John Creasy wrote:Setanta wrote:I've not characterized you as evil or wanting to convert anyone to "the dark side." You just make yourself appear more ridiculous by making such a silly claim.
"Devout atheists?" That's truly hilarious. As it happens, in the treaty with the Bey of Algiers, the Fifth United States Congress asserted that the United States is not founded in any regard upon the Christian religion. Does that mean they rejected "god's morals" and replaced them with their-own man-made morals? You cannot demonstrate the existence of your fairy-tale deity, so why should anyone reasonably believe that the morality of which you speak is any less man-made?
You have avoided entirely the question of whether or not putative atheists have ever set out to destroy others because of their religious opinions. You have asserted that communists, acting apparently upon their alleged atheism, destroyed 100 million people--can you prove that? Can you prove that they were motivated by atheism?
Any time you're ready, i can write page after page on the willful campaigns to destroy others instigated by religionists who stated that their god authorized those murders. Any time you feel up to it.
Yes, devout atheists, as in someone who denies even the possibility of God's existence. I can't prove God's existence any more than you can prove the non-existence of God. I never claimed to. No nobody that I know of has ever killed strictly in the name of atheism. Does that mean that atheists are right about God?? I don't think so. The point I was trying to make was that until somewhat recently, killing was common throughout the world and in no way restricted to religion. Are you telling me that the clergy and religious people were not persecuted in Russia? How about what has been done to the Jews?
The US government of the early 13 colonies sanctioned the diversity of religion, i.e. The Pilgrims, Quakers, Anabaptists and even Jewry...
Thus we cannot say the State was separate from God but allowed God to exist within it's midst.
The separation of church and state was not to rid the state of God but to position the state to dynamically coexist with most all non extreme faiths.
Thus the separation of church and state ensured harmony between the church, state and God. It was to allow religion to perpetuate by it's own democratic nature... This separation took the choice out of the Governments hands and placed it in the individuals own will.
This accomplished several things.
It took the authority of God from the state and placed it into a the hands of a democratic society. The state could never again claim to be God...
Then it created a republic to protect this diversity of faiths. The republic is only to see that diversity and personal liberty is not persecuted.
This does not mean that in the time it has taken to realize the full meaning of separation of church and state that mistakes have not been made along the way.
Such is the nature of the "ideals" that our founding fathers perceived.
They perceived and idea of a "free" world but the reality of the time was different.
They perceived a state free of religion but many of its constituents had their own strong diverse spiritual beliefs. Yet they found common understanding.
They as a whole did not want any one "belief" to usurp all freedoms and liberty including their own. This could then infect the state and bring back the religious tyranny of England and Rome...
The separation of church and state is that the state accept "all" religions as long as they respect human spiritual anonymity, basic dignity and each persons own right to religious individuality... It is the states duty and obligation to protect religious freedom and human liberty at all cost.
