Separation of church and state

[Richca]

…Seems fairly arbitrary. Why not a separation of Holywood and state? Or science and state?

I know that there are historical reasons for this.For example, the religious wars in Europe and Americans trying to set aside their religious differences for the sake of building up a better world. Seems like in the states it is the IRS that polices this boundary.Seems like Obama and Biden want to shrink the domain of church into an ever smaller territory.

Any thoughts on what the proper boundary, if any, should be?

God bless,
Ut

The state oversteps its boundary when it makes any law contrary to the natural law which is based on the eternal divine law of God such as the law on the woman’s so called right to abortion.

 

[utunumsint]

Soviet Russia (China, et al) was more than just simple separation of church and state though. We have a fairly nominal separation in places like Canada, Australia and New Zealand and it doesn’t cause many problems. The soviets went down a much darker path, they weren’t just secular (that is, having nothing to do with religion OR lack of religion as well, the question of religion doesn’t pop up) they were avowedly an Atheistic state (as opposed to secular) and they were anti-religion and anti-clerical.

I’m an atheist (granted not one of those “new atheist” richard dawkins types) but i certainly wouldn’t support this kind of thing. If it were happening i’d be fighting on the side of the religious.

As i was saying earlier, i think its the degree of separation thats the important thing.

Agreed. Maybe what we need is a better definition of what the secular is. Perhaps if we better define this term we can come to a better conclusion about what the boudaries and degrees of separation are.

A quick google search brings up a lot of hits:

sec·u·lar
adjective /ˈsekyələr/ 
1.Denoting attitudes, activities, or other things that have no religious or spiritual basis

• secular buildings
• secular moral theory
  2.(of clergy) Not subject to or bound by religious rule; not belonging to or living in a monastic or other order

 

[GaryTaylor]

The state oversteps its boundary when it makes any law contrary to the natural law which is based on the eternal divine law of God such as the law on the woman’s so called right to abortion.

“If Congress can employ money indefinitely to the general welfare,
and are the sole and supreme judges of the general welfare,
they may take the care of religion into their own hands;
they may appoint teachers in every State, county and parish
and pay them out of their public treasury;
they may take into their own hands the education of children,
establishing in like manner schools throughout the Union;
they may assume the provision of the poor;
they may undertake the regulation of all roads other than post-roads;
in short, every thing, from the highest object of state legislation
down to the most minute object of police,
would be thrown under the power of Congress… Were the power
of Congress to be established in the latitude contended for,
it would subvert the very foundations, and transmute the very nature
of the limited Government established by the people of America”

James Madison

 

[ThinkingSapien]

Agreed. Maybe what we need is a better definition of what the secular is. Perhaps if we better define this term we can come to a better conclusion about what the boudaries and degrees of separation are.

A quick google search brings up a lot of hits:

sec·u·lar
adjective /ˈsekyələr/ 
1.Denoting attitudes, activities, or other things that have no religious or spiritual basis

• secular buildings
• secular moral theory
  2.(of clergy) Not subject to or bound by religious rule; not belonging to or living in a monastic or other order

There was a medical student that i thought did a fairly decent presentation on secular morality that may be useful.

youtube.com/watch?v=uFNusjjAZNA

Pardon my mistakes. Sent from my kobile device.

 

[utunumsint]

There was a medical student that i thought did a fairly decent presentation on secular morality that may be useful.

youtube.com/watch?v=uFNusjjAZNA

Pardon my mistakes. Sent from my kobile device.

So in your opinion, is what this medical student describes in this video the only basis for estabilishing laws in the secular realm? Would this be the only form of delibration possible for determining laws because of the separation of church and state?

God bless,
Ut

 

[utunumsint]

So in your opinion, is what this medical student describes in this video the only basis for estabilishing laws in the secular realm? Would this be the only form of delibration possible for determining laws because of the separation of church and state?

God bless,
Ut

 

[utunumsint]

“If Congress can employ money indefinitely to the general welfare,
and are the sole and supreme judges of the general welfare,
they may take the care of religion into their own hands;
they may appoint teachers in every State, county and parish
and pay them out of their public treasury;
they may take into their own hands the education of children,
establishing in like manner schools throughout the Union;
they may assume the provision of the poor;
they may undertake the regulation of all roads other than post-roads;
in short, every thing, from the highest object of state legislation
down to the most minute object of police,
would be thrown under the power of Congress… Were the power
of Congress to be established in the latitude contended for,
it would subvert the very foundations, and transmute the very nature
of the limited Government established by the people of America”

James Madison

So I guess in this point of the view, the idea of limited Government was to preserver the religious realm from undue manupulation and coersion by the government. Free market would allow for the greatest amount of freedom of choice in determining what is right and wrong regardless of you religious world view.

God bless,
Ut

 

[utunumsint]

Here is an interesting definition of Secularism from Charles Taylor:

davidewart.ca/2007/12/synopsis-of-cha.html

Taylor notes there are three kinds of secularism.

1.The first stage is characterized by the withdrawal of the religious world-view from the public sphere. This is the result of much more than just the rise of scientific world-view. This is the disenchantment of the cosmos. Secularism is the move from the enchanted reality to the de-enchanted reality - this freed science to follow its own trajectory. In an enchanted worldview science, politics and religion all shared the same world view. When that enchanted world-view disappeared science became free to follow its own rationale.
2.The second stage is seen in the decline in personal religious practice and commitment. This is a individual’s withdrawal from the community. People shift the source of meaning away from external ‘eternal’ sources to more personal choices.
3.The third stage is the most recent development, which has caused a fragmentation of our ideas of social order. This is the shift in the culture away from assuming Religious Faith is the norm, or the default expectation of how to live your life. Faith is now one option among many. This is society living in a universe which has no central point around which it revolves.

Secularism is a world view, a philosophy like any other. It is not necessarily an accurate description of reality. It is currently the most powerful world-view at play in Western society.

God bless,
Ut

 

[TEPO]

To Gary Taylor - or in fact, anyone who wants to reply - Does it make any different that Jefferson and most of the Founding Fathers were Deists? Meaning, they didn’t believe in the concept of God intervening or causing miracles and so forth, rather they believed in Naturalism, that God makes the world go around and created the things in it and that is about as far as it would go, right? (Doubt my definition would pass in grad school, but I don’t want to write a thesis here. Apologies!!!)

Also thinking, we are all not of the same religion, so you would have to ask yourself, WHICH church and state? All religions? Or only Christianity?

Thanks! VG

It makes all the difference in the world… Jefferson was a horrible father and a horrible husband to his wife. He is also known For creating his own bible in which all the miracles and supernatural events of Jesus are omitted!
en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jefferson_Bible

I’m ashamed personally to refer to Jefferson as a “founding father”.

 

[sedonaman]

A major shortcoming of the use of metaphor in legal analysis is that a metaphor, in equating two distinct objects, can easily lend itself to faulty comparisons. For instance, a wall restricts parties on both sides; but the First Amendment was meant to restrict only the federal government. When Justice Hugo Black in his decision in the 1947 Everson v. Board of Education case called Jefferson’s wall the definitive interpretation of the First Amendment, he capitalized on the image, declaring, “That wall must be kept high and impregnable.” This is an even greater broadening of the First Amendment’s scope. Dreisbach notes that some have called a high and impregnable wall a “wall of spite,” and that good neighbors would prefer a low New England stone wall, at which neighbors can meet and speak. An amicus brief filed in Everson warned against turning the wall of separation into an iron curtain. Others have suggested the images of a wall with doors or guarded gaps, like the Great Wall of China; a barbed wire fence; and even a prison wall. The fact that all of these conceptions of the wall with their conflicting legal corollaries can be (and are) drawn from Jefferson’s wall demonstrates how problematic the metaphor is.

Different readings of the wall metaphor result in an inconsistent array of decisions dealing with church and state: confusion over school vouchers, prayer, or crèches in public schools, the tune “God Bless America,” the words “Under God” in the Pledge of Allegiance, etc. More often than not, the metaphor’s ambiguity has made it an easy cudgel to be used by radical secularists and other unprincipled partisans to promote their political agendas. … – Daniel L. Dreisbach’s Thomas Jefferson and the Wall of Separation Between Church and State
By Joseph A. P. De Feo
(book review from Catalyst March 2003)
catholicleague.org/research/dreisbach.htm

If we were to poll everyone in the US and asked them what “separation of church and state” meant, we would get 300 million different answers. One meaning appears to be what is termed “strict separatist”. Mine is different. So whose definition do we use? It doesn’t really matter because, like an “extraterrestrial is from outside the planet earth, “separation of church and state” is “extra-Constitutional” – from outside the Constitution., courts cannot interpret what is not in it. Besides, the phrase is so overly broad that it is meaningless. However, here is a court interpretation of the First Amendment from a case, ACLU vs. Mercer Co., in which the Sixth Circuit Court ruled the following:

“…Under the endorsement [of religion] test, the government violates the Establishment Clause when it acts in a manner that a reasonable person would view as an endorsement of religion. … This is an objective standard, similar to the judicially-created ‘reasonable person’ standard of tort law. … Accordingly, we do not ask whether there is ANY person who could find an endorsement of religion, whether SOME people may be offended by the display, or whether SOME reasonable person MIGHT think [the government] endorses religion. Rather, the inquiry here is whether THE reasonable person WOULD conclude that Mercer County’s display has the effect of endorsing religion. …

“The ACLU makes repeated reference to ‘the separation of church and state.’ This extra-constitutional construct has grown tiresome. The First Amendment does not demand a wall of separation between church and state.. See Capitol Square, dismissing strict separatism as ‘a notion that simply perverts our history’. Our Nation’s history is replete with governmental acknowledgment and in some cases, accommodation of religion. See, e.g., Marsh v. Chambers, upholding legislative prayer; McGowan v. Maryland, upholding Sunday closing laws; see also Lynch, ‘There is an unbroken history of official acknowledgment by all three branches of government of the role of religion in American life from at least 1789’; Capitol Square, describing historical examples of governmental involvement with religion. After all, ‘[w]e are a religious people whose institutions presuppose a Supreme Being’, Zorach. Thus, state recognition of religion that falls short of endorsement is constitutionally permissible.” – Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals, ACLU of Kentucky vs. Mercer County, KY [Emphasis in original]
ca6.uscourts.gov/opinions.pdf/05a0477p-06.pdf

If we had erected a “wall”, religious people would never have been able to demand the abolition of slavery, since religious reasons were their motivation. In fact, “I wouldn’t own a slave, but will not force my beliefs on others” was actually used to straddle the political fence on the issue in antebellum times.

---

“The ‘wall of separation between church and State’ is a metaphor based on bad history, a metaphor which has proved useless as a guide to judging. It should be frankly and explicitly abandoned – Justice William Rehnquist in Wallace v. Jaffree

 

[TEPO]

This is who Jefferson really was… Hardly a Christian at all -just read some of his quotes…!

nobeliefs.com/jefferson.htm

 

[ThinkingSapien]

So in your opinion, is what this medical student describes in this video the only basis for estabilishing laws in the secular realm? Would this be the only form of delibration possible for determining laws because of the separation of church and state?

God bless,
Ut

Presentations tend to be a summary and not a complete expressions of the totality of a subject matter. I don’t take it as an expression of the only motivations for establishing laws. I shared the video becuase i thought it was a fairly articulate expression and there seemed to be a false equivalency potentially developing with being non-religious and secular with some other non-religious figures in history that were known for being destructive to society. While i would not expect any one that saw the video to adopt his view i thought his presentation may be helpful in distinguishing between the two.

Pardon my mistakes. Sent from my mobile device.

 

[Bl_Pope_Pius_IX]

I don’t want to derail this discussion on this topic, but I understood that the Syllabus is not official church teaching. Is there any more official sources that say this? For example the Catechism or Papal Encyclicals?

God Bless,
Ut

The Syllabus was an Encyclical. It is, most certainly, official and certainly binding. How is it not?

EDIT: Upon further review, the Syllabus was delivered as an encyclical letter, but it acts as a conglomeration of encyclicals and miscellaneous addresses given by the Holy Father. In any case, it remains binding, and Catholics are to submit to it.

 

[utunumsint]

Presentations tend to be a summary and not a complete expressions of the totality of a subject matter. I don’t take it as an expression of the only motivations for establishing laws. I shared the video becuase i thought it was a fairly articulate expression and there seemed to be a false equivalency potentially developing with being non-religious and secular with some other non-religious figures in history that were known for being destructive to society. While i would not expect any one that saw the video to adopt his view i thought his presentation may be helpful in distinguishing between the two.

Pardon my mistakes. Sent from my mobile device.

Understood. Thanks for clarifying.

God bless,
Ut

 

[TEPO]

The Syllabus was an Encyclical. It is, most certainly, official and certainly binding. How is it not?

EDIT: Upon further review, the Syllabus was delivered as an encyclical letter, but it acts as a conglomeration of encyclicals and miscellaneous addresses given by the Holy Father. In any case, it remains binding, and Catholics are to submit to it.

So Pope Pius IX made an official error involving matters of faith and morals? I thought that wasn’t possible.

 

[utunumsint]

Interesting Quote from an Address to the diplomatic corp from Pope John Paul II:

People often invoke the principle of secularity, legitimate in itself if it is understood as the distinction between the political community and religions (cf. Gaudium et Spes, n. 76). But distinction does not mean ignorance! **Secularity is not secularism! It is nothing other than respect for all beliefs on the part of the State that assures the free exercise of ritual, spiritual, cultural and charitable activities by communities of believers. In a pluralistic society, secularity is a place for communication between the different spiritual traditions and the nation. Church-State relations can and must, on the contrary, lead to a respectful dialogue conveying fruitful experiences and values for the future of a nation. **There is no doubt at all that a healthy dialogue between the State and the Churches - which are not rivals but partners - can encourage the integral development of the human person and harmony in society.

God bless,
Ut

 

[buffalo]

Very simple - the state should not impose on its people, religion should propose to the state.

 

[ManRay]

The forefathers were most certainly clear in their beliefs regarding the separation of church and state the letter that Jefferson wrote to the baptist church is the clear blue print for what is in the constitution. Could you possibly imagine all of the Jewish, Muslim, Hindi, Catholics, etc…etc… we would have to cater too? Sure you support the church in government as long as it’s a catholic church eh’??? I’m not going to mention the hundreds of other letters written by others, but individuals who write things such as

Thomas Paine from: The Age of Reason -

I do not believe in the creed professed by the Jewish Church, by the Roman Church, by the Greek Church, by the Turkish Church, by the Protestant Church, nor by any church that I know of. My own mind is my own church.

I do not believe because a man and a woman make a child that it imposes on the Creator the unavoidable obligation of keeping the being so made in eternal existence hereafter. It is in His power to do so, or not to do so, and it is not in my power to decide which He will do.

John Adams -

As the government of the United States of America is not in any sense founded on the Christian Religion

Besides the forefathers were mostly deist - Catholics on this board would have a hard time even recognizing them as christian

 

[Bl_Pope_Pius_IX]

So Pope Pius IX made an official error involving matters of faith and morals? I thought that wasn’t possible.

I’m not sure I follow what you mean.

 

[TEPO]

As the government of the United States of America is not in any sense founded on the Christian Religion

Besides the forefathers were mostly deist - Catholics on this board would have a hard time even recognizing them as christian

It’s true… If anyone wants to know what a deist is like, just talk to a Freemason.