Freedom of Religion?

[Chancellare]

…

There have been some funny things said on these forums, and this is probably at the top of the list… Wow…

Reasons and citations thereof should be the basis for ‘things said on these forums’, don’t you think?

On the basis of such one can determine how funny one can be.

 

[KarenNC]

If the founding fathers, council members and the children in the bus were predominantly Athena worshippers, yes.

To quote you:
"In your example of the representative of the state, his actions can only favor non-religion because he cannot perform his prayers based on his religious conviction." By switching your focus from the person offering the prayer to now requiring that the audience be “predominantly Athena worshippers” in order for me to be allowed to pray according to my religious conviction, you turn your argument on its head.

You are not favoring a freedom of expression of personal religious conviction. You are favoring a government-sanctioned support of your religious conviction or, at best, that of the most popular religious conviction of the group regardless of what the religious conviction of the person leading the group may be. That is precisely what the government is trying to avoid. That is 180 degrees from “protecting the believer”.

So instead of your original post: “current US Justice system does not protect real freedom of religion for all” what you are actually advocating is not indeed “real freedom of religion for all” but only “freedom to express and agree with and join in public worship of the Deity of the majority of whatever group you happen to be in”. That will be interesting when you are in a group that is predominantly Muslim and are required to lead or participate in a public prayer to Allah in order to suit your audience.

You further said: But the ‘selves’ it recognizes as legitimate are ‘unencumbered’ ones, meaning only those who impugn the legitimacy of religious truth that imposes itself upon the mind or soul. US courts therefore consider any community which presumes a natural or supernatural claim over the consciences and wills of its members to have an illiberal and thus illegitimate view of man. In effect, such community and its members are eased out of the legal protection as we know it.
As such US jurisprudence cannot reverse itself and therefore can only rule accordingly: that prayers in public constitute a violation of ‘neutrality’ as defined above. Good for the atheists but sorry for believers. That makes ‘equal protection’ a sham."

The only “selves” you seem to recognize as legitimate are Christian ones, not merely theists as you state. My religion also “presumes a natural or supernatural claim over the consciences and wills of its members”. I am certainly a “believer”. What is it about requiring a popularity vote before engaging in my prayers and, if the majority worship some other Deities/Deity, changing my prayer to be a prayer to their Deities/Deity “protects” me as a believer?

There is already more than ample opportunity for and protection of folks to lead public participatory prayers among groups of their fellow believers. There is ample opportunity for and protection of folks to say prayers aloud in public to whichever Deity they may so choose. There is ample opportunity for those who hold government positions to do so when not specifically functioning in their role as a representative of the state.

There is not the freedom for the members of one group to presume that they may use their position as elected officials or employees of the state as a platform to require others to participate in public worship of a Deity that is not their own or in a manner that is not consistent with their worship. There is not the freedom for members of the most popular religious group to formally use willingness to worship in the style of or the Deity of another group in order to serve in an elected position or obtain a job with the state. Catholics should be glad of this. It has benefited them greatly over time and continues to do so.

 

[AndyF]

There was a Supreme Court case that wouldn’t allow certain Native Americans to practice religious ceremonies that involved hallucinogenic drugs. Likewise, I’m sure human sacrifice would be shut down if someone tried to restart the Aztec religion. Religious freedom is not absolute nor should it be.

My point was from the perspective of civil law.

The reality is that as of 2000 years ago, there is only one real religion.

AndyF

 

[KarenNC]

The reality is that as of 2000 years ago, there is only one real religion.

It is rare to find a Christian who is willing to admit that Christianity is only 2000 years old.

 

[Wirraway]

I started this thread because I realized that, after some readings, US Jurisprudence has adopted the fundamental view that ‘neutrality’ toward religion is essential to protecting all selves. But the ‘selves’ it recognizes as legitimate are ‘unencumbered’ ones, meaning only those who impugn the legitimacy of religious truth that imposes itself upon the mind or soul. US courts therefore consider any community which presumes a natural or supernatural claim over the consciences and wills of its members to have an illiberal and thus illegitimate view of man. In effect, such community and its members are eased out of the legal protection as we know it.
As such US jurisprudence cannot reverse itself and therefore can only rule accordingly: that prayers in public constitute a violation of ‘neutrality’ as defined above. Good for the atheists but sorry for believers. That makes ‘equal protection’ a sham.
Therein lies the root of many a consternation among historical Christians such as Catholics.

I wish you could cast your first amendment critique in the language that a constitutional lawyer would recognize. We are talking about the law here, so at least demonstrate a grasp of first amendment analysis.

Can you provide a citation to any federal decision where someone could find these holdings:

" But the ‘selves’ [the judiciary] recognizes as legitimate are ‘unencumbered’ ones, meaning only those who impugn the legitimacy of religious truth that imposes itself upon the mind or soul."

and:

“US courts therefore consider any community which presumes a natural or supernatural claim over the consciences and wills of its members to have an illiberal and thus illegitimate view of man. In effect, such community and its members are eased out of the legal protection as we know it.”

Where in any recorded decision would you find a ruling that religious belief posits an “illiberal and thus illegitimate view of man”?

The strawman detector has sounded.

Try to give relevant case cites, say, within the last 30 years and preferably to USSC decisions, the final arbiter of first amendment issues.

 

[Chancellare]

I wish you could cast your first amendment critique in the language that a constitutional lawyer would recognize. We are talking about the law here, so at least demonstrate a grasp of first amendment analysis.

Can you provide a citation to any federal decision where someone could find these holdings:

" But the ‘selves’ [the judiciary] recognizes as legitimate are ‘unencumbered’ ones, meaning only those who impugn the legitimacy of religious truth that imposes itself upon the mind or soul."

Citations:

1. Kenneth R. Craycraft in ‘The American Myth of Religious Freedom’, p 6
2. Murray, Deeper Significance, p 592

and:

“US courts therefore consider any community which presumes a natural or supernatural claim over the consciences and wills of its members to have an illiberal and thus illegitimate view of man. In effect, such community and its members are eased out of the legal protection as we know it.”

Citations:

1. Michael Sandel’s analysis of 1963 USSC decision in Abingdon v. Schempp
2. Thomas Jefferson, ‘Writings’, Merril D. Peterson, ed. (New York Library of America, 1984), 283-287 346-348

Where in any recorded decision would you find a ruling that religious belief posits an “illiberal and thus illegitimate view of man”?

Same citations above.

The strawman detector has sounded.

…directed back to you.

What’s yours?

 

[Chancellare]

To quote you:
"In your example of the representative of the state, his actions can only favor non-religion because he cannot perform his prayers based on his religious conviction." By switching your focus from the person offering the prayer to now requiring that the audience be “predominantly Athena worshippers” in order for me to be allowed to pray according to my religious conviction, you turn your argument on its head.

Your own bias is confusing you.
I did not switch Christianity for Diety Worship. You did.

If you insist on saying a prayer for Athena in front of non-Athena worshippers, nobody (except the 1st Amendment) is preventing you. Certainly not me.

If I was, I should not have raised this thread.

 

[KarenNC]

Your own bias is confusing you.
I did not switch Christianity for Diety Worship. You did.

If you insist on saying a prayer for Athena in front of non-Athena worshippers, nobody (except the 1st Amendment) is preventing you. Certainly not me.

No, the first amendment does not stop me from “saying a prayer for Athena in front of non-Athena worshippers”. I can do that all day long. It stops me, if I were a representative of the state in some form, from leading participatory public prayer to Athena when acting in my role as a representative of the state.

You put this in terms of theism vs. atheism. There are many more forms of belief in a Deity or Deities than Christianity.

So you do, then, expect that the public participatory prayer led by a representative of the state when acting in that role should reflect that of the majority of the audience, rather than the actual religious convictions of the person praying?

In order for such to be possible, there must be some mechanism for knowing the religious affiliation of one’s audience. How do you suggest that a public official or employee of the state would know in advance the religious affiliation (if any) of the members of any given group in order to determine which group is in the majority? Say a teacher walking into a classroom of students or a city council member walking into a public meeting?

 

[Exalt]

Reasons and citations thereof should be the basis for ‘things said on these forums’, don’t you think?

On the basis of such one can determine how funny one can be.

Haha…

Oh man, you’re hilarious.

Nice to wake up to something that makes me smile.

 

[Chancellare]

In order for such to be possible, there must be some mechanism for knowing the religious affiliation of one’s audience. How do you suggest that a public official or employee of the state would know in advance the religious affiliation (if any) of the members of any given group in order to determine which group is in the majority? Say a teacher walking into a classroom of students or a city council member walking into a public meeting?

You see, I’m actually on your side.
If you’re walking into a roomful of students in a chemistry class and you decide to talk about Chaucer’s opening lines in Canterbury Tales, my point is you should not be berated by the Principal (1st Amendment) simply because you have literary affinity with Chaucer’s works. But I cannot prevent the students from smirking from behind.

 

[KarenNC]

You see, I’m actually on your side.

No, actually, I don’t see that you are. I believe that the best way to protect individual religious freedom is precisely that separation of religious observance and acting as a representative of the state against which you are arguing. I simply wish it was more honored in actuality than in the breach around here.

If you’re walking into a roomful of students in a chemistry class and you decide to talk about Chaucer’s opening lines in Canterbury Tales, my point is you should not be berated by the Principal (1st Amendment) simply because you have literary affinity with Chaucer’s works. But I cannot prevent the students from smirking from behind.

Actually, if you were hired to teach those students chemistry, you should be berated, whether the students smirk or not and whether or not the room is 3/4 full of students who also enjoy Chaucer, because you are not doing what you were hired to do. You are instead choosing to use your position to push your own agenda. It is no different than if you were using your chemistry class time to train your students to sell Amway or extolling the virtues of Amway products above all others, using only Amway products in your experiments.

Those students are paying (or their parents are paying for them) to learn chemistry, not Chaucer. You are being paid to teach chemistry, not Chaucer. There is no inherent need to include Chaucer in a discussion of chemistry, even for historical purposes. Assigning the students to learn passages of Chaucer, to recite them in class, etc is inappropriate in your role of chemistry teacher, regardless of your “affinity”.

Allowing the students who are actually there to learn chemistry and are not interested in Chaucer the option of waiting in the hall while you engage in your study of Chaucer with the 3/4 who enjoy Chaucer and returning when you decide to get around to mentioning chemistry is not appropriate. Saying that you need to teach them Chaucer because you believe “their education is not complete without an intimate knowledge of Chaucer” is not appropriate.

It has nothing to do with your “literary affinity with Chaucer’s works”. It has nothing to do with whether Chaucer’s works have merit, whether his works are popular or whether they were part of the same history of Western civilization that also includes chemistry.

You are perfectly free to read Chaucer as often as you like on your own time, participate in clubs with fellow devotees of Chaucer, stage public performances of such, publish a newsletter about issues related to the study of Chaucer, etc…but not while you are supposed to be teaching chemistry.

You are even potentially free (depending on the rules of the school) to bring the collected works of Chaucer and keep them prominently displayed on your desk, wear a T-shirt that says “Geoff Rules” to class and serve as the sponsor for and advisor of the Chaucer club at the school as an extracurricular activity if such clubs are allowed for all authors. You are free to write, publish and market your own curriculum, “Chemistry for Chaucer-lovers”, for those who want all their (or their children’s) coursework to relate in some way to Chaucer. However, unless your principal hired you to teach Chaucer rather than or alongside chemistry, you are out of bounds and should be called on it.

Freedom of religion does not mean freedom from ever encountering any religion with which you do not agree, but it should and does mean that neither you nor your children should be expected to participate in public corporate worship of any Deity or Deities as a requirement for your participation in a government-funded (read “taxpayer-funded”) activity (ie a city council meeting, public school classroom, etc). That includes whether the worship of said Deity is “popular” among the participants of any given group or not.

 

[Chancellare]

No, actually, I don’t see that you are. I believe that the best way to protect individual religious freedom is precisely that separation of religious observance and acting as a representative of the state against which you are arguing. I simply wish it was more honored in actuality than in the breach around here.

Actually, if you were hired to teach those students chemistry, you should be berated, whether the students smirk or not and whether or not the room is 3/4 full of students who also enjoy Chaucer, because you are not doing what you were hired to do. You are instead choosing to use your position to push your own agenda. It is no different than if you were using your chemistry class time to train your students to sell Amway or extolling the virtues of Amway products above all others, using only Amway products in your experiments.

Those students are paying (or their parents are paying for them) to learn chemistry, not Chaucer. You are being paid to teach chemistry, not Chaucer. There is no inherent need to include Chaucer in a discussion of chemistry, even for historical purposes. Assigning the students to learn passages of Chaucer, to recite them in class, etc is inappropriate in your role of chemistry teacher, regardless of your “affinity”.

Allowing the students who are actually there to learn chemistry and are not interested in Chaucer the option of waiting in the hall while you engage in your study of Chaucer with the 3/4 who enjoy Chaucer and returning when you decide to get around to mentioning chemistry is not appropriate. Saying that you need to teach them Chaucer because you believe “their education is not complete without an intimate knowledge of Chaucer” is not appropriate.

It has nothing to do with your “literary affinity with Chaucer’s works”. It has nothing to do with whether Chaucer’s works have merit, whether his works are popular or whether they were part of the same history of Western civilization that also includes chemistry.

You are perfectly free to read Chaucer as often as you like on your own time, participate in clubs with fellow devotees of Chaucer, stage public performances of such, publish a newsletter about issues related to the study of Chaucer, etc…but not while you are supposed to be teaching chemistry.

You are even potentially free (depending on the rules of the school) to bring the collected works of Chaucer and keep them prominently displayed on your desk, wear a T-shirt that says “Geoff Rules” to class and serve as the sponsor for and advisor of the Chaucer club at the school as an extracurricular activity if such clubs are allowed for all authors. You are free to write, publish and market your own curriculum, “Chemistry for Chaucer-lovers”, for those who want all their (or their children’s) coursework to relate in some way to Chaucer. However, unless your principal hired you to teach Chaucer rather than or alongside chemistry, you are out of bounds and should be called on it.

Freedom of religion does not mean freedom from ever encountering any religion with which you do not agree, but it should and does mean that neither you nor your children should be expected to participate in public corporate worship of any Deity or Deities as a requirement for your participation in a government-funded (read “taxpayer-funded”) activity (ie a city council meeting, public school classroom, etc). That includes whether the worship of said Deity is “popular” among the participants of any given group or not.

Thanks for confirming that you are not truly free to express your religion as much as non-religion.

 

[KarenNC]

Thanks for confirming that you are not truly free to express your religion as much as non-religion.

Your definition of “truly free” appears to be “to do something in any manner that I desire in any place or situation and at any time that I desire simply because I desire it”. That is not the standard that is applied to any rights of any American citizens that I can see.

With rights and freedoms come responsibilities to your fellow citizens and with choices come consequences. As a consequence of their choice of employment, public officials and employees of the state are not free to use their positions in order to advance their own religious agenda by requiring public participation in the practice of their religion. This does not mean that they do not have the same rights to individual religious freedom as the rest of us.

 

[Chancellare]

Your definition of “truly free” appears to be “to do something in any manner that I desire in any place or situation and at any time that I desire simply because I desire it”. That is not the standard that is applied to any rights of any American citizens that I can see.

No.
It simply means both religion and non-religion should have equal protection under the law with full consent of and in accordance with the moral and social sensibilities of the community.

 

[KarenNC]

No. It simply means both religion and non-religion should have equal protection under the law with full consent of and in accordance with the moral and social sensibilities of the community.

I do not see a compelling argument to support the position that religion is not allowed equal protection because public officials and employees of the state are not allowed to force others to engage in participatory public worship as a requirement to participate in a taxpayer funded activity. This is certainly not equal protection for those of minority religions. What you are advocating reduces the definition of “religion” to nothing more than a dog and pony show done for the public eye. (Matthew 6: 5-6 comes to mind, I must admit)

What you are suggesting does not appear to be actual equal protection for individual religious conviction or expression. It appears to be a free-for-all of “whatever I can get away with in forcing others to publicly validate my religious choices”.

 

[Chancellare]

I do not see a compelling argument to support the position that religion is not allowed equal protection

As one previous poster said, no strawman argument please. (But who also failed to give his citations)

Please read my citations which come from Kenneth R. Craycraft in ‘The American Myth of Religious Freedom’. As such it is supported by legal and constitutional analysis with supporting corollary citations.

Afterwards you can come back discuss your counter-citations

Having none, yours is just an opinion.

 

[KarenNC]

As one previous poster said, no strawman argument please.

You are then saying that your own argument is a strawman?

Precisely what actions are you prevented from taking that you consider to be an abridgement of your freedom of religion?

 

[Chancellare]

You are then saying that your own argument is a strawman?

Precisely what actions are you prevented from taking that you consider to be an abridgement of your freedom of religion?

Read posts 25 and 26. If you can’t follow the points discussed, read my citations or Kenneth Craycraft’s works on USSC rulings.
.

 

[KarenNC]

Read posts 25 and 26. If you can’t follow the points discussed, read my citations or Kenneth Craycraft’s works on USSC rulings.
.

I have read posts 25 and 26. These posts contain page numbers, not points. I do not have access to the works you cite as I do not have copies of these books to hand. If you have an online source for them that can be linked and read, I will be glad to look at them and discuss those sources. Otherwise you are going to have to give some specific summations and examples of what you mean.

I am asking you to state examples of instances in which your personal religious convictions have been abridged or not provided equal protection to that of another religion or non-religion. Surely if this is as widespread as you claim, you will be able to give ample examples from your personal experience. So far the only thing that I have been able to determine that you feel is lacking is the ability of a public school teacher or public official to force others to participate in their personal religious worship activities at state-funded events. Further, that being able to so force others to comply is the heart and soul of true religious freedom. That is a very different thing from being free to express one’s religious convictions and to have the religious convictions of all be protected.

Religion is, purely and simply, not persecuted in this country, especially not Christianity.

 

[rwoehmke]

Non-Religion = Religion? Utter nonsense! How can non-religion be a religion? Aren’t we dealing with freedom of “religion”? Seems to me non-religion is off topic.