Free Republic

Thomas Jefferson, The First Amendment and the separation of church and state - most are surprised to discover that neither the Constitution nor the First Amendment contain these words. The First Amendment simply states: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” The fact that the phrase “separation of church and state” appears in no founding document does not prevent many judicial and social activists from invoking that phrase as the basis for many public policy decisions. Today, Thomas Jefferson (author of that phrase) is portrayed as the authority on the First...

IRS Asked to Investigate Tax Status of Americans United for Separation of Church and State www.LC.org Today Liberty Counsel filed a complaint with the IRS, asking the agency to investigate the tax-exempt status of Americans United for Separation of Church and State ("AU"). Our complaint follows last week's letter by AU against Liberty University. AU has engaged in a consistent pattern of filing complaints against conservative churches and nonprofit organizations. Its statements are designed to intimidate, silence, and harm those with whom it disagrees. AU's activity is reckless because the group fails to investigate the accuracy of its statements when...

What would America look like after four years of an Obama administration? "Hardship," "persecution" and "suffering" are among the prospects in a hypothetical letter from a "Christian from 2012" released today by evangelical leader James Dobson's political activist group Focus on the Family Action. Titled "Letter from 2012 in Obama’s America," the piece clearly targets the many evangelical Christians seeking "change," particularly the young, who could tip the election in favor of the Illinois Democrat . At the end of the letter, the fictional Christian laments that these people "simply did not realize Obama's far-left agenda would take away many...

A northern Minnesota preacher's presidential endorsement from the pulpit of Republican John McCain over the weekend is part of a national challenge of federal restrictions on such political expressions. The Rev. Gus Booth of Warroad Community Church made his endorsement Sunday as part of the Alliance Defense Fund's "Pulpit Freedom Sunday." The fund said Booth and other pastors around the country were exercising "their First Amendment right to preach on the subject, despite federal tax regulations that prohibit intervening or participating in a political campaign." Booth, a delegate to the Republican National Convention in St. Paul, said Monday he did...

Science tried to purge other scientists who disagree with the establishment http://www.thebulletin.us/site/index.cfm?newsid=19904502&BRD=2737&PAG=461&dept_id=576361&rfi=8

Muslims students at the University of Miami have organized for the Islamic call to prayer, broadcasted each Friday afternoon this month from Richter Library's clock tower in commemoration of Islamic Awareness Month. The call to prayer, or Adhan, is spoken in Arabic and is meant to resonate throughout the area. "It serves as constant reminder of when we have to pray, because prayer itself is a reminder of our religion and how we practice it," said Selima Jumarali, the vice president of the organization. According to the teachings of Islam, Muslims are to pray five times a day. In Muslim-majority...

LDS Church leaders have told legislative bosses that the "element of humanity" should be re-introduced to the state's immigration debates. Before each general session, GOP and Democratic leaders in the House and Senate sit down separately with The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints special affairs committee, a group made up of church general authorities, church public relations officials and their lobbyists, to discuss any items on the minds of both legislators and church leaders. House Minority Whip David Litvack, D-Salt Lake, said the Democrats' meeting with church officials brought up several issues, but the immigration discussion was the...

SPOKANE -- The cross is coming off the official patch worn by Spokane Police Department chaplains after a federal lawsuit prompted changes inside the police chaplains office. The removal of the cross stems from a lawsuit filed against the city last year by a senior police volunteer who argued it was unconstitutional to have a cross on an official City of Spokane insignia. The federal lawsuit, filed by Ray Ideaus, said the patch was illegal and the department's requirement that chaplains adhere to the Judeo / Christian ethic was also unconstitutional because government cannot favor one religion over another. So...

This is an invitation for people to tell me why I should be thankful for the Fourteenth Amendment. It is likewise an invitations to others like me to discuss the pitfalls of this amendment. I would just as well like to see the amendment repealed, but maybe someone with an unbiased, rational, balanced perspective can articulate how the benefits of this amendment (if they exist) outweigh the liabilities. Personally, I feel the Fourteenth Amendment rewrote the Constitution the Founders of our nation gave us.The Fourteenth Amendment has a troubled history. From the beginning, when states withheld ratification, attempted to withdraw...

 A lawsuit pro-life attorneys filed on behalf of a group of students who were denied official recognition for their pro-life club apparently did the trick. Colonial Forge High School was the latest to come under fire for discriminating against pro-life students and found itself on the receiving end of a lawsuit from the Alliance Defense Fund.A student at the school wanted to start a pro-life student club on campus and applied for her club to become officially recognized.  Officially recognized student clubs enjoy privileges such as access to the school newspaper, bulletin boards, and the public announcement system, as well...

Now that Dhabah aka Debbie Almontaser has resigned as the principal-designate of the Khalil Gibran International Academy and has been replaced by a Jewish woman, Danielle Salzberg, some assume the opposition to the school itself is over. That supposition would be false. The demand for information from the Department of Education continues. The big question is why isn't the ACLU involved in this issue? The last I heard, this legal civil liberty organization was seeking removal of a cross in a Louisiana courtroom and threatening a lawsuit in Connecticut because a public school was using a cathedral for its commencement...

Stephen Mansfield explains how the "Everson" decison got it wrong and mis-represents the intent of the Founding Fathers, even of Thomas Jefferson himself.

"To help Muslim students meet their religious obligation, Waukesha South High School has opened a room for daily prayer for the first time this year. Interested Muslim students leave their classroom and gather for a Jamaat, or an organized prayer service."

Godly Foundation of America http://www.bibles.com/absport/news/item.php?id=206 Rev. Dr. Paul G. Irwin President American Bible Society New York, NY, July 2, 2007 The Fourth of July provides an excellent opportunity to think about the principles that were the foundation of this country. Even though a recent Gallup Poll shows that nine out of ten Americans believe in God, strangely enough there are those who are convinced that the bedrock of the creation of the United States is based solely on secular principles rather than religious ones. There is a reason why the Ten Commandments, Scripture quotations and beautiful artwork depicting biblical scenes...

Religious expression in public schoolshttp://www.mysanantonio.com/news/metro/stories/MYSA051507.01A.praying_kids.346b298.html http://tinyurl.com/2f9gzw Web Posted: 05/14/2007 11:03 PM CDT J. Michael Parker Express-News Religion Writer Zach Van Veldhuizen believes Jesus should be honored in public schools. The MacArthur High School senior doesn't understand why prayers or other religious expressions at school-sponsored events would be a problem. But Katina Rajunov, a Clark High School senior, believes that religious messages given at school-sponsored events might make students of differing faiths feel excluded. Enter the Texas Legislature, which has joined the fray most commonly the province of school district officials, who often face a conundrum in the religious freedoms of...

Elizabeth May's bizarre speech National Post: lead Editorial Published: Tuesday, May 01, 2007 On Sunday, Elizabeth May, the leader of the Green Party of Canada, returned to London, Ont., where she lost a byelection five months ago. Although Ms. May was not on the campaign trail, she was preaching the Greens' environmental catechism, this time from the pulpit of a local United Church. Her odd sermon should concern not only Green party members who hope to take the party into the political mainstream, but also Liberal leader Stephane Dion, who recently struck a controversial political alliance with Ms. May...

A plan being shoved down a fast track in the Oregon Legislature would give homosexuals a vast range of new state laws they could use to impose their moral perspective on Christians across the state, according to opponents who fear for their speech and religious expression rights. Senate Bill 2, on its face, is written to enshrine in state law special protections for homosexuals by classifying them as a protected civil rights group. But hundreds of pastors – whose churches include tens of thousands of evangelical Christians – are horrified by what they see advancing virtually without opposition. "Senate Bill...

Another category of Christian, however, is rapidly losing its traditional identity in our culture: Evangelical. While it never made distinctions on theological grounds, that term could always be counted upon to identify those Christians who are conservative, Protestant, culturally influential and outspoken about their faith. With recent developments, however, the defining elements of Evangelical may soon go the way of the much-encompassing Christian. Why? Because some who purport to speak for all evangelicals are being sucked into marginal issues that are usually harped on by America-hating liberals. And because conservative Christians are allegedly being divided, the mainstream media is eating...

Last weekend the top two celebrities in the Democratic presidential contest, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, ventured south to Selma to pitch their campaigns to voters in black churches. If the visits evoked concern by any liberal commentator anywhere about the separation of church and state, it was not evident on Monday. Or Tuesday. Or… Imagine, however, how many would have found themselves “frightened” and “angry” if a couple of bigwig Republicans had pitched their messages from the pulpit to evangelicals. It really is time for the media to get to one standard on whether it’s permissible for candidates to...

WHY ARE POLITICIANS MAKING POLITICAL SPEECHES IN CHURCHES? Obama spoke from the Brown Chapel AME Church in Selma, Alabama. Hillary, not to be outdone, spoke from another church a few blocks away. Hillary is being roundly ridiculed for trying her best to sound southerny. Kind of like condescending, patronizing, I-wanna-look-like-you every-word-is-two-syllables southerny. As if the audience can't tell the difference. But since the only time southern folks ever see real live politicians is when they are either running for something or shaking the money tree, they sit around and listen and look glad for getting some attention. I can abide...

Before David Paszkiewicz got to teach his accelerated 11th-grade history class about the United States Constitution this fall, he was accused of violating it. Shortly after school began in September, the teacher told his sixth-period students at Kearny High School that evolution and the Big Bang were not scientific, that dinosaurs were aboard Noah’s ark, and that only Christians had a place in heaven, according to audio recordings made by a student whose family is now considering a lawsuit claiming Mr. Paszkiewicz broke the church-state boundary.[snip] The student, Matthew LaClair, said that he felt uncomfortable with Mr. Paszkiewicz’s statements in...

A public-school handout urging young children in Virginia to attend a "Pagan ritual" tomorrow to "celebrate Yule" is sparking objections from concerned parents. "Amazing – government schools ban orthodox Christianity, but allow an openly pagan organization to proselytize six-year-olds!" one observer who asked for anonymity told WND. The concern has risen to such a level that the head of the Albemarle district in Charlottesville, Va., admits the policy allowing handouts may change, potentially eliminating them from all organizations. The flyer in question is from a group called NatureSpirit from the Thomas Jefferson Memorial Church, a Unitarian Universalist congregation that also...

It’s a tableau worthy of any 4-H Club county or state fair exhibit: The tiny West Virginia town of St. Albans (pop. 11,000) has put up a display in a local park that includes a manger - defined as "a container (usually in a barn or stable) from which cattle or horses feed"; a few animals; a couple of shepherds; a star (it’s nighttime); and a palm tree (this particular barn or stable must be in Phoenix). It cannot possibly be a Christmas display because the manger is not being used as a makeshift crib for the baby Jesus –...

THE US Supreme Court has agreed to decide whether a challenge can go forward arguing that President George W. Bush's faith-based initiative violates the constitutional requirement on church-state separation. The justices said they would hear a Bush administration appeal of a ruling that allowed a lawsuit by a Wisconsin group called the Freedom from Religion Foundation and three of its members to proceed. In January 2001, right after he became president, Mr Bush issued an executive order creating he White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives and similar centres in a number of federal agencies. The White House said...

The Tennessean is a Gannett newspaper and does not allow copying or excerpting of articles. Click on this link to read the article: ACLU sues Wilson County over alleged religious practices In my own words - the plantiffs are alledging a Christmas play, praying parents, national prayer day and teacher-led prayer in a public school have traumatized their child and they need attorneys’ fees and compensatory or nominal damages to get over it. The plantiffs are not named in the suit for fear they will be attacked and ostracized.

WASHINGTON — Sen. Orrin Hatch wants the Justice Department to correct what he and other senators see as a "misinterpretation" in a decision made in a New York bankruptcy case dealing with charitable contributions. Late last month, the court decided that certain people at higher income levels who are in Chapter 13 repayment plans cannot deduct charitable contributions when calculating their disposable income. "For people of faith in America, the obligation to tithe presents a significant part of the free exercise of religion, which is guaranteed to all Americans under the First Amendment," Hatch, R-Utah, along with Sen. Charles Grassley,...

AUSTIN - Public school students don't need to go to church on Sunday for a strong dose of religion — in some cases, according to a new study, they merely show up for class. . . . The 76-page report, titled "Reading, Writing and Religion: Teaching the Bible in Texas Public Schools," is one of the most ambitious looks so far at Bible courses that have sprouted in the nation's public high schools. The report was a joint effort by Mark Chancey, a biblical studies professor at Southern Methodist University, and the Education Fund of the Texas Freedom Network, a...

There is a hue and cry coursing through the more ardent supporters of President Bush's Iraq policy and its mostly a matter of disturbed semantics. It seems those supporters, including Bush himself, Rumsfeld (naturally) and U.S. Sen. Rick Santorum (more naturally) have pounced on the term "fascism" to be the easiest way to popularly press their suit for "staying the course" in Iraq. Their sense of history is most disappointing. From Rumsfeld most of all, who is the only one of this transformed trio to have lived during an era when democracy actually faced a do-or-die challenge from fascism. George...

CHAMPAIGN, Ill., Aug. 26 (UPI) -- Vashti McCollum, the plaintiff in a landmark U.S. Supreme Court case on religion in public schools, has died at 93 Champaign, Ill. McCollum challenged the religious education classes in the Champaign public schools. Her son, James, then in fifth grade, was required to attend a class against his will. In her lawsuit, McCollum argued that the classes were discriminatory because those for Protestants were held at the schools while classes for Catholics and Jews were held elsewhere. She lost in the state courts but won an 8-1 ruling from the U.S. Supreme Court. "The...

Church-state issues are among the most contentious and emotional issues in American life. Dozens are currently testing the bounds of the First Amendment's Establishment and Free Exercise clauses: school vouchers; government funding of faith-based social services; the role of faith in the public lives of judges, elected officials, legislators, pharmacists, doctors and lawyers; and the role of religion in public life, from Ten Commandments postings and the Pledge of Allegiance to religious groups' role in politics and prayers at public meetings. ReligionLink offers a diverse and extensive guide to individuals and organizations expert in these issues

A dispute in Georgetown, Del., underscores the rising tensions over religion in public schools.I spend a fair amount of time trying to convince other religious Jews that their concerns about Evangelical Christians are baseless, and that they should cooperate with them on common objectives such as preserving Israel, protecting religious freedom, social issues etc. The incidents described in this story is exactly the kind of thing they many of them are afraid of. And, that does not include the prayers per se, but the ridicule, and exclusionary nature of some of the prayers. What do my fellow conservatives advise I...

A federal judge ruled yesterday that the East Brunswick High School football coach can bend a knee and bow his head while his players recite pre-game prayers this season, ending a dispute that had mushroomed into a nationally recognized test of the separation of church and state. After nearly two hours of arguments, U.S. District Judge Dennis Cavanaugh sided with the coach, Marcus Borden, declaring "taking a knee" isn't praying and that the Middlesex County school district can't order him to stand still while his players perform a locker room ritual that spans decades. "Tradition plays a part, and the...

Spare us from the God-haters By MICHAEL COREN Toronto Sun July 22, 2006 In West Virginia local activists are trying to remove a picture of Jesus that has hung on the wall of a local school for many years. Various so-called civil liberties groups claim that such a portrait is an infringement of basic human rights. Elsewhere in the United States assorted opponents of organized religion have been fighting for decades to ban prayer in schools, to force teachers to take down copies of The Ten Commandments from classrooms and to eliminate all mentions of God from public halls...

In a speech to the Notre Dame student body during the 1984 U.S. presidential campaign, New York governor Mario Cuomo addressed the issue of church-state relations and the growing activism of the so-called Religious Right. The governor said: “Are we asking government to make criminal what we believe to be sinful because we ourselves can’t stop committing the sin? The failure here is not Caesar’s. This failure is our failure—the failure of the entire people of God”1 As a conservative Christian pastor who seeks to uphold biblical morality before two congregations on a weekly basis, I find the above question...

May 18, 1908: Congress mandates use of "In God We Trust" http://www.historychannel.com/tdih/tdih.jsp?category=wallstreet&month=10272957&day=10272983 http://tinyurl.com/lxte6 In a move that seemingly flew in the face of America's founding belief in the separation of church and state, Congress passed legislation on this day in 1908 that made the maxim "In God We Trust" an obligatory element of certain coins. The motto dates back to the early 1860s, when the Civil War stirred religious feelings throughout the nation. America's heightened piety manifested itself in many places, including the treasury department, which received countless letters requesting that the nation's coins pay some form of tribute to...

Professor Akhil AmarProf Amar spoke at The David Library last night, and I had the privilege of attending. The lecture was billed as "Some Thoughts About George Washington, Religion and the American Constitution" but he included precious little about The General, some of which was incorrect (he did not know the date of the first inauguration, for example). But I'm quibbling: the good professor dropped a bombshell and that is the main reason I am posting this. Here's the First Amendment: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the...

As Prefect of the Congregation for Doctrine of the Faith, Cardinal Ratzinger spent many hours pouring over Liberation Theology.  The liberationists had become very involved in political movements to insure a just society.  They had confused the role of the Church and the role of the State.  And, at times, they were openly Marxists.  In 1966 when the German journalist Peter Seewald asked the Cardinal what was his greatest success in his work, he pointed to the corrections offered to Liberation Theology.  The Pope's first encyclical shows the fruit of this long struggle with liberationists.  The Holy Father carefully outlines...

RICHMOND -- A federal judge has ruled that a southeastern Virginia school district didn't violate a teacher's free-speech rights by removing Christian-themed postings from his classroom walls. U.S. District Judge Rebecca Beach Smith rejected arguments that York County school officials deprived William Lee of his First Amendment rights when they ordered the removal of postings that included articles about President Bush's religious faith and John Ashcroft's prayer meetings with his staffers when he was attorney general. "This case is not about what free-speech rights Lee has as an individual expressing himself on private property," Judge Smith wrote in her opinion...

The much-bandied about phrase “separation of church and state” means different things to different people. To those from the secular humanist persuasion, it means that the state can make no public acknowledgement of religion, have no religious displays, recognize no tax exemptions for churches, and goes so far to regulate even religious expressions of private individuals in the public arena out of line. One also hears that any attempt by others to “moralize” or use any religious values to argue for a policy should be silenced. On the other hand, there are those who believe the matter is simply that...

ROME -- The American debate over intelligent design versus evolution is merely stuff for Sunday school scholars. An Italian court is considering whether the Roman Catholic Church is breaking the law by teaching that Jesus Christ walked the earth 2,000 years ago. The case pits against each other two men in their 70s, who are from the same central Italian town and went to the same seminary school in their teenage years. The defendant, Enrico Righi, went on to become a priest writing for the parish newspaper. The plaintiff, Luigi Cascioli, became a vocal atheist who, after years of legal...

Subject: Laus Deo Laus Deo I thought that you and others may like to see this. One detail that is not mentioned in Washington, DC, is that there can never be a building of greater height than the Washington Monument. With all the uproar about removing the ten commandments, etc... This is worth a moment or two of your time. I was not aware of this historical information. On the aluminum cap, atop the Washington Monument in Washington DC, are displayed two words: Laus Deo. No one can see these words. In fact, most visitors to the monument are totally...

Does the Fourteenth Amendment make the entire Bill of Rights a restriction against the States? If so, which amendments or clauses? What did both "due process of the law" and "equal protection" mean to the Congress who produced the Amendment? Does the Fourteenth Amendment guarantee State paid education to aliens? [snip] I hope everyone reads this because for me it was the most important reading of the year. One of the most wonderful discoveries you will find from reading is where equal protection of the laws came from and how it was defined to mean by the author of the...

Court Allows Church to Rent Space in Public Schools Saturday, Nov. 26, 2005 Posted: 12:11:25PM EST Religious groups may rent spaces in public schools for meetings just as other organizations can, a federal judge ruled recently. The decision by Judge Loretta Preska of the Federal District Court in Manhattan, N.Y., allows the evangelical Bronx Household of Faith church to rent space in a public school for four hours every Sunday. “The government may not treat activities that are similar to those previously permitted as different in kind just because the subject activities are conducted from a religious perspective," Preska wrote...

'Tis the season not to offend anyone? Friday, December 10, 2004 Kaeley Hay is your typical fifth-grader from Garwood, N.J. Kaeley and her classmates were given the assignment of writing a Thanksgiving Day poem. Who would have thought that such a traditional classroom exercise would trigger a Constitutional crisis? But, according the Newark Star-Ledger, that's pretty much what happened. Kaeley's verse was such a hit with her classmates that her rhyme was posted on the hallway bulletin board. The problem arose when school officials decided that the literary work of a 10-year-old violated the sacrosanct "separation between Church and State."...

The All Saints Episcopal Church in Pasadena, a very, very liberal church, is being investigated by the IRS to see if their tax exempt status should be removed. The LA Times has been covering this story with the church as a victim. If this had been an evangelical or fundamentalist protestant church the LA Times and the news networks IMO would have taken a different tone, but that's beside the point. For those of you that are interested in this controversy the sermon that caused this controversy is available on-line at: http://www.allsaints-pas.org/all_saints_church.htm You'll need to click on the archives link...

A federal judge in San Francisco today has ruled that it is unconstitutional to recite the pledge of allegiance in public schools. The ruling flies in the face of the recent Neadow v Common Sense ruling in 2003 that says there is nothing wrong with having school kids declare their allegiance to the legal entity that pays for their education and supplies their freedom. There is also nothing illegal about people such as Neadow lobbying their federal legislators to change the law, but that takes too much time. The court that ruled that the pledge was unconstitutional was also the...

The American Civil Liberties Union has found a sympathetic ear for its latest assault against the Boy Scouts. At issue is the famous Jamboree, held since 1981 at Fort A. P. Hill in Virginia and indirectly receiving support from the Army in billeting, infrastructure, and so forth. The ACLU argues that this arrangement breaches the First Amendment's separation between church and state. A federal judge in Chicago concurs, declaring government aid for the Jamboree unconstitutional. Because the Scouts require members to "privately exercise their religious faith as directed by their families and religious advisors," the ACLU petitioned the court to...

My wife and I were just discussing the erosion of Christian values throughout the country, namely the decision to ban the Ten Commandments from the courtroom. Has there been an attempt to remove the Bible from the courtroom? As far as I know, swearing to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, with a hand on the Bible is still the practice. Interesting that this practice has yet to be attacked as a violation of Separation of Church and State.

...In van Orden v. Perry, the Court allowed a six-foot granite monument to the Ten Commandments on the grounds of the Texas capitol. But in McCreary County v. ACLU of Kentucky, it decided that a display of framed copies of the Ten Commandments inside two Kentucky courthouses was going too far. ...Reading through the majority opinions, it seems that the difference boils down to such "context" dependent issues as the fact that the granite monument was old -- it had been there since 1961 -- while the Kentucky commandments were of newer vintage and therefore possibly a product of the...

When told that India was the most religious country in the world and Sweden the most secularized, the eminent sociologist Peter Berger is said to have replied, "Then the United States must be a nation of Indians ruled by Swedes." The remark wittily expresses the profound split between the religious and the non-religious in America, but it doesn't suggest the ongoing, irreconcilable conflict between the two camps. Now, disturbingly, that conflict is being fought out again on the familiar battleground of the Supreme Court. At the start of its new term last month the court said that it would consider...