I like your post in general. I do take exception with your categorizing Catholics as part of the religious right. Aside from the Pope's unfortunate fixation on sexual reproductive rights issues (which I and most of my peers ignore), I suggest that a very high percentage of we Catholics are as progressive as the rest of you. My family and I are active workers and supporters of the Jesuit Volunteer Corps. doing work in the central city, and you will find my name on the active donor list of Planned Parenthood of Columbia - Willamette.

Of the many flaws in your article, the one that stands out the most is the claim that "none of them (the various holy books you listed) supercede the Constitution and the U.S. Code when it comes to politics and public policy."

If you would bother to read a little history and the writings of the founding fathers, you would discover that our Constitution and laws were derived from the Bible, not in spite of it. That was where the founders saw that all men were created equal, among other things. If you were to go even farther back in history to Western Europe, you would see that the rise in science, capitalism, and freedom was due to what men saw in the Bible. It's been well documented in more than one place.

But hey, don't let the facts get in the way of your opinion.

Christian right,

he religious right is not a unitary body of people. They range from Catholics to Espicopalians to charismatics to Mormons. Within that spectrum there exist many differences; some fundamentalists believe both Catholics and Mormons are doomed to hell, while the Mormons base much of their faith in a book other religions deem outside the "normal" bounds of Christian theology. Historic Catholicism, for its part, has placed the office of priest as primary, a far cry from the practice of Presbyterians.

I think you are convoluting religion and politics. There is nothing "right" politically about many Christians. Would anyone have described Dorothy Day, the founder of the Catholic Worker, as part of the political right? How about Reverend Sloan Coffin, who headed SANE/Freeze in the laste 80's. How about Martin Luther King? Its plain ridiculous to all these different currents of the "christian right."

There really is no "Christian" right. The religious right resulted from efforts by Republican politicians like Pat Robertson, whose father was a US Senator, to organize Republican churches as a core political constituency and attached "christian" to them as part of a branding effort. There is no doubt many evangelical christians are socially conservative and many vote Republican. But many, far from mixing church and state, are apolitical and therefore politically irrelevant. Many of them recognize Robertson, Falwell and Reed as politicians who are exploiting their religious beliefs for political purposes.

If you look at the Christian churches as a whole, you will find many of them engaged in their community. They run homeless shelters, collect food etc. Without Catholic Social services many poor people would have nowhere to turn. Many churches are engaged in advocacy work on behalf of the poor in addition to their direct service work. They also provide the active core of the peace movement around the country. In short the notion of the churches as part of the "right" is a complete misreading.

Of course churches have a mixed record. The Catholic Church also provides the core of the right-to-life movement. It has not been particularly friendly to women's other rights either and has been anti-gay.

Mormons are clearly not Christians any more than Muslims or Jews are. They all share some common texts, but their religious beliefs are significantly different.

So, from us on the left, here's an offer: We abandon gay rights. We acquiesce to your belief in the biblical injunction against homosexuality and stop working for equal rights on the basis of so-called sexual orientation. The gays, lesbians, transsexuals and whatevers are on their own. If they can go to court and win those battles, more power to them. If they can propose ballot measures and convince 51% of the voters, hooray for democracy. But we won't help them, and we won't counter your arguments.

First they came for the Jews and I did not speak out because I was not a Jew. Then they came for the Communists and I did not speak out because I was not a Communist. Then they came for the trade unionists and I did not speak out because I was not a trade unionist. Then they came for me and there was no one left to speak out for me.

Pastor Martin Niemöller

Perhaps you have something to learn from those who actually know how to live their beliefs. Have you spent your 25 pieces of silver yet?

Steve, Bullshit.

In fact:

"As the government of the United States of America is not in any sense founded on the Christian Religion,-as it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion or tranquility of Musselmen,-and as the said States never have entered into any war or act of hostility against any Mehomitan nation, it is declared by the parties that no pretext arising from religious opinions shall ever produce an interruption of the harmony existing between the two countries."

Treaty of Tripoli, 1796.

CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

Article. VI.

Clause 2: This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding.

That's a scary deal. Thank god the forefathers of this country had the good sense to implement separation of church and state. When intelligent people concede the primacy of rights provided for by the constitution to alterations strategically seeking to negate that crucial separation, we move in the wrong direction.

Within christianity and other denominational faiths, there are plenty of religionists. They have in many cases, chosen not to share in some of the rights that are synonymous with the U.S. Constitution. They have surrendered some of the very important rights and freedoms its language allows for to the dictates of their personal religion, to the point that their religion, and not the Constitution, is the only language they speak anymore.

How can you consider making deals with such people? Each individual doing so represents a small but certainly threatening step towards sealing a horrible fate for most of us in this country.

You know what? You had me belieiving I was reading a serious person's thoughts until I got to the part about Bush and mass murder.

You have proved that you are not to be regarded a serious person. Sorry for the temporary misunderstanding.

Well, my Bible says "Thou shalt not murder," which is different. I guess it comes down to a question of semantics and translation.

But thank you, TA, for giving us all a lesson in theocracy. Truly, you are so awesome, that your pithy logic will have the religious right throw up their arms and say, "We cannot compete with your inescapable logic! It's a wonder that no one realized this for four thousand years, but I guess we'll just close up shop now."

If you're really going to press the religious right on something, first at least read Paul's Letter to the Romans. Get a comprehensive understanding of the New Testament so that your understanding of the Christian faith is noat least more than a few Bible quotes taken out of a larger context.

But at the cener of it all is the answer to why there's such a schism (or at least perceived as such) between people of faith and liberals. TA... your argument isn't trying to bring anyone together or convince them of something: The purpose of your post is to draw additional distinctions and poke fun at what you see as inconsistencies of faith. And you do so by trivializing your own commitment to the Democratic platform? (Speaking of inconsistency, that's not the kind of commitment you congratulated yourself on in your post The Arrogance of Non-Partisan Purity.)

I'm alays going to be a little bit liberal... I'm always going to honestly call myself a progressive. But it's partly Democrats that trivialize my faith that showed me I couldn't stand with that party any longer.

Hot damn, that Treaty of Tripoli is a terrific laugh.

Posted by: General Turgidson | Mar 1, 2007 12:10:54 AM

Hot damn, that Treaty of Tripoli is a terrific laugh.

And the Geneva Conventions are quaint.

I have a better trade. The left will agree to lock up TA Barnhardt and stuff a sock in his mouth for future considerations.

One side believes in the separation of church and state; the other side sees that divide being the entrance to hell.

The problem here is you keep taking sides. I, for one, consider myself a conservative Christian. But I also believe in the separation of church and state. As do most Christians I know. I would bet there are many, many more with the same beliefs out there. And I will agree there are many right wing lugnuts, but there are just as many left wing lugnuts. Maybe if everyone would quit taking sides we could have a functioning country.

Don't forget: the Flying Spaghetti Monster - as evidence-based a deity as Jehova, Zeus, the Angel Moroni, Jebus, Mohammed, Ra and the Pope in Rome - promotes equal opportunity for ALL pirates (and allows them to marry whomever they like!)

Someday we'll realize the promise of our Enlightenment forebears...

But at the moment, religious prejudice can still stop someone (even good-hearted, Blue Oregon Democrats) from acknowledging their neighbors as real, flesh and blood human beings. Again and again it provides justification (evidence-free justification) for disenfranching people from access to basic rights.

I vote for my Constitution's guarantee of equal protection (and for everyone, not just pirates) over zany and unfounded religious bigotry, no matter how long it takes - overwhelming evidence suggests the former is the way to go. Yar!

Mr Moore states: "But it's partly Democrats that trivialize my faith that showed me I couldn't stand with that party any longer."

It is your faith, Mr Moore, that trivializes others, that makes me not able to stand w/ you.

BlueNote -

According to the Church, your soul is in grave danger for actively supporting Planned Parenthood. If you claim to be a Catholic, but don't believe the Church when it comes to the salvation of your soul, why are you a Catholic at all?

All the social work in the world cannot erase the sin of supporting abortion - an intrinsic evil. Please think about the danger you are in. Please!

T.A. has always been a self centered Hypocrite, what else is new?

"All the social work in the world cannot erase the sin of supporting abortion - an intrinsic evil. Please think about the danger you are in. Please!"

Interestingly enough, there's nothing Biblical that even suggests the idea that abortion would be a sin. This seems to be a recently invented "sin" or "evil".

I wouldn't worry about the state of my immortal soul if I were you, BlueNote.

Curt

Thank You Kari.

Anonymous, what's the matter, you to cowardly to put your name on it? I'm not surprised, typical behavior for those such as you. You got nothin' to backup your bullshit.

TA, this is the first time you've ever left me speechless. There's a cure for stupid, it's called education. These creatures aren't stupid (for the most part), they engage in willful ignorance. They teach their children to be stupid. There is no talking, no compromise, with them. I will not throw away my gay and lesbian friends, my atheist friends and my rights as a gnostic "under the bus" to placate a bunch of mouthbreathing, reality challenged bedwetters that the latest census shows to be a substantial minority (~25%) of the population of the Pacific Northwest.

Animals, bow down to gods; Human Beings, do not.

Calling Steve a nitwit is too harsh.

The Constitution was undoubtedly formed with an eye not only to English common law but to natural law as well. While the Constitution might not exactly be based on the Bible, both documents (as well as the Declaration of Independence) are very fine specimens of natural law. Now, natural law may have its origins at least as far back as Aristotle, and we can isolate divine and secular aspects of such law, but natural law has been a beast transformed through many centuries of Judeo-Christian influence, at least in the Occident.

In any case, even if it isn't based on the Bible, the Constitution does seem infused with the aura of the holy text, doesn't it? A secular bible if there ever was one.

On a related note, I'm reminded of Derrida and Chomsky. Constitutions are paradoxical things: they define and uphold systems of law while they simultaneously short-circuit such systems through appeals to sovereignty (i.e. "we're apart or separate"). Constitutions are as inclusive as they are exclusive, and in that way, they assume a reasonably divine aspect.

Anonymous, what's the matter, you to cowardly to put your name on it?

Nope. Just don't want anyone coming to find me if they find TA Barnhardt locked up with a sock stuffed in his mouth. If he wants to trade away people's rights for political purposes, he can start with his own. Go lock yourself in a closet TA and stay there the rest of your life.

How about this? Religious folks could have these tax free sanctuarys where they can read their holy stories and hear the voices speak to them, eat crackers and drink wine and pretend it is somebody's blood and flesh, and do whatever stuff you want to do.

If you as churches and religions want to remove the barrier between church and state, then lets have you pay your fair share in taxes. Then your congregations can be susceptible to the same zoning, equal protection and tax laws as the rest of us.

Has Pat Robertson ever opened up his books?

I am a moral atheist, I work in my community and love my family. You can freely excercise any kind of hocus pocus you want- just leave me out of it. If religious belief is your only justification for a law, then it should not be a law.

Anonymous - thanks for the additinal post. One of the percs of being in this (the internet) game for over fifteen years: I know who you are.

Peace.

Point taken, and I won't disagree with you in so total a fashion, but ...

Maybe this is a bit underhanded, but what are then the origins of the Constitution of the Iroquois Confederacy? Probably lots of legend and such history, right? Were such ideas adapted because they were inspiring in and of themselves, or were they fine examples of things we'd already aspired to achieve (and does such a difference even matter)? Just how substantially different are the underpinnings of the sets of natural law that we're considering as formative with regard to this country's constitution? They can't be mutually exclusive, can they?

In any case, why am I even going on about this? All this talk on origins is just sprawling interpretation, and what's the good of that?

TA should be DA for dumb ass.

Seperation of Church and State "Congress shall make no law...." That really does not affect displaying the 10 Commandments in the town square or wherever, does it?

The real issue is homosexuals wanting to legislate their societal acceptance. I dont think that will work. Getting a legal status that will require conversion of 1st graders through special education programs will indeed run afoul of anyone with a brain. If you dont think this is the issue, please check in with TA, you are birds of a feather. What, no tolerance for religion?

I'm with Kari. What the Hell??!!! We don't compromise human rights and we fight for the underdogs. The concept of "Equal treatment" comes up a lot in the Constitution, an ideal not yet fully realized, and subject on occasion to backsliding. But we do NOT stop aiming for the goal. Some standards cannot be neotiated & compromised.

I too was suspecting satire.....am I too PC to recognnize it anymore? Or can a writer whom I often see eye to eye with, and whose style and humor I've admired, suddenly slip off the tracks?

Thomas -

I know who you are.

There is more than one "anonymous" here ...

But that leaves me conflicted. Do I want someone to grab TA, lock him up and stick a sock in his mouth or not?

our Constitution and laws were derived from the Bible, not in spite of it...

While the Constitution might not exactly be based on the Bible...

Many of the authors of the Declaration or Independence and Constitution, Jefferson being the obvious example, were entirely men of the Enlightenment and not conventionally religious at all. Moreover, to the extent that the Bible has anything to say about human rights and law, one could just as sensibly argue that the Bible is nothing more than a sort of codification of human experience.

Separation of Church and State "Congress shall make no law...." That really does not affect displaying the 10 Commandments in the town square or wherever, does it?

The point is that the public display of the 10 Commandments, such as done by that wacky judge in the Deep South, always seems to be done as a pointed symbol of "aggressive Christianity", a radically in-your-face gesture. Furthermore, this sort of display willfully promotes the bogus idea that morality cannot exist without religion, and particularly a religion that invokes a judgmental, omniscient god.

Catholics, Jews, Christians, Buddhists, Hindu, Christian -- you name it, you got the fanatics therein "proving" they are doing god's will when they ostracize, judge, condemn, rob, rape, kill. no religion is immune.

Rather a blanket statement and certainly nonsensical as regards Buddhism, for which the phrase "god's will" is an oxymoron, as the idea of an omniscient, creator god does not even exist in Buddhism. I believe the same is true of Hinduism.

i hope most of the folks who jumped into my shit read this and understand what i find ridiculous to point out to them: i wasn't being serious.

But isn't that the problem? Your post was ignorant and bigoted both with respect to religion and sexual orientation. And you thought you were being funny. Abandoning other people's basic rights is not something to be joked about.

not one of you seemed to understand my "offer" was nothing of the sort, nothing more than a literary device

But it is awfully close to what actual Democrats have done in recent elections - abandon equality for gays and lesbians in order to appease religious prejudice.

In fact, it's interesting to see several posts agree with your sarcastic offer (Catholic BlueNote among them) - because so many Democrats ARE religious, and share and perpetuate the evidence-free ignorance routinely spewed from pulpits...

Measure 36 did not pass by attracting "right wing" Republicans alone. It takes religious faith to dismiss your neighbors so thoroughly as to relegate them to second class legal status in Oregon, and abandon them on the stump...

lestatdelc | Mar 1, 2007 4:57:15 PM writes:

Ok, I now have high confidence that I can ignore anything you have to "contribute" as being at all substantive or close to reality and simply dismiss (and mock) you as an ill-informed bigot and genral dip-shit.

(scroll)

Let's be clear, are you saying that if homosexual marriage gains legal status, that that exact topic will not be brought forth in elementary classrooms? Please.

That's OK TA, we all have aging relatives who are annoyed when no one laughs at the inappropriate "jolks" that they think are amusing but are really just offensive.

raising hand

Um, I got that it wasn't serious. I know we all have different perspectives and it's often difficult to discern sincerity online, but I definitely did not mistake TA's "offer" for something legitimate. He was pointing out hypocrisy, albeit in a bit of a different way than some people would expect. I'm not saying I agree with it, but I understood his point.

Just my $0.02

So Barnhart really was joking? Pure satire, huh? It's done all the time, but those artfully expressing a provocative viewpoint in a contradictory manner better be really sure enough hints are in the bit to make sure the readers get it in order to avoid unpleasant surprises. Ever see Hitchcock's Strangers on a Train?

Every good idea has at is base the earthy AND spiritual concerns of the people involved; it contains economic, political, religious, philosophical and "other" truths which make that good idea successful in the long run. No one can say the American Constitution has not been successful, based on its longevity, the number of mutations and copies it has generated, and the ongoing interest it provides debaters.

I introduce a "conservative" idea by Robert Caplan, author, in defense of a "liberal" one. These terms in America are intertwined, as we are a "liberal" democracy attempting to "conserve" the legacy of its success.

"The constitution of the United States was written by fifty-five men - and one ghost," writes retired Army Lieutenant General Dave R. Palmer in 1794: America, Its Army, and the Birth of the Nation. The ghost was that of Oliver Cromwell, the archetypal man on horseback who, in the course of defending Parliament against the monarchy in the mid-seventeenth century, devised a tyranny worse than any that had ever existed under the English Kings. The Founders were terrified of a badly educated populace that could be duped by a Cromwell, and of a system that could allow too much power to fall into one person's hands. That is why they constructed a system that filtered the whims of the masses through an elected body and dispersed power by dividing the government into three branches.

Cromwell, Protestant Liberal: Charles I, Catholic Conservative. The founders realized that, like Lincoln later, "two men can fight so long and so hard that they can fight themselves into each other's jackets" ( a paraphrase as the original is in dispute) The Constitution is a Remedy for the English Religious Civil War which spilled over into the New World in 1620, and without a common enemy, the wilderness and its Indians, would have divided America permanently.

Let us Conserve the original compromise of Liberal Democracy.

Who can parse what those nut cases think anyway? You all probably have better links to it than me, so I'll let you read it for yerselves, but you have got to get a load of the Lenten Homily given by Cardinal Biffi in Rome.

The pope goes into retreat before Easter to conduct "spiritual exercises" with his closest advisors (maybe that's what Cheney is doing here when he visits Peckerwood). He selects a cardinal to stand in and give a lenten meditation that sets the tone for the season.

Anyway, Cardinal Biffi mused that perhaps the anti-Christ is not a person at all, but an idealogy. He described the anti-Christ ideology as ecological, ecumenical, vegetarian, pacifist and democratic. He quoted a 19th century Russian nut case that an ecumenical conference would soon be convened where the world's religions will kiss and make up and will create a lowest common denominator faith. This LCD faith would abandon key Catholic tenets and so is seen as a grave threat.

It would be laughable if they weren't destroying the planet with their breeding practices. It's got to be conscious. What can he possibly have against vegetarianism? Can only be that it reduces the "footprint" - got to be maximally consumptive. And before you say he isn't representative, he is widely reported to have received a vote on the third ballot in the 2005 conclave. Probably himself.

And Ratzo knew he would talk like that. He's already on record with statements like, "the Italian government should favour Catholic immigrants to offset the number of Muslim immigrants and protect Italy's 'national identity'". Amidst consternation in the Curia, I am informed that a popular theory- for real- is that he thought Biffi would keep the assembled faithful awake. No doubt.

Stop! I'm spinning in my grave! I'm so neglected...

OK, OK, I take it back, neglect me already. You make a little complaint and the Greeks start calling you queer and your own people respond by banning YouTube! I do apologize.

<h2>(Why couldn't this have happened two weeks ago?!)</h2>