@cicerone imposter,
You continually speaking in the name of science is ridiculous ci. You don't know any. All the above, on which you comment so casually, is inevitable. So much so that one might justifiably consider the possibility that it was engineered by the Founding Fathers (all patriarchs) with an eye on the main chance for the legal profession. The FFs must have known that religion is an integral part of human nature and ineradicable. And they must have known that Church and State had been in an intimate union since about the 4th century as dual arms of government with power shifts between them along the way but never sundered.
The separation of Church and State in the Federal Constitution is sometimes said to have had unexpected effects. But that assumes that the FFs were a bit thick and didn't know what they were doing. That's an assumption I don't make. I would maintain, purely for the purpose of the argument of course, that not only were the effects not unexpected but that the separation was specifically designed to cause them and was successful in doing so. I support the conspiracy theory of history consistent with ID rather than the Cock-up theory of the evolutionists.
The effect, which I think intended, was to let Americans choose their religion which is obviously a move back to heresy, faction and presumably ending in full blown Paganism. That's when there are so many gods that there's a god of the ashtray and the potato peeler which causes divine glory to be diluted and the god of war becomes just another god, along with the god of underpants, rather than a God to crusade for.
Religion cut loose. The result, obviously, is as many denominations as there were in the days of Marcion and Bar Daisan and, dare I say, Thelca who scoffed at men's beards and who deserves to have a shaving product named after her. And these denominations flourish.
The freedom to choose any version of Christianity, and there were a lot, no matter how emotional or how base the appeal. And they could be marketed as consumer choices with the flair for business and commerce which has been so expertly practiced in the USA on a whole range of products such as minted toothpaste and white-wall tyres. Marginal groups and various niches, both exploited and created, reach the point where orthodoxy disintegrates and the niches are all there is. Like with curtain patterns. Politicians, mainly legal types, are the only source of guidance once orthodoxy has disintegrated. And very few of them dare contradict their wives on anything of importance as some cult leaders have done. Mr Squeaky-Clean is in charge now. Anybody with a brilliant future beckoning him had better watch his step.
And how wonderful all this is for atheists. It allows them to pick out from this multiplicity of heresies and target one they choose, an extreme nutty one for preference on the SD principle, (that's sitting duck), as wande so often does, and by concentrating their vituperation on their choice they convince themselves that they are attacking and discrediting Christianity itself and, by extension, all beliefs and religious observances. A grand delusion if ever there was one.
Hence it comes about that the constitutional separation of Church and State functions in the same way for atheists as does setting a sitting duck on the porch taffrail does for the armchair hunter so he can pose as a real hunter by carrying a dead duck about with him in the selfsame psychological state that thinks of itself as having potted orthodox Christianity by potting one or two of the tailor-made consumer choices available which, it has to be admitted, requires very little expertise as can be seen on these threads.
In ordinary bar-room language it is a complete and utter wimpy cop-out which, if not done cynically as Saint Paul recommended, flags up a woeful lack of understanding of even the simplest aspects of these matters. Being abled to pretend that they have anything significant to say is the very reason anti-IDers adhere, like **** to a blanket, to the doctrine of the separation of Church and State which is a wedge that allows them to flatter themselves into thinking that they are attacking Christianity and they are actually not even coming close in the same way that the armchair hunter couldn't hit a flying duck.
Nor do they touch the essence of these cults they pick out so carefully when they are seen collectively just as they don't go anywhere near the social consequences of destroying that essence which one might expect as there is no chance of them doing so because the crass banalities of science are not enough for the masses and the spokespersons for science are no match for the charismatic preachers in alliance with American business enterprise.
