Mona Charen’s Sunday column (“ACLU: Have no other gods before us”) presents all liberals as antagonistic to anything referring to God being unconstitutional. She refers to, “…The notion that this country, founded firmly in the Judeo-Christian tradition.” This is another example of the pick-and-choose method when interpreting the history of this country. Many of the early politicians were Christian fundamentalists, many were part of the Transcendentalist Movement, and many were agnostics. What I believe is most important to remember is that our Constitution borrowed liberally from the traditions of the Iroquois nation. Finally, many of our African slaves practiced their indigenous religious rituals.
This country has a diversity of religious practice because of the separation of church and state. If I were to focus primarily on going back to respecting the origins of this country, in preference to respecting our current composition, then I would insist that not only monuments for the Judeo-Christian viewpoint remain in place, but I would be politically active to ensure that monuments of Iroquois, Transcendentalist, and indigenous African spirituality be propped up right next to the Judeo-Christian monuments. The United States has never been a theocracy. It’s a democratic republic.
I cherish the notion that church and state should be separated. My reading of past and current history is whenever a country moves toward any religion taking up political power, the government becomes oppressive and ruthless because God is on their side. My spirituality, my religion guides me to pray unceasingly that no religion will gain such a foothold in this country. Separation of church and state continues to ensure freedom of religious expression for all its citizens. Any monument on government property that celebrates only one religious viewpoint in this democratic republic is simply not in alignment with the constitution. It belongs on church/temple grounds. That’s not God-fearing. It’s God-respecting.
Carol M. Detrick
Everett
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