RELIGION AND PUBLIC POLICY

I regret that I will likely lose readers over this.

One of my best life experiences was being raised in the United Methodist Church. I grew up among friends, some of whom are friends to this day, and many of the adults in the church were the best role models and mentors for whom one could ask.

As an adult I got away from the church until my wife and I had small children and moved to a different state and city where we eventually joined the Presbyterian Church (USA) because we needed an opportunity to meet folks, and we wanted community support for our children. Again, it was a wonderful experience, but when the minister visited with us about joining the church I told him I only believed about 30-40% of what he said on Sunday morning. He replied that there were choir members who believed even less. It was a very open-minded congregation, to say the least.

All this to say, I know that a religious experience can be valuable, and it offers solace and comfort to countless people.

But, as I’ve mentioned previously, I was 14 years old when Dr. Martin Luther King was murdered, and when our pastor said a prayer for the King family the following Sunday morning a good portion of the congregation stood up and walked out. The church Board also voted to post men at the church doors to keep black folks from attending services.

Needless to say, I began questioning Christian theology at age 14. I already wondered why there was such competition between our Methodist church and the Baptist church on the other corner, and the events surrounding Dr. King’s death magnified my doubts and raised even more questions.

I’m fortunate that my parents encouraged analytical thinking, so I started reading about Christian history, and much of this culminated in me taking two World Religion classes as an undergraduate. These and other classes opened a whole new world to this Mississippi kid.

It is probably easy to figure out that I’m no longer member of a religious community. I spend quite a bit of time contemplating the divine/eternal and the source of eternity and my role in it, but I do not follow a religious tradition. That DOES NOT mean I oppose organized religion; it just means I find no solace or understanding via such structures. In fact, as I mentioned earlier, I know the value of religion for so many people, whether they be Christian, Muslim, Buddhist, Jewish, Hindu, Sikh, Taoist, Jainism, Shinto, Confucian, or other. It’s just that none of those offer satisfactory answers to my countless questions. And I do believe Jesus and others have a great deal to teach us. I just disagree with the theology and dogma added to their teachings by religious leaders over the years. I’ll leave it at that.

Many or most people of faith believe theirs is the one true religion, the one true path to the eternal. I have trouble believing an all-knowing and all-loving God would condemn people to damnation simply because they refused to utter the correct words, because they acted in ways opposed by a particular religion, because they did not take the correct sacraments, or because they did not follow one faith tradition.

But I absolutely support people’s faith choices…unless they try to impose those choices on others, and that gets me to the issue of the day.

As you may have heard, just this week Louisiana Governor Jeff Landry (R) signed a law requiring that the Ten Commandments be posted in every classroom in the state. I guess the Louisiana legislature and Governor Landry forgot that in 1980 the Supreme Court ruled that posting the Commandments violated the Establishment Clause of the Constitution’s 1st Amendment. Louisiana will now spend millions of dollars defending its new law in the federal courts, money that could be used to improve roads, feed children lunches, or increase teachers’ salaries.

Further, if Christians believe the word of Jesus is the explicated word of God, why are so many focused on the Ten Commandments from Moses rather than Biblical passages attributed to Jesus? Why not fight to include these passages on classroom walls?:

• Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you (Matthew 5:44)

• Blessed are the meek for they shall inherit the Earth (Matthew 5:5)

• Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God (Matthew 5:9)

• If anyone wants to be first, he must be the very last, and the servant of all (Mark 9:35)

• Do to others as you would have them do to you (Luke 6:31)

• Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy (Matthew 5:7)

• Truly I tell you, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you (Matthew 17:20)

• But love your enemies, do good to them, and lend to them without expecting to get anything back (Luke 6:35)

• But I say to you who hear, love your enemies, do good to those who hate you (Luke 6:27)

Are such passages as these not forced into classrooms because they don’t support a narrative?

More importantly, how would people react if the Louisiana law required the posting of sections of other religious texts such as the Upanishads, Bhagavad Gita, The Koran, the Dhammapada, the Dao De Jing, or The Talmud? As I argued in a recent post, America is NOT a Christian nation although a majority of Americans do claim that religion. In fact, as you know, many of our nation’s pioneers came to this land to escape religious mandates.

I fear for a nation led by individuals who seek to impose their personal religious beliefs on others, whether they be Christian, Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist, or Pastafarians. And I fear for our nation because so many “leaders” are now trying to impose their personal religious beliefs on our country by writing laws enforcing those beliefs.

I’m pretty sure most of our Founders would be equally concerned.

Thanks for following along.

David