Separation of Church and State

This discussion is ridiculous. My point was, explicitly, that you can say it, if you define it strictly as meaning just "this happens to be the majority". However, Pwnemon was not using it like that; he was implicitly reasoning, on the basis that the US is a "Christian nation", that church and state don't particularly need to be separated. My argument is that "there happens to be a Christian majority" does not equal "the state should grant privileges to Christians" (and yes, establishing a state church is granting privileges to Christians: it's funding their religious institution with everyone's tax dollars), any more than "there happens to be a white majority" equals "the state should grant privileges to white people". Calling the US a "Christian nation" is just a way of dressing this argument up to look less unfortunate implications-y than otherwise.

(Before somebody starts complaining about things like state-sponsored health care being the same thing: no, it isn't, because then the health care is for everyone; you just happen not to end up needing it unless you get sick or have an accident. It is still there for you when you need it. A Christian church, on the other hand, is only/mostly there for Christians, hence the privilege.)

Butterfree, my point= missed.

What I said is that the Consitution explicitly prohibits making a law respecting a state religion. You just said I argued in favor of a state religion.

I also said that the fact that a majority of Americans are christian, so it would be fair to classify it as a christian nation. I ALSO said that the reason church and state are not necessarily separated is because the constitution prohibits only laws establishing a state religion. I DID NOT DID NOT DID NOT say that since the majority is christian, that church and state are not separate.

So it's okay if there are explicit references to/endorsements of Christianity within the government and public sector as long as it's not the "state religion"? And this is justified because Christians hold the religious majority in the US, and they somehow have the right to impose their beliefs on everyone?

yeah. seperation all the way. church states destroy states, church states destroy religions. Hypocrisy is the only thing the US and many countries would be following if it calls itself a Christian state due to many of those unchristian actions that they commit

Question of the day:

Many conservatives like to argue that the Establishment Clause, which reads "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion", simply prohibits Congress from enacting a law that makes a particular religion the national religion, and that it was meant so that the state could not interfere with the church, not vice versa. Your response?

Well, I'm British, and I think that the Lords Spiritual should be abolished, and the Queen removed as Head of the Church of England, replaced by say the Archbishop of Canterbury. I don't like the combination of church and state we have over here. Especially the endemic amount of church primary schools.

Lorem Ipsum said:

Well, I'm British, and I think that the Lords Spiritual should be abolished, and the Queen removed as Head of the Church of England, replaced by say the Archbishop of Canterbury. I don't like the combination of church and state we have over here. Especially the endemic amount of church primary schools.

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And not the Lords Temporal?

I thought you were on about Doctor Who for a second there. o.o
Although, I'm cool with the House of Lords in general, so yeah.

Why? It is not democratic in the slightest.

Well they don't really have any power, they can just hold back legislation for a few months. I guess I'm fine with it because their only purpose is to stop (or at least delay) any party from making too many drastic changes.
So, say, if 'x' party wanted to get rid of the HRA, they'd be able to delay it, and stuff.
In the end, it doesn't make much of a difference (at least, in my eyes), and I guess they act as a sort of buffer, I don't know.
Plus, if we completely removed the Upper Classes from politics, we'd have less to bitch about. And Britain's, like, the only place where that's a bad thing.

opaltiger said:

Why? It is not democratic in the slightest.

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The idea of the House of Lords is that of a revisory body rather than one which has any political purpose. I believe that we should leave the politics to the Commons, and leave the sober reflection to the Lords, where party ties are weaker, and there are a very large number of unallied Crossbenchers. I don't want two levels of political debate like in the US where it can be disastrous when two parties hold the two different chambers - I like it as is.

I personally think that party whips are a bad idea but that's another issue for another day.

house of lords isn't democratic: it's like a senate, it's old people who can't make laws but can revise them and agree with them to point out shitty mistakes and the like