Separation of religion and politics

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Pag_Hingowa

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Separation of church and state is important,
but… what’s our personal experiences in the separation of religion and politics?
Is it possible?
 
Pag_Hingowa said:
Separation of church and state is important,
but… what’s our personal experiences in the separation of religion and politics?
Is it possible?
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I agree that separation of Church and State is important; however, its meaning, according to the Constitution, must be carefully defined, and has been somewhat open to interpretation. And as they say, therein lies the tale. Insofar as the separation of religion and politics, I suppose it is within the realm of possibility some day; but for all practical purposes in today’s society, it has not been separated by either the Right or the Left, and most likely cannot and should not be entirely separated. At its worst is the practice of not voting for a given candidate solely on the basis of their religion. At its best is basing one’s politics and policies on the underlying moral principles of one’s religious beliefs, particularly when those principles are shared by those of most other religions.
 
Hey, I noticed the good news from the Philippines the other day–the reason I knew about the issue was your previous postings on the situation 🙂

What I see happening in the US as any aspect of anything which could possibly be construed as religious is pushed out of political consideration is that activity is based on an underly philosophy or set of principles. We have pushed religion out of consideration but all that means is that a-reilgious and anti-religious ways of thinking are allowed to dominate. We have gone too far with this, to the point that self-described Catholocs feel comfortable supporting abortion while claiming to be personally against it. This is ridiculous: we just have mob rule if our representatives vote against what they say is their conscience and only according to what they think their constituents want.

Without strong support for religion, I think a government will devolve to a Might Makes Right scenario with no basis in even natural law morality.
 
Pag_Hingowa said:
Separation of church and state is important,
but… what’s our personal experiences in the separation of religion and politics?
Is it possible?
Click to expand...
Definitely not. Religion is the conscience of government.
“We are told by liberals that we live in a pluralistic society and therefore have to be tolerant of others. Interesting to note is that when liberals ask for tolerance, they are implicitly admitting that there is something wrong with their ideas and/or behavior. After all, you don’t need to ask people to ‘tolerate’ good ideas or behavior. Mother Teresa never had to ask for tolerance.” – From F. Turek, Correct, Not Politically Correct
 
Calgar said:
What separation of church and state? I’m not familiar with this law.
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You should have. Baptists invented it. Rhode Island was founded as a place for religious freedom for all. I beleive all the other states had official state churches.

That is something to have pride in!
 
The First Amendment to the US Constitution reads:

***Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or ***
***abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; ***
or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

“An establishment of religion” is singular.
“Establishment of religion” is a denomination.
“Respecting” is favoring one denomination over others.

Many denominations provide excellent social services and they receive grants from the government to carry out those needed services. The standard to qualify for the grants are the same regardless of which denomination applies. They CANNOT use the money to ‘preach’ the tennets of their religion, but only to provide the social services stated in the Grant.
 
I admit, I am also confused on what to think in regards to the separation of Church & State. My sticking point is that religion & the faith of our Founding Fathers, are what led them & influenced them to write the US Constitution, in the first place. In fact, religion, like it or not influences & shapes every politicians core.
 
When I served in Germany in the 80s, I was surprized to learn that Catholic churches received financial support from the German Government. I presumed that Lutheran Churches and others received government support as well but I do not know for sure.

Through much of History extending back before Christ, it has been a big issue as to whether religious leaders had more power than secular leaders - Kings and Princes, etc.

Most of us are aware of the violence that occured during the 1500s and later when various secular leaders FORCED one religion for all subjects. Religion WAS IMPORTANT. It was just a matter of who was in charge of religion. We continue to see religious persecution in the world today. Some do want one religion only while others want no religion at all.

Poland met with some success in allowing more than one religion to operate in peace with the others and government in the late 1500s. The First Amendment in the late 1700s was the first lasting guarantee of FREEDOM of religion. It was and remains important that government NOT FORCE religion on our citizens. But it was and remains equally important to allow the free exercise of religion.

Religion deals a lot with Moral Law. Government deals in Civil Law. Religion informs individuals of the higher value of Moral Law. These individuals then vote their conscience and Civil Law is created that we all can live with.

That’s idea, anyway. IMHO.
 
GratefulFred said:
Religion deals a lot with Moral Law. Government deals in Civil Law. Religion informs individuals of the higher value of Moral Law. These individuals then vote their conscience and Civil Law is created that we all can live with.

That’s idea, anyway. IMHO.
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Great point. Church and State must be divided.

The choice of politics still must be inspired by your beliefs, with your free will, and your interpretation of the church doctrine.

I do make an effort to make political choices that will reflect my catholic values of social justice and peace in the world. it is not always easy, and I do not expect my political party to uphold all my catholic beliefs, but I try to find the one that represents me most.

Hope it answers some of your questions.

Pax Christi
 
Jaguar said:
In fact, religion, like it or not influences & shapes every politicians core.
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I am not sure about that. I think most politicians are no different than most citizens. And, at least here in the US, most merely give a nod to religion and religious observance without it having a profound effect on their decision making.
 
I think at least personally that the Founders erred when they didn’t at minimum declare us a Christian nation. I don’t think it’s a question of such a declaration causing persecutions, but a statement that much like in England gave a specific place to Christianity as the moral bedrock of the society. We don’t have that, so we can’t say much about moral issues without forming a POLITICAL organization. We need Christians for life because of secularism, which starts with the faulty premise of “all religions and religious ideas are equal.” This leads to the idea that my expressing Christianity in public (esp. if elected) is “establishing a religion” and is quickly sliding into “any expression of religion outside of church, mosque, temple or synagogue is violating other people’s right to freedom of religion”. For all the faults, institutional national churches at least give the society a moral bedrock – a way to preserve and protect Christian practice and moral beliefs.
 
Dale_M said:
I am not sure about that. I think most politicians are no different than most citizens. And, at least here in the US, most merely give a nod to religion and religious observance without it having a profound effect on their decision making.
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You make a point.

What is your opinion on, religion/faith and their influence on the Founding Fathers and the role that they played on the US Constitution?

Thanks.
 
Our religion points us towards what is right and moral. Nothing God has says is immoral does not have a practical application that shows why it is wrong in society though. Thus I know that anything that God has told us is immoral is also bad for society. Whether that is homosexual marriage, contraception, or abortion I know that it will have a negative impact on society. If I move to make something illegal or to make sure its not promoted as something good, I’m not doing it just because God said so, I’m doing it because it is bad for society.

That said, we then have to debate what is the role of the government and how far it is allowed to go in the name of protecting society and promoting the common good. For one though we could never agree with a law or policy that promoted something we knew to be intrinsically evil. At minimum we should work to make it so that the government is never promoting something intrinsically evil and calling it good. Once again we do this not because of what our religion teaches, but because we know it to be harmful to society and do not wish it to be promoted as something good.

Depending on what a person believes the role of government should be in our lives, that will then advise them as to how much power the government should have to promote the general good of the population. Should the government be allowed to tell us what to eat, in the name of our health? Can the government require us to buy something in the name of the common good? How far reaching should the right to privacy extend? What kinds of relationships should the government promote? The answers to these kinds of questions are what inform a person how far they believe the government should be allowed to go in the name of protecting society.
 
Separation of Church and state is imho a bad thing. Because of it, we’ve murdered 50 million babies and counting since 1973.
 
Nate13 said:
Our religion points us towards what is right and moral. Nothing God has says is immoral does not have a practical application that shows why it is wrong in society though. Thus I know that anything that God has told us is immoral is also bad for society. Whether that is homosexual marriage, contraception, or abortion I know that it will have a negative impact on society. If I move to make something illegal or to make sure its not promoted as something good, I’m not doing it just because God said so, I’m doing it because it is bad for society.

That said, we then have to debate what is the role of the government and how far it is allowed to go in the name of protecting society and promoting the common good. For one though we could never agree with a law or policy that promoted something we knew to be intrinsically evil. At minimum we should work to make it so that the government is never promoting something intrinsically evil and calling it good. Once again we do this not because of what our religion teaches, but because we know it to be harmful to society and do not wish it to be promoted as something good.

Depending on what a person believes the role of government should be in our lives, that will then advise them as to how much power the government should have to promote the general good of the population. Should the government be allowed to tell us what to eat, in the name of our health? Can the government require us to buy something in the name of the common good? How far reaching should the right to privacy extend? What kinds of relationships should the government promote? The answers to these kinds of questions are what inform a person how far they believe the government should be allowed to go in the name of protecting society.
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Nate, I don’t fully understand the logic of your argument, although I understand the substance and gist of it, particularly your final paragraph. It sounds to me you may be contradicting yourself when you say, on the one hand, “Thus I know that anything that God has told us is immoral is also bad for society,” and on the other, “Once again we do this not because of what our religion teaches, but because we know it to be harmful to society…” Could you explain whether you depend on your religion to impart morality to you or whether you know certain things to be harmful to society apart from what your religion states and your religious beliefs.
 
meltzerboy said:
Nate, I don’t fully understand the logic of your argument, although I understand the substance and gist of it, particularly your final paragraph. It sounds to me you may be contradicting yourself when you say, on the one hand, “Thus I know that anything that God has told us is immoral is also bad for society,” and on the other, “Once again we do this not because of what our religion teaches, but because we know it to be harmful to society…” Could you explain whether you depend on your religion to impart morality to you or whether you know certain things to be harmful to society apart from what your religion states and your religious beliefs.
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Yes, I depend on religion to impart morality to me. My religion points me to the fact that abortion is wrong, which leads me to further investigate the issue because I know that God does not tell us something is immoral just for the heck of it. There is a real physical reason why God has said something is immoral. Even looking back at the dietary laws in the Old Testament we see that there were reasons God told the Israelite’s to avoid certain foods. All of God’s laws are there to help guide us to true happiness and to protect us.

Thus when I oppose something in the secular realm of politics, I’m not truly doing so because of my religion. I’m doing so because I believe it will have a harmful impact on society in a real physical manner that does not require believing in God to realize.

This leads into the third paragraph though where I talked about the role of government and how that relates to acting upon what I believe will have a harmful effect on society. Does that make sense?
 
Nate13 said:
Yes, I depend on religion to impart morality to me. My religion points me to the fact that abortion is wrong, which leads me to further investigate the issue because I know that God does not tell us something is immoral just for the heck of it. There is a real physical reason why God has said something is immoral. Even looking back at the dietary laws in the Old Testament we see that there were reasons God told the Israelite’s to avoid certain foods. All of God’s laws are there to help guide us to true happiness and to protect us.

Thus when I oppose something in the secular realm of politics, I’m not truly doing so because of my religion. I’m doing so because I believe it will have a harmful impact on society in a real physical manner that does not require believing in God to realize.

This leads into the third paragraph though where I talked about the role of government and how that relates to acting upon what I believe will have a harmful effect on society. Does that make sense?
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Yes, it does. Thanks for the clarification.
 
Jaguar said:
What is your opinion on, religion/faith and their influence on the Founding Fathers and the role that they played on the US Constitution?
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I’m not well enough acquainted with the personal lives of the Founding Fathers to know how deeply their decisions were affected by their religious beliefs.

With regard to the US Constitution, I don’t think it shows evidence as having been strongly influenced by religious beliefs.
 
andrewstx said:
You should have. Baptists invented it. Rhode Island was founded as a place for religious freedom for all. I beleive all the other states had official state churches.

That is something to have pride in!
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Why are you avoiding answering my question? What law?
 
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