Non-Christian - not my brother

@joefromchicago,

That's a good thing Smile

0 Replies

@joefromchicago,

I suspect that you're willfully obtuse because you don't want to concede the point. A club doesn't necessarily imply access to exclusive truth--and in fact, you'd have to torture your arguments more than you have been doing to sustain such a claim.

Religions, on the other hand, do claim to have access to revealed truth, truth revealed by divinely inspired and therefore inerrant scripture. Religions--and this is especially true of conservative christian sects--consider that they have a duty to impose their version of the truth on others, under divine authority. That's considerably different from being simply the member of a club, no matter exclusive one alleges it to be.

2 Replies

@Thomas,

Thomas wrote:

joefromchicago wrote:
That's a difference in degree, not in kind.

That would be one of those questions on which you are wrong.

I've already pointed this out. I suspect that you'll enjoy no more success in getting through to him than i did.

0 Replies

@Setanta,

Setanta wrote:

I suspect that you're willfully obtuse because you don't want to concede the point. A club doesn't necessarily imply access to exclusive truth--and in fact, you'd have to torture your arguments more than you have been doing to sustain such a claim.

Religions, on the other hand, do claim to have access to revealed truth, truth revealed by divinely inspired and therefore inerrant scripture. Religions--and this is especially true of conservative christian sects--consider that they have a duty to impose their version of the truth on others, under divine authority. That's considerably different from being simply the member of a club, no matter exclusive one alleges it to be.

I have to go along with Setanta and Thomas on this one.

0 Replies

@joefromchicago,

joefromchicago wrote:

How do you get "inferior status" out of the statement "you [non-Christians] are not my brothers and sisters?" You're not my brother, but that doesn't mean I consider you to be inferior. It just means you're not my brother.

No, it means more than that. In most families, other things being equal, members can expect a level of cooperation from each other that they cannot expect from non-members. By contrast, the governor's cooperation with his citizens must be equal. That makes it inappropriate for him to pronounce that some Alabama citizens are "family" to him whereas others are not.

joefromchicago wrote:

That's just laughable. At no point did the governor associate one set of religious beliefs with the state. He made a religious statement during a religious service.

He did indeed make a religious statement during a religious service---

on the particular day of his inauguration as state governor
on a particular date that just happens happens to be an official United-States holiday
at a particular location that the National Park Service just happens to have declared a National Historic Landmark of the United States, because it's the site where the holiday's namesake organized the Montgomery bus boycott.
in a particular church, whose community the governor is not a member of, but that happens to lie the closest to the State Capitol's premises.
in a service that immediately followed the governor's inauguration, and is reasonably interpreted as an exercise in the civil religion traditionally practiced around such state ceremonies.

No association with the state there? Yeah right.

1 Reply

@Arella Mae,

Arella Mae wrote:

Thomas wrote:

Suppose I said, "Arella, gues what? You're a whore". Of course, you and your friends would get offended, so the next day I would offer the following for an "apology" : "I'm sorry if I offended Arella by pointing out she's a whore" Would that satisfy you? I think it shouldn't. By the same token, I don't think Bentley's "apology" should satisfy anyone who felt offended in the first place.

Why would I be offended? You would be lying because I am not a whore.

Yes I would, and no you're not, but that's not the point. The point is that one makes apologies for people whom one offended in the first place. And if it offended you that I'd call you a whore---it doesn't, but that's not the point---then you shouldn't accept an apology from me that merely says "I'm sorry it offended Arella that I pointed out she's a whore." You're entitled to demand that I retract the offending statement, too.

0 Replies

Note: Alabama.

It's not like the people of Alabama are going to put the fire to the heals of their governor. That Atheist convention may decide to bring more national attention to this.

In fact, given the attention the Atheist convention got in the national media because of the sign they put up, I'd not be surprised if this was a direct jab at them.

A
R
T

0 Replies

@Setanta,

Setanta wrote:

I suspect that you're willfully obtuse because you don't want to concede the point.

As someone who constantly claims that he never insults anyone unless he is insulted first, I'd like you to point out where I called you "obtuse" or something similar in this thread.

Setanta wrote:

A club doesn't necessarily imply access to exclusive truth--and in fact, you'd have to torture your arguments more than you have been doing to sustain such a claim.

If I argued that the Girl Scouts aren't a club, and I define "club" to exclude any organization that sells cookies, then I'd be begging the question. Likewise, if you argue that a religion can't be a club, and you define "club" to exclude any organization that "implies access to exclusive truth," then you are similarly begging the question. And so, by the way, was Thomas.

2 Replies

@Thomas,

Thomas wrote:

No, it means more than that. In most families, other things being equal, members can expect a level of cooperation from each other that they cannot expect from non-members. By contrast, the governor's cooperation with his citizens must be equal. That makes it inappropriate for him to pronounce that some Alabama citizens are "family" to him whereas others are not.

Would it be inappropriate for the governor to say "all Christians are my co-religionists, and all non-Christians are not my co-religionists?"

Thomas wrote:

He did indeed make a religious statement during a religious service---

on the particular day of his inauguration as state governor

on a particular date that just happens happens to be an official United-States holiday

at a particular location that the National Park Service just happens to have declared a National Historic Landmark of the United States, because it's the site where the holiday's namesake organized the Montgomery bus boycott.

in a particular church, whose community the governor is not a member of, but that happens to lie the closest to the State Capitol's premises.

in a service that immediately followed the governor's inauguration, and is reasonably interpreted as an exercise in the civil religion traditionally practiced around such state ceremonies.
No association with the state there? Yeah right.

Cripes! Now he can't make religious statements within a certain radius of the state capitol or on any federal holiday? This has got to be some kind of joke.

OK, I'll play along. Would what he said on MLK Day have been appropriate if he had delivered those remarks a month later in his own church in Tuscaloosa?

2 Replies

@joefromchicago,

joefromchicago wrote:

Would it be inappropriate for the governor to say "all Christians are my co-religionists, and all non-Christians are not my co-religionists?"

No, that would be fine. After all, this way of phrasing it wouldn't be raising any expectations of preferred treatment for co-religionists.

joefromchicago wrote:

OK, I'll play along. Would what he said on MLK Day have been appropriate if he had delivered those remarks a month later in his own church in Tuscaloosa?

"Appropriate" goes a little too far. But yes, I would have much less of a problem with it, to the point where I wouldn't care.

1 Reply

@joefromchicago,

joefromchicago wrote:

Cripes! Now he can't make religious statements within a certain radius of the state capitol or on any federal holiday? This has got to be some kind of joke.

You're changing the subject. The subject you had raised was that the governor didn't associate his religious beliefs with the state. My response on that subject is that the bullet points I listed, taken together, create an association between the governor's religion and the state, and a pretty strong one at that.

0 Replies

I think there are way too many "oh poor me don't you dare hurt my widdle feelings but I want freedom of speech so I can say anything to or about you that I want" arguments going on.

I can't figure some of you out. You'd get ticked if I called you my brothers/sisters in Christ and you weren't and then we got people getting ticked because they aren't his brothers/sisters in Christ and he is stating the truth.

Bunch of big babies. Seriously, I'd hate to see what some of you would do if someone really offended you. I agree with joefromchicago. Seriously, if people are going to let what this man said upset them so much I don't hold out much hope for them when the going really gets tough.

1 Reply

@joefromchicago,

I don't think individuals who hold elected offices have their own time insofar as they're within sight and earshot of the public--like being overheard while on the toilet, and especially when giving public speeches.

0 Replies

@joefromchicago,

joefromchicago wrote:

If I argued that the Girl Scouts aren't a club, and I define "club" to exclude any organization that sells cookies, then I'd be begging the question. Likewise, if you argue that a religion can't be a club, and you define "club" to exclude any organization that "implies access to exclusive truth," then you are similarly begging the question. And so, by the way, was Thomas.

To assess if ones reasoning constitutes question-begging, it often helps to recall what the question was. In your case, it was "What is a religion but a type of club?" My response is that religions are a particular kind of clubs, and that the particulars matter to this case. That's a valid answer to your question, not a begging of it. I never said that religions aren't clubs.

1 Reply

@Arella Mae,

Arella Mae wrote:

I can't figure some of you out. You'd get ticked if I called you my brothers/sisters in Christ

Only if you were talking as a government official in the context of government business.

1 Reply

@Thomas,

Are your feelings so sensitive you can't just say, "ya know, maybe he shouldn't have said it, but hey, he's human and I'm not going to let this upset my life because he has the same right to freedom of speech that I do?" It's not like the guy said, "I am going to introduce a bill stating everyone who is not a Christian should be made to follow ten steps behind Christians." Now THAT would upset and offend anyone.

Please understand I am not discounting anyone's feelings here. I honestly do not see the reason for such an uproar over a comment made in a CHURCH, where one should expect comments concerning beliefs to be heard.

1 Reply

@Arella Mae,

Arella Mae wrote:

Are your feelings so sensitive you can't just say, "ya know, maybe he shouldn't have said it, but hey, he's human and I'm not going to let this upset my life because he has the same right to freedom of speech that I do?"

My feelings are beside the point. The point is that Bentley's remarks were inappropriate in a republic that respects the separation of church and state.

Arella Mae wrote:

I honestly do not see the reason for such an uproar over a comment made in a CHURCH, where one should expect comments concerning beliefs to be heard.

That would be a fine rebuttal if the comment had been made just in a church. But it wasn't. It was also made on a National Historic Landmark, one block from the State Capitol, commemorating a national holiday, at the site that made this date a national holiday, in the immediate context of a state ceremony.

1 Reply

@Thomas,

He was in church. Are you telling me since he is the governor when he is in church he should not say anything religious?

He has freedom of speech. He had every constitutional right to say what he did. It didn't work out too well for him but it was still his right. Just like it is yours to try to take away his freedom by saying.....................oh wait, no, you don't have that right and neither do I.

Now you want to limit him to what type of church he can speak in or where it is? Who cares if it was a national landmark or not? People trample all over Golgotha where Christ was crucified. You don't see me raising a big baby stink about it.

2 Replies

@Arella Mae,

Arella Mae wrote:

He has freedom of speech. He had every constitutional right to say what he did. It didn't work out too well for him but it was still his right. Just like it is yours to try to take away his freedom by saying.....................oh wait, no, you don't have that right and neither do I.

The governor can't whitewash inappropriate acts just by intermingling them with appropriate ones. Granted, citizen Bentley has the freedom of speech, as well as the freedom to exercise his religion. That much is true. Governor Bentley, on the other hand, does not have the rightful power to establish his religion in the context of government business.

But that's what he did when he made exclusionary remarks in the context of a government ceremony, on a government holiday, at the government-anointed National Historic landmark that gave rise to the government holiday, in a speech about the deeds that gave rise to the government holiday. This makes governor Bentley's speech an inappropriate attempt to establish a privileged role for his religion. It's irrelevant that the same words are also free speech and free religious exercise by citizen Bentley.

0 Replies

Arella Mae- Let's look at this another way. You are part of the majority of Americans who are Christians. Suppose Christianity was not the majority religion, and the person who made the remarks was from another group that WAS the majority.

Would you think that what he said was appropriate in that scenario? Would you feel like this public servant was dividing the populace into two groups...........us and them, based on their religious preferences? Think a bit on it!

2 Replies

Non-Christian - not my brother

Related Topics

Quick Links

My Account

able2know