10 Commandments controversy
Apr. 1st, 2005 10:23 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sarahmichigan(Am I the only one that'd like to see Frank the Goat back on the LJ main page instead of this Brad dude?)
I'm against having 10 Commandments displayed on public property. An opinion piece at salon.com today put it much better than I have managed to when I've talked to others about this issue. Here are some excerpts:
In gods we trust
Evangelicals insist that the U.S. is a Christian country. An increasing number of Americans beg to differ. (So does the Constitution.)
- - - - - - - - - - - -
By Juan Cole
April 1, 2005 | It isn't just Michael Schiavo -- even George W. Bush has drawn the wrath of American evangelicals. In February 2002, the president and Laura Bush visited a Shinto shrine in Japan, to which they showed respect with a bow. They were immediately denounced by evangelical organizations for having "worshipped the idol." To listen to the anguished cries of disbelief from Bush's Christian base, you would have thought he had met the same fate as Harrison Ford in "Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom," where Indie was hypnotized by the evil rajah into worshipping the pernicious Hindu idol of the thugees.
The reason for the evangelicals' frenzy is the first two commandments of the Decalogue (the Ten Commandments), said to have been given to Moses on Mount Sinai by God. The first says, "Thou shalt have no other gods before me." The second says, "Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God..." George and Laura's respectful nod to the spirits in the Meiji Shrine violated those precepts in the eyes of true believers.
Both the reelection of George Bush and the Schiavo travesty have heightened the sense that the religious right in the United States is all-powerful. This isn't true. . . The United States is still a predominantly Christian country, but it is no longer an overwhelmingly Christian one. And more and more Americans are either non-religious, unchurched or subscribe to non-Christian religions.
. . .
In 2001, Chief Justice Roy Moore of Alabama had a massive two-ton granite monument bearing the Ten Commandments wheeled into the state Supreme Court building. The Southern Poverty Law Center and other organizations sued to have it removed, on the grounds that its installation in this public building constituted a state endorsement of a particular religion.
. . .
The courts ruled against Moore, but he refused to obey them, declining to mothball the monument to the Ten Commandments. A special judicial court removed Moore from his position as chief justice late in 2003. Moore complained to CNN, "Without acknowledgement of God, we have no justice system, according to the Constitution. And that, I'm sworn to uphold."
. . .
The Moore case has been taken up by the U.S. Supreme Court. Among the groups that filed a "friend of the court" brief against the Ten Commandments monument was the Hindu American Foundation, along with Buddhists and Jains.
. . .
Despite all the thundering by the Revs. Franklin Graham and Jerry Falwell about the evils of secular humanism, then, it is making rapid inroads in American society. Worse for them, the percentage of Americans who say they are "Christian" fell from 86 in 1990 to only 77 in 2001.
. . .
Asian and other non-Christian religions (Buddhism, Islam, Hinduism and so forth) still do not make up more than about 4 percent of the American population, but their adherents grew from about 5 million to over 7 million between 1990 and 2001 in the SUNY poll (which probably undercounts the smaller groups). As the Asian population grows in the United States, the number of Buddhists and Muslims will increase significantly. The United States adds a million immigrants a year, many of them from Asia.
. . .
The friend-of-the-court brief filed by the Hindus and others notes, "To members of non-Judeo-Christian religions, the Ten Commandments do not merely recite non-controversial ethical maxims; several Commandments (e.g., the first, second and third) address the forms and objects of religious worship." Underlining that there are nearly a million Hindus in the United States, and some 700 Hindu temples, the brief says, "Nor can Hindus accept the First Commandment's prohibition against 'graven images.' The use of murtis (sacred representations of God in any of God's various forms) is central to the practice of the religion for virtually all Hindus." The government-sponsored posting of the Ten Commandments implies a U.S. government preference for a theology that Hindus cannot accept. As for the country's 3 million Buddhists, the brief is even more blunt: "The conception of God, or the notion of worshipping creator gods, is considered an obstacle to the enlightenment sought by Buddhists."
Government endorsement of any particular religion's conception of God is also an obstacle to the American dream, of a society where the state is neutral with regard to theology. The founding fathers signed into law a 1797 treaty with Tripoli (now Libya), which declares that "...the government of the United States is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion" and adds that "it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion or tranquility of Musselmen [Muslims]."
. . .
More than 200 years later, all the progress achieved in the realm of religious tolerance by the first generation of Americans is in danger of being wiped out by ignorant fanatics who are not good enough to shine their shoes. That danger arises even as the number of non-Christians has risen to record highs. The irony is that the true iconoclasts throughout Christian history would have recognized Judge Moore's two-ton behemoth for what it is: a graven idol.
I'm against having 10 Commandments displayed on public property. An opinion piece at salon.com today put it much better than I have managed to when I've talked to others about this issue. Here are some excerpts:
In gods we trust
Evangelicals insist that the U.S. is a Christian country. An increasing number of Americans beg to differ. (So does the Constitution.)
- - - - - - - - - - - -
By Juan Cole
April 1, 2005 | It isn't just Michael Schiavo -- even George W. Bush has drawn the wrath of American evangelicals. In February 2002, the president and Laura Bush visited a Shinto shrine in Japan, to which they showed respect with a bow. They were immediately denounced by evangelical organizations for having "worshipped the idol." To listen to the anguished cries of disbelief from Bush's Christian base, you would have thought he had met the same fate as Harrison Ford in "Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom," where Indie was hypnotized by the evil rajah into worshipping the pernicious Hindu idol of the thugees.
The reason for the evangelicals' frenzy is the first two commandments of the Decalogue (the Ten Commandments), said to have been given to Moses on Mount Sinai by God. The first says, "Thou shalt have no other gods before me." The second says, "Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God..." George and Laura's respectful nod to the spirits in the Meiji Shrine violated those precepts in the eyes of true believers.
Both the reelection of George Bush and the Schiavo travesty have heightened the sense that the religious right in the United States is all-powerful. This isn't true. . . The United States is still a predominantly Christian country, but it is no longer an overwhelmingly Christian one. And more and more Americans are either non-religious, unchurched or subscribe to non-Christian religions.
. . .
In 2001, Chief Justice Roy Moore of Alabama had a massive two-ton granite monument bearing the Ten Commandments wheeled into the state Supreme Court building. The Southern Poverty Law Center and other organizations sued to have it removed, on the grounds that its installation in this public building constituted a state endorsement of a particular religion.
. . .
The courts ruled against Moore, but he refused to obey them, declining to mothball the monument to the Ten Commandments. A special judicial court removed Moore from his position as chief justice late in 2003. Moore complained to CNN, "Without acknowledgement of God, we have no justice system, according to the Constitution. And that, I'm sworn to uphold."
. . .
The Moore case has been taken up by the U.S. Supreme Court. Among the groups that filed a "friend of the court" brief against the Ten Commandments monument was the Hindu American Foundation, along with Buddhists and Jains.
. . .
Despite all the thundering by the Revs. Franklin Graham and Jerry Falwell about the evils of secular humanism, then, it is making rapid inroads in American society. Worse for them, the percentage of Americans who say they are "Christian" fell from 86 in 1990 to only 77 in 2001.
. . .
Asian and other non-Christian religions (Buddhism, Islam, Hinduism and so forth) still do not make up more than about 4 percent of the American population, but their adherents grew from about 5 million to over 7 million between 1990 and 2001 in the SUNY poll (which probably undercounts the smaller groups). As the Asian population grows in the United States, the number of Buddhists and Muslims will increase significantly. The United States adds a million immigrants a year, many of them from Asia.
. . .
The friend-of-the-court brief filed by the Hindus and others notes, "To members of non-Judeo-Christian religions, the Ten Commandments do not merely recite non-controversial ethical maxims; several Commandments (e.g., the first, second and third) address the forms and objects of religious worship." Underlining that there are nearly a million Hindus in the United States, and some 700 Hindu temples, the brief says, "Nor can Hindus accept the First Commandment's prohibition against 'graven images.' The use of murtis (sacred representations of God in any of God's various forms) is central to the practice of the religion for virtually all Hindus." The government-sponsored posting of the Ten Commandments implies a U.S. government preference for a theology that Hindus cannot accept. As for the country's 3 million Buddhists, the brief is even more blunt: "The conception of God, or the notion of worshipping creator gods, is considered an obstacle to the enlightenment sought by Buddhists."
Government endorsement of any particular religion's conception of God is also an obstacle to the American dream, of a society where the state is neutral with regard to theology. The founding fathers signed into law a 1797 treaty with Tripoli (now Libya), which declares that "...the government of the United States is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion" and adds that "it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion or tranquility of Musselmen [Muslims]."
. . .
More than 200 years later, all the progress achieved in the realm of religious tolerance by the first generation of Americans is in danger of being wiped out by ignorant fanatics who are not good enough to shine their shoes. That danger arises even as the number of non-Christians has risen to record highs. The irony is that the true iconoclasts throughout Christian history would have recognized Judge Moore's two-ton behemoth for what it is: a graven idol.
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Re: Re Frank the Goat & Brad.
Date: 2005-04-01 11:42 am (UTC)Re: Re Frank the Goat & Brad.
Date: 2005-04-01 11:45 am (UTC)