"Under God" supporters- what if SCOTUS had banned it?

Great Debates
1

and Congress was unwilling/unable to take it out of SCOTUS jurisdiction, what would you support your kids doing during Pledge time when going to public school?

(Btw, I also totally support “under God”, have no kids, but am wondering what an appropriate response would be.)

I can see two responses-

encouraging my kids to say “under God” & sue the first school administrator that tries to forbid them;

discourage my kids from saying the “Godless” Pledge at school while we say the “under God” Pledge at home (my far less-preferred option).
Btw, I actually would have a morning liturgy with my hypothetical kids- Prayer, the Creed, the Two Great Commandments & the Pledge.

2

I don’t have any kids here, so this will be a hypothetical on top of a hypothetical. I’d support them doing whatever they wanted to do in regards to the pledge, I think, but if they asked me, I’d just tell them to say the pledge without the “Under God” part. The court would have had spoken. C’est la vie.

3

I would first remind them that they are not required by law to pledge to anything, tell them to remain silent while some of their classmates pledge, and to follow their hearts and minds and do what they feel they want to.

4

You’d make the Pledge of Allegiance part of your liturgy?

5

No offense, but you seem pretty confused. Your kids can recite any pledge they want, anytime, in school or out, and no one in this case was even asking to change that. Kids can recite the pledge with “Jesus Christ” if they want. This case was primarily about what TEACHERS do (and LEAD kids in doing), not what kids do.

Do you also forbid your kids to recite the “godless” alphabet? Are you aware of how silly it is to label something godless JUST because it doesn’t reference God in some way?

Personally, I agree with this blog’s take: http://www.reason.com/hitandrun/005660.shtml

Legally and morally, the case should have been a clear win for Newdow without the custody problem, but given that the court was not going to give us that verdict, this is probably the best option. And if they did strike the pledge, then we’d have to endure a lot of politicians pretending that they are all brave and edgy for proudly reciting the pledge over and over in front of TV cameras, as if that had anything to do with anything.

6

Maybe liturgy was the wrong word, in the sense of “rite of worship”- Morning ritual may be more appropriate- tho I could say that pledging loyalty to the society (with the qualifiers that such loyalty is “under God” & for the furthering of “liberty & justice for all”) is a re-affirmation of the Second Great Commandment.

7

Does anyone else find it funny that the end of the Pledge is just all screwed up?

“… under god (not really), indivisible (mostly) with liberty and justice for (most)”

8

So, you must be pretty bummed that Creed broke up before you had the kids, huh?

9

Creed broke up? That proves that God exists, and he has good taste.

10

Some help for a foreigner please? What is the Creed, the Two Great Commandments & the Pledge?

11

Actually, I was hoping someone would bring up the fact that any decision would NOT affect the legality of kids saying “under God”. which is why I’d teach my kids to say it. However, that does not mean some snippy school official wouldn’t reprimand a kid for saying it.
RE the term “godless”- I probably should have referred to it as a “degodded pledge”- tho since “God” was added to it, “God”'s exclusion would have made it explicitly “Godless” (since “God” has never been part of the alphabet, that would not be an issue- however, lets say someone decided to remove references to God from American history- that would leave some noticeable gaps).

12

The two former are some fundie Christian things (never was a big deal when I was a Christian, at least), the latter is the Pledge of Allegiance, where all the schoolkids line up and promise to play nice and not be rebels or terrorists or stuff. That’s about all you need to know.

13

If the OP is Protestant, her church probably has it’s own creed. However, she is likely referring the the Nicene, or Creed of the Apostles. It begins “We believe in one God, the Almighty, maker of Heaven and Earth, of all that is Seen and Unseen, etc.”

The Two Great Commandments were those handed out by Jesus when his followers asked him what the most important of the Ten Commandments were: Matt.22:36-40 - Master, which is the great commandment in the law? (37) Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. (38) This is the first and great commandment. (39) The second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. (40) On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.

and

Matt.7:12 - Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets.
The Pledge Of Allegiance is a short pledge of allegiance to the flag of the United States, and was written for Columbus Day prior to the 1892 Columbian Exposition.

It contains the text “I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America; and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, with liberty and justice for all.” The text under god was added to the pledge in 1954, and was challenged by a California atheist named Michael Newdow in 2000. He maintained that it was unConstitutional for the teacher in a public school to lead the children in a pledge that declared allegiance, in effect, to God.

14

Btw, if I were a teacher what would I do?

I would teach the “godless” :smiley: Pledge- and I would teach the history, that in the 1950s “under God” was added to distinquish the US from the USSR, and that in 2003-4, an atheist parent challenged it & had it removed, so I could not teach that as part of the Pledge’s text, but that the students were free to say or not say it as they wished.

15

The Creed is hardly a fundie Christian thing- it’s the statement of faith of the historic Church, agreed upon by Catholics, Orthodox & most Protestants.
The Two Great Commandments are the core teaching of Jesus quoting Deuteronomy & Leviticus- Love God with all you have & Love your neighbor as yourself.

16

The Creeds (The Apostles Creed and the Nicene Creed)-

I believe in God, the Father almighty,
creator of heaven and earth.
I believe in Jesus Christ, God’s only Son, our Lord.
He was conceived by the Holy Spirit
and born of the Virgin Mary.
He suffered under Pontius Pilate,
was crucified, died, and was buried.
He descended to the dead.
On the third day he rose again.
He ascended into heaven,
and is seated at the right hand of the Father.
He will come again to judge the living and the dead.
I believe in the Holy Spirit,
the holy catholic Church,
the communion of saints,
the forgiveness of sins,
the resurrection of the body,
and the life everlasting. Amen.
We believe in one God,
the Father, the Almighty,
maker of heaven and earth,
of all that is, seen and unseen.
We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ,
the only Son of God,
eternally begotten of the Father,
God from God, Light from Light,
true God from true God,
begotten, not made,
of one Being with the Father.
Through him all things were made.
For us and for our salvation
he came down from heaven:
by the power of the Holy Spirit
he became incarnate from the Virgin Mary,
and was made man.
For our sake he was crucified under Pontius Pilate;
he suffered death and was buried.
On the third day he rose again
in accordance with the Scriptures;
he ascended into heaven
and is seated at the right hand of the Father.
He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead,
and his kingdom will have no end.
We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life,
who proceeds from the Father and the Son.
With the Father and the Son he is worshiped and glorified.
He has spoken through the Prophets.
We believe in one holy catholic and apostolic Church.
We acknowledge one baptism for the forgiveness of sins.
We look for the resurrection of the dead,
and the life of the world to come. Amen.

The Two Greatest Commandments-
Jesus was asked what the greatest commandments of God were & he
answered, quoting Deuteronomy & Leviticus, “You shall love the Lord your
God with all your heart, all your mind, all your soul & all your strength; And you
shall love your neighbor as yourself.”

The Pledge of Allegiance-
I Pledge Allegiance to the flag of the United States of America
and to the Republic for which it stands, one Nation under God,
indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

The words “under God” were recently challenged in court by the atheist father
of a schoolgirl who was taught the Pledge. After a federal court ruled that the
words did violate the Constitutional seperation of religion & government, it was
contested up to the Supreme Court. Today the Supreme Court ruled that since the
father was not the custodial parent, he did not have sufficient right to bring the suit, especially since the mother who has main custody is a Christian & has no problem with the “under God” clause in the Pledge.

17

At which point, they would get handed a letter from the ACLU. Ironic, no?

No one is removing any references to god from history. They were talking about removing it from an official pledge of allegiance that we take to our flag.

Wouldn’t you agree that belief in god is not a requirement of being a patriotic citizen? If so, why is an affirmation of god’s authority over the country part of the pledge? Why isn’t that left up to believers, who know better than the government how they want to acknowledge whatever role they think god plays in the country.

And your logic doesn’t work. If someone came in an typed “god” into a line of C++ code where it didn’t belong, and the original programmer came and took it out again, how would that make the code anymore “godless” than it was to begin with? What’s the point of calling it godless and not calling the alphabet godless? Neither make any statement about god, pro or con.

18

Arghhh… You can teach about any version of the pledge text you want. If Newdow had his way you just couldn’t lead children in pledging allegiance to “one nation under god”. I could do with a little less “bearing false witness” in this debate.

19

So it would be degodded if god was removed. Hmm. Since god wasn’t in the original, do you generally refer to the current incarnation of the Pledge as “godded”? “With extra god”?

20

By this logic, the rights of atheists are not of course being infringed upon by your failure to have a big sign on your front lawn that says “There Is No God”; but if an atheist sneaked into your yard in the middle of the night and put up a sign that says “There Is No God”, then you would be infringing on the religious liberty of atheists when you took it down.