obligation to each other is distinctly grounded in theistic religion.

[RumTumTugger]

Do you not understand the Constitution CP. A law can't be enacted that violates the Constitution, and compelling children to pray is a violation of the Constitution.

1. no compelling
2. no law is being enacted.

[firstfloor]

Absolutely. And, on these positions, the atheists are "double negative".



So why do atheists come up with all kinds of derogatory terms for the things we hold dear? If you simply don't believe them, ignore them. But to attack them? You are driven by your own religious fervor.



It's OK, you can pretend you're not part of a religion, while preaching against the "false religion" of Christianity.

Why else are you here?

This is, in a small way, a battle against superstition. In all our discussions, both sides hardly ever accept the answers given. I think it is better to work on mutual understanding given that we are so bound together. There is no going away to the desert to contemplate God.

[One Bad Pig]

This is, in a small way, a battle against superstition.

In your opinion.

In all our discussions, both sides hardly ever accept the answers given.

True.

I think it is better to work on mutual understanding given that we are so bound together.

Your first statement would appear to be rather at odds with this one. Calling the other side 'superstition' is hardly likely to achieve mutual understanding.

There is no going away to the desert to contemplate God.

Actually, there is.

Hey, you got one out of four right - that's an improvement!

[Jedidiah]

So it does. Change the example to:

Using that approach, state police dispersing all congregations that attempt to engage in Xtian worship (or destroying all printing presses in the state or cutting out the tongues of public speakers) is not unconstitutional because it's not congress making a law.I'm saying that you're claim that school prayer is constitutional because it doesn't involve passing a law is garbage, because school prayer is dependant on there being a law having been passed that permits a school to hold it.

goalposts.jpg

[Jedidiah]

The state church in England does not (currently) stop other religions or religious minorities from worshiping as they see fit, but the state church in Saudi Arabia does. Present tense.

So the answer to your question is that yes, a state church often stops other religions or religious minorities from worshiping as they see fit. Your selection of an example where it does not does not affect that answer.

You probably did not notice that I specifically mentioned England as an example of a State Christian church. A state church does not stop other religions from worshiping, an oppressive government such as Saudi Arabia does. There is no need for a minority church to be eliminated when you have a state religion. Thus my example does indeed answer the question.

[Jedidiah]

This is, in a small way, a battle against superstition. In all our discussions, both sides hardly ever accept the answers given. I think it is better to work on mutual understanding given that we are so bound together. There is no going away to the desert to contemplate God.

Nice in theory, but the last time I had a real discussion of that sort with a liberal was way before the TWeb crash with the one who does not exist. It is impossible to have am honest discussion with someone who simply makes snide dishonest remarks, like you, JimL and Tass.

[Jedidiah]

Now you've lost me. Teachers are not law enforcement officers.

on a slightly different track:

Do you think that the writers of the constitution and the fathers of our country, the USA, meant that there could not be any prayers in school when they wrote the constitution and the first amendment? That it was their intention to keep religion out of schools altogether?

Not a fair question. It can not be answered honestly by these anti Christian liberals without shooting themselves in the foot.

[firstfloor]

Your first statement would appear to be rather at odds with this one. Calling the other side 'superstition' is hardly likely to achieve mutual understanding.

Mutual understanding does not have to involve agreement. All that is required is the ability to present your opponents argument accurately. That way we show that we understand the other person’s point of view. We hardly ever see that either.

[Jedidiah]

Mutual understanding does not have to involve agreement. All that is required is the ability to present your opponents argument accurately. That way we show that we understand the other person’s point of view. We hardly ever see that either.

Certainly not by you.

[Psychic Missile]

It's a simple fact that the First Amendment is wholly unconcerned with religious minorities, and it certainly wasn't written with the intent of protecting "religious minorities" from "Christian privilege". It wasn't even written with the intent of forbidding government from informally preferring or promoting one religion over another. Its only purpose is to prohibit government from creating laws that establish or restrict religious expression.

Don't religious minorities have the most to fear from the state establishing or restricting religious expression? Didn't the founding father's distaste for the English church come from the treatment of minority Christian sects? What does the religious majority have to fear if their religion becomes the state church and dissent is made illegal?

[Cow Poke]

Don't religious minorities have the most to fear from the state establishing or restricting religious expression? Didn't the founding father's distaste for the English church come from the treatment of minority Christian sects? What does the religious majority have to fear if their religion becomes the state church and dissent is made illegal?

I don't understand why you're not getting this. Jefferson's letter to the Danbury Baptist Association was in response to concerns that there would be a "state religion", and it was made clear -- in a very "religious way", by the way - by Jefferson that there would not be.

To messers. Nehemiah Dodge, Ephraim Robbins, & Stephen S. Nelson, a committee of the Danbury Baptist association in the state of Connecticut.

Gentlemen

The affectionate sentiments of esteem and approbation which you are so good as to express towards me, on behalf of the Danbury Baptist association, give me the highest satisfaction. my duties dictate a faithful and zealous pursuit of the interests of my constituents, & in proportion as they are persuaded of my fidelity to those duties, the discharge of them becomes more and more pleasing.

Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between Man & his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legitimate powers of government reach actions only, & not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should "make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof," thus building a wall of separation between Church & State. Adhering to this expression of the supreme will of the nation in behalf of the rights of conscience, I shall see with sincere satisfaction the progress of those sentiments which tend to restore to man all his natural rights, convinced he has no natural right in opposition to his social duties.

I reciprocate your kind prayers for the protection & blessing of the common father and creator of man, and tender you for yourselves & your religious association, assurances of my high respect & esteem.

Th Jefferson
Jan. 1. 1802.

bolding mine, of course