God bless America

[baddog]

As much as people seem to tag the Republicans as being holy rollers, it sure seems like there is a lot more references to religion in the DNC speeches.

[Brujah]

lol isn't politics and media funny? I just read a DrudgeReport linked article about how they had taken God out of the DNC.

[DWB]

I watched part of the convention and it was like watching the documentary Jesus Camp. God this, God that. It was sickening. Buuuuuut, that goes to show you the mindset of the majority of republicans.

[Mutt]

As long as it isn't used to justify discrimination against anybody i'm fine with both parties using religious speech - the country was founded on Judao-Christian principles.

They do it because it makes those who are religious feel good, most agnostics just accept it and only a small number of angry atheists liberals get worked up about it.

[Barry-xlovecam]

God is on our side ...

[DTK]

Originally Posted by Mutt

the country was founded on Judao-Christian principles.

Tell that to the founding fathers. Many of them (especially Jefferson) were vehemently against religion. Of the 7 'core' founding fathers, only John Jay was an orthodox christian.

This christian nation/j-c principles is a revisionist myth.

[BlackCrayon]

i find it sad that so many americans are still so religious that they buy into politicians using such stupid phrases to appeal to them.

[cherrylula]

The separation of church and state is a joke. They should not even be allowed to mention god. Some of us don't believe in those fairy tales, and it does not belong in government.

[Sly]

Originally Posted by DTK

Tell that to the founding fathers. Many of them (especially Jefferson) were vehemently against religion. Of the 7 'core' founding fathers, only John Jay was an orthodox christian.

This christian nation/j-c principles is a revisionist myth.

The founding fathers came hundreds of years after the settlers were escaping religious persecution. They may have signed papers making this a country, but it started way before them.

[baddog]

Originally Posted by DWB

I watched part of the convention and it was like watching the documentary Jesus Camp. God this, God that. It was sickening. Buuuuuut, that goes to show you the mindset of the majority of republicans.

I guess you were not paying attention and have not been watching the DNC (DEMOCRATIC National Convention0, not RNC.

Originally Posted by DTK

Tell that to the founding fathers. Many of them (especially Jefferson) were vehemently against religion. Of the 7 'core' founding fathers, only John Jay was an orthodox christian.

This christian nation/j-c principles is a revisionist myth.

Take a look at the Declaration of Independence and Constitution and get back to us.

[Mutt]

Originally Posted by DTK

Tell that to the founding fathers. Many of them (especially Jefferson) were vehemently against religion. Of the 7 'core' founding fathers, only John Jay was an orthodox christian.

This christian nation/j-c principles is a revisionist myth.

news to me, show me some evidence.

[tony286]

Originally Posted by Mutt

news to me, show me some evidence.

Treaty of tripoli signed by John Adams says we are not a Christian nation.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_of_Tripoli

As the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion,?as it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion, or tranquility, of Mussulmen [Muslims],?and as the said States never entered into any war or act of hostility against any Mahometan [Muslim] nation, it is declared by the parties that no pretext arising from religious opinions shall ever produce an interruption of the harmony existing between the two countries.

[spazlabz]

The dems have to match the rhetoric of faith that the repubs use or they lose a large number of votes. Keep in mind that many moderate democrats attend church regularly and would consider themselves Christians and in some ways are socially conservative.


It is distasteful to me personally to see God in politics but in the US they are married for better or worse

[DTK]

Originally Posted by Mutt

news to me, show me some evidence.

Originally Posted by tony286

Treaty of tripoli signed by John Adams says we are not a Christian nation.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_of_Tripoli

As the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion,?as it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion, or tranquility, of Mussulmen [Muslims],?and as the said States never entered into any war or act of hostility against any Mahometan [Muslim] nation, it is declared by the parties that no pretext arising from religious opinions shall ever produce an interruption of the harmony existing between the two countries.

There's this. Adams also said:

• "Can a free government possibly exist with the Roman Catholic religion?" -letter to Thomas Jefferson
• "Have you considered that system of holy lies and pious frauds that has raged and triumphed for 1,500 years?"
• "This would be the best of all possible worlds, if there were no religion in it."

James Madison

• "Religious bondage shackles and debilitates the mind and unfits it for every noble enterprise." -letter to Wm. Bradford, April 1, 1774
• "Ecclesiastical establishments tend to great ignorance and corruption, all of which facilitate the execution of mischievous projects."
• "The purpose of separation of church and state is to keep forever from these shores the ceaseless strife that has soaked the soil of Europe in blood for centuries." -1803 letter objecting use of gov. land for churches

Ben Franklin

• "Lighthouses are more helpful than churches." -in Poor Richard's Almanac
• "The way to see by faith is to shut the eye of reason." -in Poor Richard's Almanac
• "It is much to be lamented that a man of Franklin's general good character and great influence should have been an unbeliever in Christianity, and also have done as much as he did to make others unbelievers" (Priestley's Autobiography)

Thomas Paine

• "All national institutions of churches, whether Jewish, Christian or Turkish, appear to me no other than human inventions, set up to terrify and enslave mankind, and monopolize power and profit."
• "We do not admit the authority of the church with respect to its pretended infallibility, its manufactured miracles, its setting itself up to forgive sins. It was by propagating that belief and supporting it with fire that she kept up her temporal power."
• "I do not believe in the creed professed by the Jewish Church, by the Roman Church, by the Greek Church, by the Turkish Church, by the Protestant Church, nor by any Church that I know of. My own mind is my own Church. Each of those churches accuse the other of unbelief; and for my own part, I disbelieve them all."

George Washington
The father of this country was very private about his beliefs, but it is widely considered that he was a Deist like his colleagues. He was a Freemason.

• Historian Barry Schwartz writes: "George Washington's practice of Christianity was limited and superficial because he was not himself a Christian... He repeatedly declined the church's sacraments. Never did he take communion, and when his wife, Martha, did, he waited for her outside the sanctuary... Even on his deathbed, Washington asked for no ritual, uttered no prayer to Christ, and expressed no wish to be attended by His representative." [New York Press, 1987, pp. 174-175]
• Paul F. Boller states in his anthology on Washington: "There is no mention of Jesus Christ anywhere in his extensive correspondence." [Dallas: Southern Methodist University Press, 1963, pp. 14-15]
• "Gouverneur Morris had often told me that General Washington believed no more of that system (Christianity) than did he himself." -Thomas Jefferson, in his private journal, Feb. 1800

Last but not least, Thomas Jefferson

• "The hocus-pocus phantasm of a God like another Cerberus, with one body and three heads, had its birth and growth in the blood of thousands and thousands of martyrs." -- Letter to James Smith, December 8, 1822
• To claim that Jefferson was a Christian is outright dishonest. He was a MATERIALIST, and he said so:
  "But while this syllabus is meant to place the character of Jesus in its true light, as no imposter himself, but a great reformer of the Hebrew code of religion, it is not to be understood that I am with him in all his doctrines. I am a materialist; he takes the side of spiritualism; he preaches the efficacy of repentance towards forgiveness of sin; I require a counterpoise of good works to redeem it." -- letter to William Short, April 13, 1820; Definition of a Materialist: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Materialism
• "Christianity neither is, nor ever was, a part of the Common Law." -letter to Dr. Thomas Cooper, 1814
• "No man shall be compelled to frequent or support any religious worship, place, or ministry whatsoever." -Virginia Act for Religious Freedom
  
• And about a million more. Jefferson really hated religion.

[keysync]

That's some interesting reading.

[CyberHustler]

[DTK]

Originally Posted by baddog

Take a look at the Declaration of Independence and Constitution and get back to us.

Lloyd, you can't find the words God, Jesus etc.. in the Constitution. Not once. You can find it in the Declaration of Independence (written mostly by Jefferson), but not in the context of the Judeo-Christian god.

"The Declaration describes "the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God." This nature's view of God agrees with deist philosophy and might even appeal to those of pantheistical beliefs, but any attempt to use the Declaration as a support for Christianity will fail for this reason alone."

http://www.nobeliefs.com/Tripoli.htm

Also, there's the 1st Amendment to the Constitution. "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances."

I'm tellin' ya bud, this christian nation bs is pure revisionism.

[Brujah]

Originally Posted by DTK

Lloyd, you can't find the words God, Jesus etc.. in the Constitution. Not once. You can find it in the Declaration of Independence (written mostly by Jefferson), but not in the context of the Judeo-Christian god.

"The Declaration describes "the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God." This nature's view of God agrees with deist philosophy and might even appeal to those of pantheistical beliefs, but any attempt to use the Declaration as a support for Christianity will fail for this reason alone."

http://www.nobeliefs.com/Tripoli.htm

Also, there's the 1st Amendment to the Constitution. "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances."

I'm tellin' ya bud, this christian nation bs is pure revisionism.

Exactly. Thank you for taking the time to type it all out in these last few posts.

[DTK]

Originally Posted by Brujah

Exactly. Thank you for taking the time to type it all out in these last few posts.

No problem. Look, as i've said, i'm neither democrat nor republican and won't be voting for either of them. If you had to put a label on me, it would be pragmatic libertarian.

That said, here's the reason i've been pretty active in the recent political threads: the amount of outright lying from the extreme right (which btw has hijacked the republican party) over the last half-dozen years is like nothing i've seen in my lifetime. they just keep making things up out of thin air and double down on them even after they've been proven to be completely inaccurate.

Great example from the RNC, which i watched most of: I watched at least 5 guys stand stand on stage and knowingly, willingly repeat the already disproven lie that Obama removed the welfare-to-work provision.

So I just can't help myself but to try and inject actual facts into the discussion.

I see it in my own life too and it's heartbreaking. Otherwise perfectly bright people parroting the fox news thinking points, and even when presented with documented facts that contradict them, they just won't accept it. Even worse, they never do their own homework. This is exactly how fundamentalists operate.