# Secular America **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [August 15, 2013, 5:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/secular-america/666330 "2013-08-15T17:45:21Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Sicks\_Ate](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/258eb7/32.png) [@Sicks\_Ate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sicks_Ate)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2013, 7:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/secular-america/666330/21 "2013-08-15T19:45:40Z")
> [@Human\_Action](#): > > What about “one nation under God” or “in God we trust” are references to one particular religion? They’re references to the Christian God. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2013, 7:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/secular-america/666330/22 "2013-08-15T19:46:17Z")
> [@Human\_Action](#): > > What about “one nation under God” or “in God we trust” are references to one particular religion? With those, we can look into the history of their creation and the written intent of the creators and those others that supported their creation. ---
**Author:** ![Human\_Action](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/ac91a4/32.png) [@Human\_Action](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Human_Action)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2013, 7:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/secular-america/666330/23 "2013-08-15T19:47:23Z")
> [@Sicks\_Ate](#): > > They’re references to the Christian God. How so? If the dollar bill said “Christ Is King” “Kneel before Yahweh” or had a Bible verse, I’d agree. But “God” is as non-specific as it could possibly be. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2013, 7:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/secular-america/666330/24 "2013-08-15T19:48:13Z")
> [@Human\_Action](#): > > Those two merely promote monotheism, not Christianity in particular. And would the official promotion of monotheism discriminate against any other religions you could think of? ---
**Author:** ![Human\_Action](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/ac91a4/32.png) [@Human\_Action](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Human_Action)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2013, 7:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/secular-america/666330/25 "2013-08-15T19:49:22Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > With those, we can look into the history of their creation and the written intent of the creators and those others that supported their creation. Sure, but that doesn’t change the meaning of the word “God” to “Jesus” or “The Christian God”. Intent tells us why it’s there, but not what it means. ---
**Author:** ![Human\_Action](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/ac91a4/32.png) [@Human\_Action](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Human_Action)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2013, 7:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/secular-america/666330/26 "2013-08-15T19:50:25Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > And would the official promotion of monotheism discriminate against any other religions you could think of? Yes, it does, and I oppose it on those grounds, I don’t want any religious content in my government. But what it _doesn’t_ do is promote Christianity as the state religion. ---
**Author:** ![Sicks\_Ate](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/258eb7/32.png) [@Sicks\_Ate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sicks_Ate)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2013, 7:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/secular-america/666330/27 "2013-08-15T19:52:21Z")
> [@Human\_Action](#): > > How so? If the dollar bill said “Christ Is King” “Kneel before Yahweh” or had a Bible verse, I’d agree. But “God” is as non-specific as it could possibly be. Becaue we know, as Czarcasm pointed out, who put them in. In the instance of “Under God”, it was the Knights of Columbus. The idea that the Knights of Columbus successfully lobbied for the inclusion of “under God” to the Pledge of Allegiance with the intention of it also including non-Christian gods is flat out wrong. ---
**Author:** ![Dissonance](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/85f322/32.png) [@Dissonance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dissonance)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2013, 7:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/secular-america/666330/28 "2013-08-15T19:52:44Z")
Christmas is a religious holiday, dammit. As everyone knows, the birth of Jesus occurred under a pine tree, some jolly old fat guy in a red suit delivered presents to all the good boys and girls using a flying sleigh pulled by reindeer, one with a glowing red nose. Then everyone made snowmen and had snowball fights with all the snow lying around what with it being winter in Jerusalem and all. ---
**Author:** ![Human\_Action](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/ac91a4/32.png) [@Human\_Action](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Human_Action)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2013, 7:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/secular-america/666330/29 "2013-08-15T19:53:13Z")
Put it this way: if I decided to follow the state religion of the United States and picked up a $20 bill to see what that was, would “In God We Trust” lead me inexorably to Christianity? No. It’d exclude polytheistic faiths, but that’s it. ---
**Author:** ![Human\_Action](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/ac91a4/32.png) [@Human\_Action](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Human_Action)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2013, 7:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/secular-america/666330/30 "2013-08-15T19:56:53Z")
> [@Sicks\_Ate](#): > > Becaue we know, as Czarcasm pointed out, who put them in. In the instance of “Under God”, it was the Knights of Columbus. > > The idea that the Knights of Columbus successfully lobbied for the inclusion of “under God” to the Pledge of Allegiance with the intention of it also including non-Christian gods is flat out wrong. The Knights of Columbus don’t get to declare what the word “God” means, though. Their intention doesn’t matter at all. If they were all pleased as punch because _they_ understood it to mean the Catholic God, so be it. The writers of the Declaration of Independence understood “all men” to mean “certain men, with the right skin color and property”. It doesn’t change what the word means to us. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2013, 7:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/secular-america/666330/31 "2013-08-15T19:57:02Z")
> [@Longshanks](#): > > Blue laws, Such as? Since I’ve been alive, blue laws are decreasing, which argues that we are becoming more secular. > [@](#): > > Christmas as a public holiday, Secular holiday. Notice the White House has a tree, not a manger. Where I live there are tons of people in the malls before Christmas who almost certainly are not Christian. > [@](#): > > ‘one nation under god’ as a part of the pledge of allegiance and in god we trust on US currency. I wish we got rid of this, but when I believe in Judaism I had no problem with them. God is such a generic term this hardly offends any religious person, and is certainly not Christian. > [@](#): > > All of these are either directly or indirectly ways that the government are promoting Christianity as the state religion, even if all it amounts to is paying lip service to the masses to appease them. There are politicians who’d love to do this, but they are not the government, nor is Fox News.Even GWB didn’t establish Christianity in any significant way - in fact, based on evidence from the guy who did his religious outreach, his White House played them for suckers. ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2013, 8:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/secular-america/666330/32 "2013-08-15T20:51:56Z")
> [@Human\_Action](#): > > The Knights of Columbus don’t get to declare what the word “God” means, though. Their intention doesn’t matter at all. If they were all pleased as punch because _they_ understood it to mean the Catholic God, so be it. The writers of the Declaration of Independence understood “all men” to mean “certain men, with the right skin color and property”. It doesn’t change what the word means to us. Came in here to say something along these lines. Yeah, the folks who put ‘In God We Trust’ on the currency knew what THEY meant by ‘God’, but so what? Everyone using the bill can think of ‘God’ in anyway they want…or, if they aren’t atheists with a bug up their ass (or polytheists hung up on a single ‘God’) about the whole business, not think of it at all and just use the money to buy hookers and blow, as the gods intended. 😛 Personally, I’d love to do away with the whole religious business, but realistically, given the disposition of the majority of my fellow citizens, that’s not going to happen any time soon. If you live in a country that’s a democracy AND has a large majority of folks who have strong religious leanings then your choices are to get out or go along and hope for small, incremental changes. Since I don’t believe that the religious aspects of our system are all that intrusive OR onerous (I even get off for stuff like Christmas, despite the fact that I don’t believe) I’ll just keep on keeping on. In my own lifetime I’ve seen a lot of changes and I expect to live long enough to see more in the future. ---
**Author:** ![slm2955](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c6cbf5/32.png) [@slm2955](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/slm2955)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2013, 11:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/secular-america/666330/33 "2013-08-15T23:44:52Z")
> [@learjeff](#): > > the biggest ways in which the us is religious are: > > - christian-based holidays … Pretty much only christmas now > - “under god” in the pledge of allegiance – lip service only > - prayers at the beginning of congress sessions (annually? No idea how often) > - we used to sometimes have prayers at public gatherings, like for school games, but this is now rare, only allowed in “semi public” things, such as a public gathering sponsored by a private entity (example: Breaking ground on a new building, launching a ship) > > however, in politics, religion is a big issue. The vast majority of elected officials are either christian or jewish. No doubt there will be a growing number of muslim. Very few are professed atheists or agnostics. A lot of political issues involve stong lines drawn largely on religious bases, such as abortion. > > But it’s very easy to be an atheist in the us, and nobody knows or cares. I work in the networking industry; rarely does religion come up even in a casual lunchtime conversation. When it does, it’s more often i who raise the subject (respectfully, asking questions and not giving opinions – which takes considerable restraint!) ta 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2013, 1:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/secular-america/666330/34 "2013-08-16T01:02:17Z")
> [@Human\_Action](#): > > It’d exclude polytheistic faiths, but that’s it. Escluding polytheistic faiths \<\> Inclusive. Also != secular. ---
**Author:** ![Broomstick](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/broomstick/32/246_2.png) [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2013, 1:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/secular-america/666330/35 "2013-08-16T01:15:49Z")
> [@Human\_Action](#): > > What about “one nation under God” or “in God we trust” are references to one particular religion? > [@Sicks\_Ate](#): > > They’re references to the Christian God. No, if it said “one nation under Jesus” or “in Jesus we trust” it would be Christian. At most, it promotes monotheism. This somewhat annoys us polytheists, but we are the definite minority and have to live with the consequences of that. Given that in a lot of places these days I could still be burned as a witch or executed for not being properly monotheist this is hardly the worst place to be. > [@Czarcasm](#): > > And would the official promotion of monotheism discriminate against any other religions you could think of? You do know that there are polytheists in the world? ---
**Author:** ![Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/f04885/32.png) [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qin_Shi_Huangdi)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2013, 1:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/secular-america/666330/36 "2013-08-16T01:53:02Z")
> [@Ravenman](#): > > You mean treated equally by the government, as opposed to being treated equally in political debates and popular opinion, right? Because the former I agree with, but the latter is just absurd. See, “Ground Zero Mosque.” I mean the former. The latter is sadly true in this country but not exclusive to the US- some countries such as France banning the hijab from schools. ---
**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2013, 1:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/secular-america/666330/37 "2013-08-16T01:58:48Z")
> [@Broomstick](#): > > You do know that there are polytheists in the world? That couldn’t have been his point, could it? ---
**Author:** ![Ibn\_Warraq](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/e19b73/32.png) [@Ibn\_Warraq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ibn_Warraq)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2013, 2:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/secular-america/666330/38 "2013-08-16T02:15:11Z")
> [@Longshanks](#): > > Blue laws, Christmas as a public holiday,‘one nation under god’ as a part of the pledge of allegiance and in god we trust on US currency. > > All of these are either directly or indirectly ways that the government are promoting Christianity as the state religion, even if all it amounts to is paying lip service to the masses to appease them. True but unlike the UK, Canada and other western countries we don’t have all these government supported religious schools. It’s why Europeans make themselves look like ignorant fools when they demand that Middle Eastern nations become “secular”. This is not a knock on Europeans so much as an observation that fish can’t see water and that countries don’t need to be “secular” like France, the US, and Turkey to be liveable. ---
**Author:** ![Ibn\_Warraq](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/e19b73/32.png) [@Ibn\_Warraq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ibn_Warraq)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2013, 2:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/secular-america/666330/39 "2013-08-16T02:19:09Z")
> [@Ravenman](#): > > You mean treated equally by the government, as opposed to being treated equally in political debates and popular opinion, right? Because the former I agree with, but the latter is just absurd. See, “Ground Zero Mosque.” That was disgusting and racist, but nothing compared to the racists in Europe and Canada who practically tripped over themselves while waging war on hijabs, burkas, and minarets. ---
**Author:** ![Gagundathar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/a183cd/32.png) [@Gagundathar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gagundathar)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2013, 4:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/secular-america/666330/40 "2013-08-16T04:12:56Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > And would the official promotion of monotheism discriminate against any other religions you could think of? Well, my goodness, I must assume that you are living up to your username when you ask this question. I certainly hope so as most of your posts are well-written and show the workings of a fine mind. But, in answer to your (hopefully) rhetorical question, just off the top of my head I can name Wicca and Hinduism as two notable polytheistic religions. Or to be more precise, non-monotheistic because quite a number of Wiccans are actually more pantheistic but the distinction is not usually noticeable to those who consider monotheism to be the only ‘real’ form of religion. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/secular-america/666330.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/secular-america/666330.md?page=3)