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To: Hemingway's Ghost
That's a wonderful sentiment, but again, I ask "which Church?"

Granted, there have been some egregious actions on the part of some church leaders who, clearly, shouldn't have been church leaders. Nevertheless, it is a simple fact that the christian church consists of all believers, and the forefathers, wanted local Christians to be the moral conscience of government and society (whether or not they liked certain denominations or not is irrelevant to the design of our government, even if it is a personal flaw on some of their parts). In fact, they considered it to be necessary to the functioning of our republic.

You are not your brother's keeper---such a notion is entirely incongruent with religious tolerance.

Cain tried that. Didn't work so well. The function of the Church (or churches if you prefer it) is to be the moral conscience of society. Our government does not work otherwise. Now, if I didn't give a crap about this republic or about the people in it, I'd keep my mouth shut and not moralize. Seeing how I do, however, there's not going to be any of this meek moral acceptance of what goes on simply because it's legal.

"We have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion. Avarice, ambition, revenge, or gallantry, would break the strongest cords of our Constitution as a whale goes through a net. Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other." John Adams
268 posted on 05/10/2007 9:23:13 AM PDT by JamesP81 (Isaiah 10:1 - "Woe to those who enact evil statutes")
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To: JamesP81
The function of the Church (or churches if you prefer it) is to be the moral conscience of society.

I'm sorry, but that's where I believe you to be wrong. The function of a church is to direct the religious life and spiritual life of the members of that church. Despite what you may want, the moral dictates of a church are simply not binding on those who do not belong to that church.

Our government does not work otherwise.

Sure it would, because it more-or-less "codifies" the grand, sweeping generalities of the Judeo-Christian ethic which underpines Western civilization. Those notions with which we all, more or less, agree.

The Devil, of course, is in the details, and when you, and others, try to tease the details of your religious beliefs into law---that's where you run into problems. Because good people from all walks of life can disagree, passionately, about "morality"---especially when you get down in the weeds.


273 posted on 05/10/2007 9:44:55 AM PDT by Hemingway's Ghost (Spirit of '75)
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