PLEDGE

[Exsubmariner]

[ QUOTE ]
America is, after all, a Christian nation, right?


[/ QUOTE ]

I'm sorry. I have to disagree.

America has welcomed Buddishts, Hindu, Muslim, Shinto, Jew, Catholic, Protestant, Satanist, Wiccan, Urainian, and quite a number of other religions I don't even know exist or can't remember.

One could say loosely that the Constitution was framed to benefit those who adhered to the puritan work ethic. If you eliminate the word puritan and replace it with the word strong or dedicated, you get a much more accurate picture.

America is not a "Christian" nation. "The Government shall make no law...."

It is more turely a capitalist nation. Once we stop confusing Christianity with Capitalism we'll do much better. Perhaps the Pledge should be changed to "One nation under Law" or "One nation for Profit."

X

[thatpfunk]

Exsub,
When you aren't trying to be extremely partisan your posts are very good.

Keep up the good posting [img]/images/graemlins/laugh.gif[/img]

[Cyrus]

[ QUOTE ]
Perhaps the Pledge should be changed to "One nation under Law" or "One nation for Profit."

[/ QUOTE ]

I think you're on to something.

[etgryphon]

[ QUOTE ]
The constitution guarantees freedom of religion, not freedom from religion. And you can just tell your little atheist spawn to skip that part when they recite it in school

From the Declaration of Independence:

" When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation."

Motto of the United States:

"On July 30, 1956 a law was passed stating that "the national motto of the United States is hereby declared to be 'In God we trust'." (70 Stat. 732. 36 U.S. Code 186)."

There is also an easy remedy to this situation. Congress has the constitutional power to strip the federal courts, including the Supreme Court, of their appellate jurisdiction on any matter in which they do not possess original jurisdiction. Such a measure passed the House last year but didn't make it to the Senate.

[/ QUOTE ]

I never thought I'd say this...

I'm going to go with Cyrus on this one

For the record, I am a very active Christian (i.e. church every sunday, try to read the Bible everyday, etc) I do not think the word "under God", even though I believe it, should be in the Pledge.

Specficially for the reason that Cyrus noted. I do not want to have to say "One Nation, who doesn't believe in God" if for some reason a good campaign gets the words changed.

The Pledge is to the Country not to a Religion. Now I will fight tooth and nail if someone says I can't meantion God or Jesus while I'm at school or a public function that is unconstitutional.

The Pledge should be changed.

-Gryph

[Exsubmariner]

Thanks for noticing pfunk. I appreciate that.

X

[Exsubmariner]

Now if only both sides of the isle would wise up and stop trying to bend the law to do their bidding, maybe we could sort this mess out.

I keep thinking about Whitewater. Partisan fighting allowed one man to be above the law. Something that should not have been allowed to happen.

I feel strongly that all sides simply view the law as a political tool to ram their agenda down everyone elses throat. If we elected true statesmen instead of greedy politicians who allow idot bureaucrats to run the government, maybe it wouldn't be this way. But, I see no generation of true statesmen to fill the void. This leaves only the military to step in in times of great national peril. I fear for the Republic. Honestly.

X

[andyfox]

What "God" do you think they mean? I don't think they're referring to Sklanskyanity. God is a eupmhemism for the Christian God.

[andyfox]

"Something needs to be done about this"

It's easy. Just take the words "under God," which were added during the McCarthy era to show how much better we were than the godless communists, back out of the pledge and there's no problem.

[DasLeben]

[ QUOTE ]
What "God" do you think they mean? I don't think they're referring to Sklanskyanity. God is a eupmhemism for the Christian God.

[/ QUOTE ]

I don't see where you get this from. The framers of the Constitution were not all Christians themselves, but rather Deists.

The references to the Declaration of Independence (which I replied to) mention a general "God," not "Jesus Christ."

[DVaut1]

[ QUOTE ]
I don't see where you get this from. The framers of the Constitution were not all Christians themselves, but rather Deists.

The references to the Declaration of the Independence (which I replied to) mention a general "God," not "Jesus Christ."

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Those who most ardently defend the continued presence of “under God” almost assuredly mean the Christian God.

I can't imagine that 'God-in-the-Pledge' defenders would support "One Nation under Allah", and I assume they would justify their opposition by falling back on "this country has a long history and heritage of Christianity" argument.

In other words, I find the ‘ceremonial references to God just signifies our respect for the Founding Fathers’ Deism’, but ‘ceremonial references of specific, non-Christian Gods is abjectly offensive to our Christian heritage’ arguments rather two-faced. Perhaps I've constructed a straw-man, but I'm willing to listen to other justifications for opposing "One Nation under Allah" (other than the one I provided) that would still validate the continued presence of other ceremonial references to a deity. I suspect almost all center around some notion of 'the United States is a Christian nation', or some (perhaps more innocuous sounding) argument derived from this, which hinge on vague notions of heritage and/or history, super-majorities, or some combination thereof.

I’m willing to bet, when pressed, most of the ardent defenders of ‘God-in-the-Pledge’ would concede that they believe the ‘God’ cited in the Pledge is a specific reference to a Christian God; which is rather ironic, given that the Supreme Court has ruled such ceremonial references to God (like the ones found in the Pledge) are legal because they’re religiously meaningless - again, it seems rather strange to me that serious Christians would be so willing to defend a practice that is more or less claiming this nation is 'under God' is nothing more than hollow chatter - unless (of course), they believed there was something more substantial behind the reference.