Religion: where do we draw the line

Great Debates
1

One or two of us would probably be happy to see religion just fucking go away, but it appears that we are saddled with it. Much of the time, it is not a problem, but also much of the time it is, especially when the person on the dais goes to whipping the followers into a froth.

Many of us favor imposing taxes on religious institutions, because we have the massive orgs that abuse the privileges granted them in ridiculous ways that appear to be way beyond what a reasonable person would consider reasonable. On the other hand, there do appear to be small-scale operations that show some indication that they are doing genuine good in the community, perhaps enough to justify their privilege, and may not deserve the impositions that the big orgs probably do. These smaller operations, I believe, originally served as the heart of their small towns, which was the justification for protecting and preserving them.

Thus, the question is, by what metric would we decide which law-abiding religious organizations are worthy of privilege (such as tax exemption) and which are not. I believe I know.

Religious belief is about you and how you relate to the unknowable. It is not about that other person or how they relate to the unknowable, or to you. As long as the message remains personal, about your spirituality, even if the content is unalloyed bullshit, it can be tolerated, but once it goes off from you, it stops being tolerable.

There are constraints on our other constitutional freedoms – religion needs them too.

2

Variations of “God rules over government, not the other way around”.

3

Allowing Congress to get involved in determining which religions are “good” (spiritual) religions and which religions are “bad” religions strikes me as an extraordinarily bad idea on principle. It also strikes me as being political suicide for any politician or party which tries to push it.

(Back in 2014 American Atheists filed a federal lawsuit, American Athe­ists Inc. v. Shulman, which challenged

That’s a far narrower and more meritorious concern; alas, the lawsuit was tossed at the U.S. District Court level and I can’t find anything to indicate the group was ever able to appeal the decision beyond that.)

4

We’ve already started down this road in the US and it is a winner for politicians. Basically Christianity trumps all in the US and they can ignore the rest. Jews cannot be ignored but they tend to be conservative anyway so roll with it. Other than that there is nothing to threaten conservative politicians.

5

American Jews tend to be liberal. See here, here and here

6

No we haven’t. The IRS doesn’t make any ideological or philosophical distinction between “good” religions and “bad” religions.

To the extent the right wing in this country wants to favor evangelical Christianity, or Christianity in general, we should continue to fight them tooth and nail.

Sorry about the double response, but another point I thought of after hitting “Reply” the first time: There are no religions which are only about your spirituality. Even Buddhism makes ethical claims (the Eightfold Path), that is, teachings on how people should relate to other people (“correct action, refraining from physical misdeeds such as killing, stealing, and sexual misconduct”) which is going beyond “how you relate to the unknowable” and talking about how we should all relate with each other.

7

The IRS doesn’t but the IRS is not the only one out there. Although the IRS seems tolerant of letting restrictions on tax exempt entities slide on churches.

Have you seen the push against abortion or birth control or LGBTQ rights or “Sharia law” to name a few? Those are pushed by Christian groups and other religions who may feel differently are losing.

8

They’ve been remarkably tolerant of the right-wing government in Israel.

And I will be shocked if you can convince me that Orthodox Jews are liberal.

9

Of course I’ve seen those things. I’m failing to see what that has to do with a completely unworkable proposal for the U.S. government to start making distinctions between “privileged” religions and “unprivileged” religions.

10

Make no mistake…I am with you on opposing the US equivalent of Sharia law. I am a big advocate of the separation of church and state.

But that wall is faltering. There is a thread current in Great Debates now which shows the US Supreme Court came within a whisker of tearing down a big protection in separation of church and state (and they still damaged it). Some justices were all for going there and one was really pissed it didn’t happen.

So yeah…the US is in danger here and politicians and judges are going there and working diligently to undermine these protections. And they are succeeding more than not.

11

Most often, those rules relate to the spiritual aspect of religion (as in, you will not be rewarded or may face punishment in the spiritual context if you misbehave), but those teachings are still about you, not about someone else’s behavior.

12

The current (and, really, the perpetual) attacks on separation of church and state are all the more reason to uphold SOCAS and stand by our principles, not to undermine that separation by advocating for the government to get into the business of deciding which religions are “privileged” and which aren’t.

13

I think we are misunderstanding each other. I suspect we agree far more than we disagree on this.

14

Every ethical teaching is implicitly about other people, too. (“I am obeying the Ten Commandments / following the Golden Rule / following the Noble Eightfold Path, so I will get to go to heaven / attain nirvana / not be reincarnated as a cockroach—unlike those sinners / unenlightened people who are oppressing widows and orphans / kicking puppies / having gay sex!”) There’s simply no way to say that you ought to do such-and-such (so you can attain some supernatural reward, or just because the Cosmos has ordained that such-and-such is the right thing to do) without saying or strongly implying that other people really also ought to do such-and-such.

Of course no religion ought to have the right to unilaterally impose its religious taboos on those who don’t choose to voluntarily follow its teachings. (Many religious taboos do also line up, more or less, with secular laws against murder and larceny and so forth, which are enforceable on everyone.)

15

The fact is, some religions, such as Christianity and Islam, are fundamentally incompatible with a “mind my own business” approach - they require proselytization. Christianity does have the “don’t uproot the tares with the wheat” principle, but these two Abrahamic religions are still, by their nature, incredibly easy to morph into theocracies.

16

“They” being all American Jews? Is this just a feeling on your part or have you done research?

The belief that Jews - either here or abroad - have a kind of special tolerance or affinity for the oppressive actions of the Israeli government is a new expression of the much older dual loyalty antisemitic canard.

The Orthodox are a minority within a minority and even they aren’t monolithic. American Jews, on the whole, are consistently progressive and have been for generations.

17

Israel had a distinctly conservative government (not quite sure what it is now). That conservatism has run a looooong time. See very recent events that were anything but liberal minded.

In the US criticism of Israel is a notorious career ender for journalists. I am not sure voting for Obama trumps that.

18

Do you realize how biased you, as (I’m guessing) a modern-day intellectual American, are toward individualism? If I understand correctly, for most religious people, religion is something that is more communal than individual. To be a religious person is, to a large extent, to be a member of a religious community.

19

The idea of allowing the government to decide with religions are good enough is entirely unworkable, as it would abridge the underlying concept of freedom of religion. It would be against the establishment clause, as it would essentially be establishing a state religion with these particular branches.

The workable solution is to make it where no religion is above the law. And that is what we supposedly have in the US. The problem is that Christianity seems to get special privilege. The goal should be to eliminate that privilege, and be a proper secular state.

Sure, religion influences how people interact with the world. But then you get to vote for the person who interacts with the world the way you prefer. That’s not religion being put in charge. That’s the main thing that’s important.

Yes, religion is about community for many. But that community is of people who consent to be a part of it. No religious person should be trying to force their religion on others. They can, of course, behave the way they think is right, which will affect others, But that’s not the same thing as forcing others to act the way you deem correct.

They can, of course, try to convince people to do things, i.e. “fighting for what they think is right.” But that’s true for all people, whether religious or not, and regardless of religion or philosophy. So that is not privileging one religion above another, or religion over non-religion.

I think the ideal we currently have on the subject is the right one. The issue is just that Christianity was, like other majorities, treated as the default for so long that we’re having to remove that sort of thing. But that’s the same with assuming everyone is white, male straight, cisgender, etc.

And I say this as a Christian myself, and one who used to be the type who pushed Dominionism without realizing it.

20

What, if anything, makes religious organizations different from other organizations?

By what metrics do we already decide which non-religious organizations are worthy of privilege (such as tax exemption) and which are not?

Seriously, I’ve long wondered this. Sometimes I get the feeling that any non-profit organization gets these privileges, and that “non-profit” is defined as “we can make as much money as we want, as long as it goes to employees and not shareholders.” Surely I’m wrong, but can someone set me straight?