religious harmony

flaja wrote:

ebrown_p wrote:
4. Flaja brought up illegal people first... I responded with irony.

Are you off your meds or something? I did not introduce illegals into this thread; you did.

Actually we are both off our meds... it was Foofie who made the comment about illegal people that I responded to.

Forgive me if I get you two confused.

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Let's make the issue clear here...

There is one group of Americans who think that they are the "true" Americans and that all of the other people (who are legal citizens of America) should shape up and do as they (the true Americans) say.

Here is the problem with that...

I am an American citizen with equal rights under the law and as far as I am concerned these "true" Americans can take a hike.

There are two definitions of "Harmony"

1. That all Americans accept the rules and customs of the "true" Americans. That would mean that we would all fall into line and recite the pledge, say the prayers and make sure our political stands are acceptable to "them".

2. That the "true" Americans accept that not everyone is like them. This would mean that they would respect differences and understand that people who are different from them are just as valuable and worthy of respect. In this case the "true" Americans can recite the pledge and respect America in their way... and the "other" Americans will respect America in ways that are meaningful to them.

Let me assure you-- the first definition of "harmony" is out. We just aren't going to let one group of "true" Americans control everything; no matter how self-righteous they are.

So the question is: Can Americans learn to respect their differences and get along?

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ebrown_p wrote:

flaja wrote:
ebrown_p wrote:
4. Flaja brought up illegal people first... I responded with irony.

Are you off your meds or something? I did not introduce illegals into this thread; you did.

Actually we are both off our meds... it was Foofie who made the comment about illegal people that I responded to.

Forgive me if I get you two confused.

Aren't you the one who started talking about compassion for illegals? You are the one who tried to send this thread off on a tangent.

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ebrown_p wrote:

Let me assure you-- the first definition of "harmony" is out. We just aren't going to let one group of "true" Americans control everything; no matter how self-righteous they are.

So the question is: Can Americans learn to respect their differences and get along?

In a sense, this is a pretty damned stupid question--although, of course, i understand why E_Brown poses it, rhetorically.

We have already learned to respect one another's differences for more than two centuries, and to increasingly tolerant degrees. Jefferson wrote his famous "wall of separation" letter to the Baptist Congregation of Danbury, Connecticut, who were offended that the State of Connecticut merely tolerated them by special dispensation of the legislature, which otherwise supported a Congregationalist establishment.

Initially, of course, most people's idea of tolerance was that one christian sect would tolerate others. But the "thousand natural shocks" to which society is heir were never far off. Joseph Smith's crackpot visions lead to the establishment of what has become, arguably, the most successful new "christian" sect since the days of the Reformation--Mormonism. The initial willingness to tolerate on the part of the public was virtually non-existent--Smith was killed and the Illinois militia was called out to expel the Mormons. The Mormons eventually went to war with the United States in a failed attempt to assert their independence and to establish their own version of the "godly republic in the wilderness."

We are now arrived, after two centuries, at a point at which crackpot christian extremists are attempting to reverse those hundreds of years of establishing tolerance rather than religious particularism. That is bad enough--it's even worse to see hare-brained ideas such as Herr Flaja proposes here advanced as if they were plausible, and not poisonous to the entire spirit of our Constitution in its relationship (or rather lack thereof) with religion.

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ebrown_p wrote:

So many questions....

3. You don't know your history. Jewish Americans have always been at the forefront of the battle to keep the separation of church and state. This makes sense if you can put yourself in the shoes of a minority religion.

The "history" of some American Jews (yes, they like the word American first) being involved in efforts, to maintain a separation of Church and State, has nothing to do with the reality that the vast majority of American Jews consider themselves as American as their Christian neighbors, and therefore their children are not advised that the Pledge of Allegiance is not for them to recite.

You know the old saying, "a rose, is a rose, is a rose." Well, within your statement there is the inference that "a Jew, is a Jew, is a Jew." I consider the inference a false premise, and assuming you are not an anti-Semite, unbeknownst to you the inference is anti-Semitic. (The definition of anti-Semitism is when one considers Jews "inherently" different, by virtue of their being Jews/Jewish.) Being a member of a minority religion does not equate to antipathy towards the majority religion. A popular, but specious notion.

Considering that the vast majority of American Jews are secular, or subscribe to any of four denominations of Judaism in the U.S. (Reform, Conservative, Orthodox, Reconstructionist) your claim about Judaism and Jews in the U.S. is specious, simply because one cannot generalize about such a diversity within a religion. (And those ultra-Orthodox that live in a totally religious world send their children to Yeshiva; they are not using state funds to educate their children, and the Pledge of Allegiance is just not part of their reality; not adversarial, just not part of their world. However, Conservative Hebrew Day schools do have the Pledge of Allegiance for students.)

Making the preference for separation of Church and State a Jewish thing is really inferring that Jews don't think for themselves, but march mentally in lockstep. Can you see how offensive that is?

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To inject a little sanity into this discussion (which has so far displayed precious little of that commodity), it is worth noting that the "Pledge of Allegiance" was written by a Baptist minister, and yet in its original form contained no reference to god.

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Setanta wrote:

and yet in its original form contained no reference to god.

Which is EXACTLY why we should revert back to the original.

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Quote:

The "history" of some American Jews (yes, they like the word American first) being involved in efforts, to maintain a separation of Church and State, has nothing to do with the reality that the vast majority of American Jews consider themselves as American as their Christian neighbors, and therefore their children are not advised that the Pledge of Allegiance is not for them to recite.

You have it completely backward. The problem has never been whether American Jews consider themselves as American as their Christian neighbors.

The problem has always been the "Christian neighbors".

There are plenty of people who consider themselves "fully American" who advise their children not to recite the Pledge of Allegiance.

Whether YOU consider people who don't agree with you to be "fully American" or not shouldn't be an issue at all.

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( sorry)
Religious Harmony is the subject.
I am an Athiest and a die har Gandhi-cum- communist to boot with.

I know a little bit about religion( HINDU...............................CHRISTIAN)

Why you need God?
Why the Hell Jesus a son of an Unknown God is popular in compassionate, consume oriented country?
Is Jesus a communist ?
Why the hell jesus had a personal Telephone to order the resident of WH to torture, rape, loot the innocent xyz land?

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ebrown_p wrote:

Quote:

The "history" of some American Jews (yes, they like the word American first) being involved in efforts, to maintain a separation of Church and State, has nothing to do with the reality that the vast majority of American Jews consider themselves as American as their Christian neighbors, and therefore their children are not advised that the Pledge of Allegiance is not for them to recite.

You have it completely backward. The problem has never been whether American Jews consider themselves as American as their Christian neighbors.

The problem has always been the "Christian neighbors".

There are plenty of people who consider themselves "fully American" who advise their children not to recite the Pledge of Allegiance.

Whether YOU consider people who don't agree with you to be "fully American" or not shouldn't be an issue at all.

I never said that those who don't agree with me are not fully American. I just said American Jews don't usually have a problem with the Pledge of Allegiance because it mentions God, and that goes against the separation of Church and State.

And the fact that some "Christian neighbors" (your point above) may consider Jews to be, a priori, less American than Christians is just a reflection of the indelible nature of anti-Semitism. That, for American Jews, has nothing to do with whether the Pledge of Allegiance is something they don't value. Europe historically considered Jews as the "perennial outsiders," and not a true citizen of the respective country, as a Christian would be. This is nothing new to Jews. It just shows that anti-Semitism in its basest form can travel across an ocean and be adopted elsewhere.

But it is interesting, that you feel like you can be a spokesman for American Jews in their feelings towards the Pledge of Allegiance, perhaps because in Boston you surely know a good assortment. But, you likely are best at knowing the well mannered Boston Jew (NYC's mayor comes from Boston). You don't know the New York Jew to the same degree, I'd guess. Not always as deferent to those that think they can opine about Jews with their very Goyisha brain.

And, you having been a teacher, the only correct answer to my post to you is, "Sorry." If you can't own up to the audaciousness, in my opinion, of your being a spokesman for American Jews, just don't respond, and move on to other posters. Thank you.

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