Evangelical Leader Threatens to Use His Political Muscle A..

There is a revolution underway in this country and most people are totally
unaware of it. it is going to get much worse before it gets batter and even
though this too will pass, it will take a very very long time to correct
the damage done but the crazies in charge now and bring things back to
where there were before the crazies got in charge.
However, in time there will be a major back lash against them and things
will drastically change going in the opposite direction
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Evangelical Leader Threatens to Use His Political Muscle Against Some
Democrats By DAVID D. KIRKPATRICK
Published: January 1, 2005
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/01/01/politics/01dobson.html

also

James Dobson
"Children are the prize to the winners in the second great civil war. Those
who control what young people are taught and what they experience – what
they see, hear, think, and believe – will determine the future course for
the nation." Children At Risk: The Battle for the Hearts and Minds of Our
Kids, Word Publishing, 1990, p. 35 (coauthored with Gary Bauer)

"What's needed is a constitutional amendment protecting the rights of
students and other citizens to voice their religious convictions and apply
their faith to everyday issues. It would require an amendment to the
Constitution of the United States to protect voluntary school prayer and
religious liberty generally." Solid Answers (Tyndale House Publishers),
1997, p. 189

"School choice is an idea whose time has come. It would give parents the
right to decide whether to send their children to a public, private, or
religious institution and even to select the specific school to which they
would be sent." Solid Answers (Tyndale House Publishers), 1997, p. 176
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From: "Kent Holland"
To: <jalison.RemoveThis@cox.net>
Subject: New article on Separation of Church and State -
Date: Sat, 22 May 2004 17:50:29 -0400

You are welcome to link to a new article that I wrote on the subject of
separation of church and state. It is written from a Christian perspective
strongly supporting the wall of separation, and attempting to show Baptists
that their history has been to support this wall rather than tear it down
as some Baptists are currently attempting to do. The link is
http://www.kentholland.com/articles/separation.htm.

Sincerely,

Kent Holland
==========================================================
Copyright ©, 2004, J. Kent Holland, Jr., McLean, VA
Permission for copying and posting this paper for use in other publications
and websites, with attribution to the author, is hereby granted.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Standing Up for Separation of Church and State is the Spiritual (and
Historically Baptist) Thing to Do

By: J. Kent Holland, Jr., J.D.
Kent.RemoveThis@KentHolland.com
http://www.KentHolland.com
Copyright ©, 2004, J. Kent Holland, Jr., McLean, VA
Table of Contents
I. Baptists' Early History of Support for Religious Liberty and
Separation of Church and State
II. Some Key Southern Baptist and Evangelical Christian Leaders
Want to Tear Down the Wall of Separation
III. Many Baptist Organizations Still Stand Firm for Separation
of Church and State
IV. Government Support for Religion Backfires against
Judeo-Christian Religions
V. Ten Commandments in Government Buildings
VI. Pledge of Allegiance – "One Nation under God."
VII. Faith-Based Grants
A. Treating Faith-Based Grant Recipients More Leniently
than Other Grantees
B. Grant Funding will Equalize Religious Organizations
C. What happens if the Grant Recipient Fails to
prove it Satisfied the Conditions of the Grant?
D. Religious Organizations should not Seek Federal Grant
Funds
VIII. Exercising Spiritual Conscience in the Political Arena
IX. Conclusion
X. Hypotheticals for Contemplation and Discussion
_______________________________________________________
[Excerpt from]
II. Some Key Southern Baptist and Evangelical Christian Leaders
Want to Tear Down the Wall of Separation

There are today some well publicized voices among a few key
evangelical leaders, Baptist leaders and pastors that have turned their
back on religious liberty and the principle of separation of church and
state.[vi] In criticizing the Supreme Court's Everson v. Board of
Education decision, for example, the authors at Christian Law Organization
argue "It is this Supreme Court case that stands in the way of individual
states passing legislation that favors religion. The Everson decision is a
clear departure from the view of the Founding Fathers. The First Amendment
was not intended to stop the states from establishing a church or favoring
a particular religion."[vii] Apparently the Christians that operate
Christian Law. Org would like to see individual states enact laws favoring
religion – presumably their own version of protestant Christian religion.
There is most certainly more than one outspoken Baptist
critical of the notion of separation of church and state. Jerry Falwell,
for example, whose church is a member of the Southern Baptist Convention,
has this to say about the First Amendment and the separation of church and
state:

Modern U.S. Supreme Courts have raped the Constitution and raped
the Christian faith and raped the churches by misinterpreting what the
founders had in mind in the First Amendment of the Constitution…. [W]e must
fight against those radical minorities who are trying to remove God from
our textbooks, Christ from our nation. We must never allow our children to
forget that this is a Christian nation. We must take back what is
rightfully ours."[viii]

Falwell is also quoted as saying:

Separation of Church and State has long been the battle cry of
civil libertarians wishing to purge our glorious Christian heritage from
our nation's history. Of course, the term never once appears in our
Constitution and is a modern fabrication of discrimination.[ix]

TV Evangelist and one-time presidential candidate, Pat Robertson is perhaps
the most vocal in his disdain for the concept of separation of church and
state. Among his statements are the following:

There is nothing in the U.S. Constitution that sanctifies the separation of
church and state.[x]

It's amazing that the Constitution of the United States says nothing about
the separation of church and state. That phrase does appear, however, in
the Soviet Constitution, which says the sate shall be separate from the
church and church from the school. People in the educational
establishment, and in our judicial establishment, have attempted to impose
Soviet strictures on the United States , and have done so successfully,
even though they are not part of our Constitution.[xi]

The above statements were made by Pat Robertson in 1996.[xii] In each year
since then he has been quoted making equally astounding remarks. In 2002
he stated:

We have had a distortion imposed on us over the past few years by
left-wingers who have fastened themselves into the court system. And we
have had a lie foisted on us that there is something embedded in the
Constitution called separation of church and state.[xiii]

James Dobson, another well-known speaker, writer, counselor and
evangelist, has spoken out against the belief that the concept of
separation of church and state is to be found in the Constitution. He is
quoted as saying: "Again, the phantom ‘separation of church and state'
clause was cited as the justification" for the courts striking down school
voucher laws.[xiv]

James Kennedy, another well-known evangelist has weighed in against the
separation of church and state as follows:

If we are committed and involved in taking back the nation for Christian
moral values, and if we are willing to risk the scorn of the secular media
and the bureaucracy that stand against us, there is no doubt we can witness
the dismantling of not just the Berlin Wall but the even more diabolical
‘wall of separation' that has led to increasing secularization,
godlessness, immorality, and corruption in our country.[xv]

The Southern Baptist Convention has broken with, and removed
their financial support for, the Baptist Joint Committee on Public Affairs
which actively supports the separation of church and state. Increasingly,
Southern Baptists are siding with those who want to tear down the wall of
separation. Many Southern Baptists now are seeking government support for
school prayers, faith-based grants to religious organizations, and
government funding for church-run schools. They view separation of church
and state to be bad for the country and adverse to religion.
A Baptist scholar, Barry Hankins, assistant professor of
history and church-state studies at Baylor University , recently conducted
interviews of Southern Baptist leaders to assess where they stood on the
issue of separation of church and state – and why. He found that
conservative Baptists "are driven by a perception of culture that changes
the entire landscape. This is the perception that the United States today
is hostile toward any expression of religion or faith…. Hunkered down in
what they call a ‘culture war,' conservatives today are willing to downplay
concerns about the possible government establishment of religion in order
to achieve the greater good of ensuring free exercise of religion."[xvi]
Professor Hankins states that when questioned closely, conservative
Southern Baptist leaders claim to adhere to historic Baptist beliefs on
church-state separation. But in practice, they espouse a different view.
He says, "On church-state issues, this perception of culture not only
shapes their positions on religious liberty but also leads them to
virtually disregard the danger of the establishment of religion."[xvii]
Perhaps the shift in the view of some Baptists who seek to tear
down the wall of separation of church and state is partly in response and
reaction to what appears to be outright hostility against religion by the
media and much secular teaching and discourse. As stated in a joint
publication of five religious organizations,[xviii] there is a view
prevalent today that "sees religion and religious groups as having a
minimal role in – perhaps even being barred from – the vital public
discourses we carry on as a democracy. It sees involvement in the
democratic process by people of faith as violating the principle of
church-state separation. It regards religious arguments as naïve and seeks
to embarrass any who profess religious motivation for their public
positions on political issues. This view denies our country the powerful
moral guidance of our religious heritage…."[xix]
**********************************************************************************
The Rise of the Theocratic States of America
PART I

http://groups-beta.google.com/group/alt.politics.kerry/msg/f23147a1624...8d?dmod

PART II

http://groups-beta.google.com/group/alt.politics.kerry/msg/432d3b52a75...b9?dmod

You can add this to it as well:

Church-State Separation: A Keystone to Peace edition 3
Clark Moeller, January 2004 -- [Copyright 2004, Pennsylvania Alliance for
Democracy -- Printing, copying and distribution is encouraged with full
attribution.] This publication is also available in pdf format at
www.padnet.org/CSS2moeller2.pdf

TABLE OF CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION
http://www.padnet.org/CSS2/CSS2Intro.html#INT
A Review of Church-State Separation

SOCIETY
http://www.padnet.org/CSS2/CSS2Society.html
Religious Conflicts
Government Repression
An American Experiment
Peace-Keeping Theory

DEMOCRACY
http://www.padnet.org/CSS2/CSS2Dem.html
Culture
Civil Rights
Trust
Tolerance

EROSION OF DEMOCRACY'S FOUNDATION
http://www.padnet.org/CSS2/CSS2Erosion.html
Intolerance
Erosion of Religious Liberty

ORGANIZED RELIGION
http://www.padnet.org/CSS2/CSS2Organized.html
Government Regulation
Government Funding
Social Trends

CONCLUSIONS
http://www.padnet.org/CSS2/CSS2Conclusions.html

APPENDICES
http://www.padnet.org/CSS2/CSS2AppdxCrit.html

Notes and Citation
http://www.padnet.org/CSS2/CSS2Notes.html
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INTRODUCTION
http://www.padnet.org/CSS2/CSS2Intro.html#INT
Church-State Separation:
A Keystone to Peace (3rd edition)
Clark Moeller, January 2004 --
[Copyright 2004, Pennsylvania Alliance for Democracy -- Printing, copying
and distribution is encouraged with full attribution.]

The quintessential American value of religious liberty is being eroded in
the United States today. The causes of this erosion are described in the
following, and the reasons why the effects of this loss will diminish other
civil rights, weaken our democracy, and sap the vitality and independence
of religious organizations are presented. These perspectives are based in
part, on a review of the historic and current experience of church and
state relations in the United States compared to those relations elsewhere
in the world. If these comparisons are reliable indicators, the loss of
religious liberty underway in the United States is now undermining the
remarkable progress we have made to build a nation of people who live in
peaceful co-existence while professing a greater variety of religious and
secular beliefs than occurs in any other nation in the world.1
Of the 195 countries in the world in 2001, only six had full
religious freedom according to ratings of Freedom House.2 These six were
Estonia, Finland, Ireland, the Netherlands, Norway, and the United States.3
It is remarkable that the United States is included in this short list
because its religious liberty has been weakened, and unlike the other 5
countries, the U.S. is not a small, fairly homogeneous nation. It is a
large, heterogeneous country with a population of 281 million, 35% to 40%
of whom attend the religious services of 325,000 congregations.4 These
congregations belong to more than 2,000 religious denominations, many of
which espouse religious beliefs very different from one another.
It is often claimed that the diversity and the extent of religious
freedom enjoyed in the United States are the result of more than 200 years
of church-state separation as defined in the Establishment Clause of the
First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States. Nevertheless,
religious liberty as defined by the First Amendment has been a source of
controversy since its adoption in 1791. The controversy continues today
among religious communities, at the municipal, county, state, and federal
levels of government, including among the nine members of the United States
Supreme Court.5
Although the specifics of these conflicts have changed over the
years, the underlying issues remain the same. These include whether
religion should play a formal role in the governance of this country at the
local, state, and federal levels, and if our government should underwrite
the costs of religious organizations, or otherwise support a religion or
various religions. The practical implications of these questions are being
vigorously debated today. For example, should taxes be used to fund
religious activities, pay for private, parochial schools, and build
churches? Should the phrase "under God" be included in the Pledge of
Allegiance recited in public schools? Should state-sponsored prayer be
permitted in public schools? Should creation-science or intelligent design6
be taught in public schools? Should religious organizations be running U.S.
Post Offices and distributing their religious literature in these
facilities?7 Does the government have a compelling state interest8 to
decide who marries, be they heterosexual or homosexual? Should the Ten
Commandments be posted in public buildings?9 Should tax-exempt, religious
organizations be permitted to engage in partisan, electoral politics?10
Given the durability of the underlying issues, some people have
suggested that it is time to rewrite the First Amendment in order, for
example, to permit state-sponsored prayer in public schools, as proposed in
the Religious Freedom Amendment11 introduced by Representative Ernest
Istook (R) of Oklahoma in 2001, and in his 2003 proposal to amend the First
Amendment, the Pledge and Prayer Amendment. This states, in part, "the
people retain the right to pray and to recognize their religious beliefs,
heritage, and traditions on public property, including schools."
Before any rewriting of the First Amendment is undertaken, it is
important to evaluate the benefits of church-state separation. Toward that
end, this paper explores three questions. What benefits has church-state
separation added to society? to democracy? and to organized religions?
The focus throughout this paper is on the relationships among
organized religions, and between these and government. These relationships
influence the degree to which individuals are free to engage in their
spiritual and religious life in houses of worship, in their homes, and
community.12

A Brief Review of Church-State Separation: The term "church-state
separation"13 is commonly used as a synonym for the Establishment Clause
(bolded below) in the First Amendment to the Constitution of the United
States.
The First Amendment: "Congress shall make no law respecting an
establishment of religion,14 or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;15
or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of people
peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of
grievances."
There are two clauses in the first 16 words of the First Amendment:
the Establishment Clause, "make no law respecting an establishment of
religion, or" and the Free Exercise Clause, "prohibiting the free exercise
thereof." Together these are intended to provide the constitutional
guarantee of religious liberty. The means for achieving this freedom was to
create a "wall of separation" between church and Congress, according to
Thomas Jefferson.16
To ensure that Congress did not make laws "prohibiting the free
exercise" of religion that might result in the punishment of or
discrimination against an individual because of his or her beliefs, the
founders separated church from state, and state from church, in 1791 by
including the Establishment Clause in the First Amendment. Historically,
laws regarding religion in both Europe and the colonies had favored, de
jure or de facto, one religion, and .suppressed other religions.
To achieve church-state separation, the word ‘respecting' in "no
law respecting an establishment of religion" of the Establishment Clause
means no law ‘involving' or ‘concerning' religion. By constitutionally
preventing Congress from making laws respecting religion, the founders
intended to preclude the possibility that Congress would establish,
endorse, or promote any religion.17 In essence, the government should be
neutral, neither favoring one religion nor discriminating against others,
directly or indirectly.
In 1940 and 1947, the U.S. Supreme Court determined that
church-state separation applied to the state governments as well as to
Congress. Subsequently, the U.S. Supreme Court adopted the following
three-part test for evaluating whether a Congressional or state law is
consistent with the Establishment Clause: a law must have a secular
purpose; its purpose must not be intended to prohibit or promote religion,
and the law should not cause government to become very entangled with
religion.18
Church-state separation is intended to create for individuals the
widest opportunity for their "free exercise" of religion: to hold, express,
and practice their belief. But this freedom does not mean a person or a
religious institution can engage in activities that violate the law, such
as human sacrifice, or interfere with the religious freedom of others. This
is how each person's freedom is guaranteed while respecting that same
freedom for others. The American ideal of freedom is based on this concept
of fairness.
Readers who dismiss the validity of "church-state separation" are
referred to the Appendix where three common criticisms of church-state
separation are discussed. These include the complaints that the meaning of
the Establishment Clause does not imply the concept of separation of church
from state, that none of the separation phrases such as church-state
separation are found in the language of the First Amendment, and the
suggestion that America has been and continues to be a "Christian nation."
continue...

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THE CONSTITUTIONAL PRINCIPLE:
SEPARATION OF CHURCH AND STATE

http://members.tripod.com/~candst/index.html

"Dedicated to combatting 'history by sound bite'."

Now including a re-publication of Tom Peters
SEPARATION OF CHURCH AND STATE HOME PAGE
and
Audio links to Supreme Court oral arguments and
Speech by civil rights/constitutional lawyer and others.

This site is a member of the following web rings:

Freethought Ring--&--Freethought, Religion & Beliefs Ring

The First Amendment Ring--&--The Church-State Ring

American History WebRing--&--The History Ring

Let Freedom Ring--&--Religious Freedom Ring

Law Issues Ring--&--Legal Research Ring

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