Heck, that was EXACTLY the ENTIRE purpose of adding those statements to the pledge and motto. They were explicitly part of a campaign who’s stated strategy is to win the nation for Christ by steadily eroding away SOCAS piece by piece in exactly this way. If they can make In God We Trust the motto this week, then next week they can point to that and say “see, that’s our motto, how can anyone object to some government organized prayers? Isn’t that silly to allow one and not the other?”
It looks like this one is over. CNN is reporting that the other 8 justices of the Alabama Supreme Court overruled Moore and are ordering the monument’s removal.
I agree with what stpauler just said.
Sorry about that…
I was having a reload war with SDMB’s server…
I just wanted to thank ya, Apos. I didn’t know that the “IN GOD WE TRUST” was such a new concept. (I was under the delusional concept it was a construct of the founding fathers but found this website which gives the history of it.)
I just wanted to be the first to say:
<Nelson-voice>
HA-HAH!
</Nelson-voice>
Sorry, rjung – looks to me like you’re the ninth to say it. At least you’re in good company!
Daniel
X’:Two wrongs don’t make a right.The national motto should not have been changed to “In God We Trust” and the “Under God” bit should not have been added to the pledge.The ten commandments should not be posted in government buildings or classrooms for the same reasons that Anton LeVey’s Satanic Bible should not be handed out by public school teachers.
The great irony in all of this is that the Bible never, ANYWHERE in that book mentions ten commandments.In the section where the commandments are listed you can come up with anywhere from 9-16 seperate commandments depending on how you itemise them but nowhere is the number “ten” even mentioned.The reason we have settled on this “ten” as the number of commandments has more to do with the fact that we have ten fingers and toes than anything said in the Bible.
I find this ironic because I am imagining God waking up from his long nap, noticing what is going on with his humans down here on earth and saying “What the…?!?Can’t they even count?!?I am going to smite that Judge Moore myself!”
Also, which Ten commandments should we be posting in our courtrooms if we are to be doing so?The protestant 10 C’s are signifigantly different than the Catholic ones and both are signifigantly different than the Hebrew 10 commandments!
Furthermore, according to the Exodus story, Moses smashed the first set of stone tablets and God said he would make a new set containing “the words that were on the first”…BUT HE DID NOT DO THAT!The second set differs greatly from the first(see Ex.20 and Ex. 34) which makes God a FIBBER!Also it sort of muddles the issue of posting “THE” ten commandments in classrooms adn courthouses.
Why aren’t the following “commandments” to be posted in courthouses:
Ex.31:15-“Whosoever doeth any work in the Sabbath day shall surely be put to death”(bolding mine of course)
Ex. 21:17-“He that curseth his father or his mother shall surely be put to death”
and so on.
That’s okay, you go ahead and mock God, but here’s the deal you are making.
If you are correct in your idea of God as nothing more than superstition, what have you ultimately gained? Nothing.
However, if you are wrong, then you will have lost everything for all eternity.
As for the true believers, they have everything to gain, and nothing to lose.
Re: Razorsharp
So God’s gonna damn us for not wanting a Graven Image installed in the rotunda? There’s some rule about that somewhere…
sorry, Pascal’s wager fails. If you accidently pick the wrong one to believe in, the real and true one may be awfully pissed about that!
Hey Razorsharp! Thanks for exhuming Pascal’s Wager from the crypt of syllogistic thoughts. Next time, cite 'em 
Wha—? Did Razorsharp really just scrape Pascal’s Wager off the bottom of the barrel for the umpteenth time?
Dude, we’ve heard that before, more times than you can count, and it doesn’t hold water any more now than it did then. It’s a cliche. It proves nothing. For just one of a thousand reasons why, consider that virtually all of the multitudinous faiths on the globe consider themselves exclusively correct, and that choosing a different faith is a path to Hell (or whatever). In other words, it’s not a choice between God and not-God. It’s a choice between Catholicism, Lutheranism, Methodism, American and European Liberal Episcopalianism, Elsewhere Conservative Episcopalianism, Orthodox Judaism, Seventh-Day Adventism, LDS, Sikhism, Shintoism, Wahabist Islam, eight hundred varieties of Hinduism, Appalachian Snake-Handling Cultist Christianity, Hale-Bopp Ridin’ Castration Tennis-Shoe-ism, Baha’i, the Amish, Greek Orthodox, Christian Scientists, Pentacostals, Aum Shinri Kyo, and who knows how many other alternatives, including my own choice, atheism. In other words, if you go with God, you have a one in ten thousand chance of getting it right and enjoying your eternal reward.
Please don’t attempt to use logic to prove the superiority of what is at root for the faithful a very personal and emotional decision to believe. You’re just going to trip and fall on your butt.
On preview: Damn, y’all beat me to it. Serves me right for a long message.
To get back on topic tho…
I am curious how Justice Moore would react if someone he sentenced reacted as he…:
We get it, you’re all about your secularly religious Ten Commandments (or is it religiously secular?). Why can’t you just keep them to yourself.
The interesting part from the same NY Times article:
Sad that people are that blind to something so highly visible.
These weasels are so tricksy. Note that this issue is not about the public display of the Ten Commandments, but they are eager to pretend it is. No different than the lying SOBs who run around claiming that the ruling against organized school prayer make it illegal for kids to pray in school.
This is known as Pascal’s Wager(after Blasie Pascal) and though it has been ripped to shreds by atheists, christians adn everyone else for the weak argument it is, we still see it pop up at least twice a week at some forum or the other.
A)The arguement assumes only two options:1)That God exists and 2)That God does not.“God” is usually assumed to be the selective interpretation of the judeo-christian God also.The problem is that what if one of the other 4, 999 gods that have been worshipped at one time or another is THE God?If Allah is the one true God than you christians are in at LEAST as much trouble as atheists.What if Satan is God?Maybe he has MPD or likes playing with humans heads by convincing them that he is a carpenter from Nazareth?What if MANY gods exist?
B)Actually believers stand to lose a whole lot if it turns out that this is the only life we get and there is no “master” in the sky cracking the whip.Every expenditure of time adn resources towards proselytising or other non-charitable functions could have been better spent with family or volunteering at a rest home or working or whatever.
I could go into much more detail but this should suffice.
Oops…when I replied I ddi not realise there was a whole page of responses to the Pascal’s wager bit.Sorry!
sorry, Pascal’s wager fails. If you accidently pick the wrong one to believe in, the real and true one may be awfully pissed about that!
Not to mention that any God who’s gonna do violence to people merely because they had the wrong beliefs is such a monster as not to deserve anyones regard or worship.