Saturday, April 13, 2019

In God We Trust, Not So Much the South Dakota Legislature

I am just furious with our provincial, back-woods prairie Legislature forcing "In God We Trust" to be posted in our our schools, for no purpose except to make smug "christians" feel good about their "serving" in Pierre.
One of the proponents of this nonsense said on Facebook today (it's so stupid I chose not to insert his name here, too embarrassing to his wife):
As a country that was founded on Christian values, I do not find a problem with putting “ In God We Trust” in public schools.
That to me is a long way from the state sanctioning a religion.
In my conservative[sic] opinion
Mrs. Radical responded, reminding me why I decided to cast my lot with her with no reservations almost twenty years ago. 
Wow . What you don't know about history is a lot. Depending on who you ask, there were 7-10 founding fathers. For the sake of argument, let's say there were 10. Of those 10: 

1. George Washington. In his letter to the Touro Synagogue, he assured American Jews that their religious liberty was as important as anyone else's, and outlined a vision of a multi-faith society.

2. John Adams rejected belief in the Trinity and the divinity of Jesus, core concepts of Christianity. In his famous Treaty of Tripoli, he states, "the government of the United States of America is not in any sense founded on the Christian Religion….”

3. Thomas Jefferson did not believe in the Trinity, the virgin birth, the divinity of Jesus, the resurrection, original sin and other core Christian doctrines. He refused to issue proclamations calling for days of prayer and fasting, saying that such religious duties were no part of the chief executive’s job. His assertion that the First Amendment erects a “wall of separation between church and state” still rankles the Religious Right today.

4. James Madison was perhaps the strictest church-state separationist among the founders. One of the authors of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, also opposed government-issued prayer proclamations.

5. Thomas Paine was a radical deist who attacked institutionalized religion and all of the major tenets of Christianity. He rejected prophecies and miracles and called on readers of his work, the Age of Reason, to embrace, well, reason.

So, tell me again how our country was founded on Christian values?

And yes, the "in God we trust" and "under God" baloney was added in the mid 1900s in direct response to the United States freaking out over Communism. Had NOTHING to do with the founding of this country.

No comments:

Post a Comment

Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.