Waitaminute…I AM still a liberal atheist, right?
This event is not about the ten commandments or the separation of church and state.
This event started with Madeline Murray O’Hare, and the formation of the Atheist religion.
First came the loss of prayer in schools, then there were attacks on the pledge of allegience, the national anthem, the word “God” being spoken, etc., etc.
The atheists are well organized, they preach, proselytize, and promote their beliefs wherever they can. If you can believe the posts on this board they feel they are superior to those who believe in God and claim they are attacking the ignorance of these “God” people. They use prolific name-calling to do so.
They respect the rights of no groups save their own.
Now, I don’t agree with Judge Moore, and I am not a Christian.
Then came the current event, the Judge didn’t roll over, He stood his ground. He appealed to the Christian right and the buses started rolling. The anti-abortion people threw in with the others and we now have a large confrontation developing.
It may be that the ten commandments will leave the building, but the battle is far from over.
The “G”-- word folks are angry, and they will write their congressmen, preach from their pulpits, and vote in their people to change the issues.
I can’t tell you how this will come out, but if I were an atheist I would start respecting the rights of others to believe what they wish as guaranteed by the constitution.
Good Luck
lekatt, you cannot possibly hope to take serious part in an honest discussion about this issue if you insist in misrepresenting the issues involved.
It isn’t prayer, it’s the government directing children to pray.
It isn’t stopping anyone from saying the pledge, or singing the national anthem, it’s about stopping the government from doing so. No one is forcing anyone to stop talking about God.
Atheism is not my religion, nor do I have any regard for O’Hair.
So stop misrepresenting both the issues and the people here.
Yes it is.
No it didn’t.
More lies. No one is being stopped from speaking the word “God”. No one is being stopped from publicly practicing their religion, or publicly preaching their religion to others and seeking converts.
We also spread plagues by poisoning the wells.
Why don’t you just come right out and demand that all atheists be hunted down and killed?
Wow, MEB, I thought you knew better than to get sucked into an argument with lekatt. You’d have more success trying to nail Jello to a tree…or beating your head against it.
I have no desire to take part in any discussion here.
You are the one misrepresenting the facts.
I went to school when prayer was legal, there was no government directive to pray. What you say is false.
The singing of the anthem was not allowed at school games, and there was a court order against saying the pledge.
There was an honor guard soldier that lost his job for saying “God Bless You”. He was just recently reinstated.
I, personally, am not bothered by these acts, just explaining how the “ignorant” folks feel.
The atheists have always had a tendency to twist the words to suit themselves. You get your facts straight.
I also went to school when prayer was legal. I’m still in school. It’s still legal.
What is not legal is to coerce students into practicing religion when they do not want to. Teachers are paid to teach; they are not paid to worship, pray, or to compel their students to do so.
I do not learn calculus in church. I do not expect to learn about God in public school.
For the record, we have sung the national anthem at every high school sporting event that I have ever been to.
In conclusion: cite?
P.S.
Pssst…prayer is still legal in school, lekatt.
(btw, why would the National Anthem be banned in school? It doesn’t mention God.)
Publius: I just took lekatt’s “You get your facts straight” as a freudian admission that it is the rest of the posters and not he who is actually getting facts straight; an observation, if you will, instead of an imperative.
It was not legal to coerce students into practicing religion in my time either. No one was forced to pray and prayer is not practicing religion. Times were a lot worse then, in the middle of WWII. prayer helped a lot to express feelings.
Religion is a set of rules, regulations, laws, on how to worship God, it is different with different religions. Spiritual practices such as prayer, kindness and love are not religion. God does exist, as a higher intelligence, and can be experienced.
No one is forcing you to.
You make a bold assertion, but then fail to back it up in any way. The fact is, I am correct. What the SC banned was schools leading kids in prayer, and what is and always has been legal and fine is individuals or freely groups praying any time they want. This was done. Schools did direct kids to pray, whatever happened in your very limited experience.
You are wrong, yet again. Many schools led students in prayer, and that was exactly what the court case was about, and put a stop to. If you missed out on this, great, but that doesn’t make it not part of history.
That’s great: so what’s stopping people from getting together and pray to express their feelings? Nothing is.
I’m sorry, but leading children in the Lord’s Prayer is leading them in a religious practice. It isn’t just atheists that object to this, but Jews, Jehovah’s Witnesses and sects that may teach different things.
lekatt: If “your time” in schools was during World War II, then you are telling us all a lie by saying that nobody was forced to pray then. Quite a few public schools had mandatory public prayer at the start of the school day back then. And, of course, spiritual practices and prayer are most certainly religious practices; unless, of course, you happen to be redefining the words on the fly so only you know which particular word fits which particular definition.
Your final assertion about God’s existence is a religious belief and it is not a fact, no matter how fervently you wish the rest of us bought into your b…er, world view.
It’s impossible to have a debate with someone who refuses to acknowledge the possibility that they could be wrong and refuses to take any arguments against their world view seriously. Lekatt seems to be one of those people.
Lekatt, to verify your claims that “spiritual practices such as prayer” do not fall within the definition of “religion”, I cracked open my American Heritage Dictionary, Third Edition (1994)
Here is the first entry for RELIGION:
Then I looked up the word PRAYER:
Do you still stick with your claim that prayer is not considered religious?
To be fair to Lekatt, The National Anthem DOES have the word God in it. However, it is on last of 4 stanzas, and when I was in school we NEVER made it further than the first Stanza.
The full text of the Star Spangled Banner, by Francis Scott Key (1814)
Sources:
http://www.law.ou.edu/hist/ssb.html
http://www.usa-flag-site.org/song-lyrics/star-spangled-banner.shtml
I personally don’t give a damn whether the courts display the Ten Commandents or a statue of Yog-Sothoth, but I would like lekatt and other supporters of Judge Moore to answer two simple questions:
Why do you think this is a good thing, and why do you think such public displays are going to change people?
I live in southwestern Indiana, an area where a fair number of people place in their yards posters displaying the Decalogue. At one point on Indiana 54 between Dugger and Sullivan, a person has erected a series of outdoor posters, each displaying his interpretation of each commandent. The first time I saw it, I thought Burma Shave signs were making a comeback.
All that public display of the Decalogue has not stopped southwestern Indiana from becoming the meth capital of the Known Universe. It hasn’t stopped me from chasing women and smoking dope when I can get it.
I am really puzzled as to what you think such public displays will accomplish.
BTW, lekatt, I covered hundreds of high school games while working four years as sports editor at two small newspapers. I can assure you that in the Hoosier state playing or singing the National Anthem before games is still a tradition. Some people may not sing along, but everybody stands and most of the men remove our hats. The performances range from truly awful – trumpet players who flat notes by two octaves – to truly beautiful a capella performances and the wonderful, jazzlike ensemble instrumentals by South Knox and Linton high schools.
Incidentally, the original version of the Pledge, and I think it should be mandatory to recite it each day, did not contain the words “under God.” That was added in the '50’s.
I think we’re being a bit abrupt with Leroy, people.
I wasn’t in school with Leroy, and the world was different then. Leroy, how about you tell us what you mean by prayer in school? What happened? Was it daily? Weekly? When did it happen?
Seriously, I’d like to know.
Chief Justice Roy Moore may loose his job as a Judge, but
He will now be a shoe-in for Governer, or State Senator,
he’s a hero now in predominantly Christian Alabama.
FrankoAbrupt with leroy? He thinks that just because he has recollections of his own particular childhood, that means that well-documented historical events and practices never happened.
The least sung verse of the anthem is the third, for pretty obvious reasons.
The anthem, just for anyone who doesn’t know, is also a later addition that came well after the founders and Constitutional conventioners were dead.
Tried to decide which post to answer, they all say about the same thing.
When I went to school, in the morning, at the start of school, all gathered on the schools grounds, and the flag was saluted, then a short prayer was offered. The prayer usually concerned the war effort, such as: “Guide our leaders in this conflict…etc.”.
It is interesting to note that we used to salute the flag with arm extended like the Germans said their “seige heil”. This was changed to the present form.
We didn’t have any atheists that I know of, but we did have Native Americans, Jehovah Witnesses, and others, for reasons of their own didn’t want to participate in these activities. They were allowed to go on to class or just stand with their arms at their sides as they wished. No one thought anything of it. We respected others beliefs, because we were taught in school to do so.
We never needed O’Hare to rescue those with different beliefs. We, as Americans believed in diversity, and the rights of others.
My final assertion was not a religious belief, I know God exists through personal experience, a near death experience. I realize atheists deny them, it is ok, I don’t mind. Jesus said: “Blessed are they that have not seen, yet believe.” I have seen, I know.
And I am not sure what “b…er” means, but if it represents some nasty name. I would rather you be honest, and just say it.
God Bless America