The Ten Commandments are on Government Land in Texas, and in the State Capitol in Oklahoma City. At first glance this might seem wrong, but when I heard the reason that it was wrong, I laughed. Most people in Oklahoma want the Ten Commandments posted at the State Capitol. The State Senator, who happens to be a Democrat, says that people who come to the Capitol who are of different faith, shouldn't have to look at it.
So close your fricken eyes!
I know what the lady in the little pink car will say, but what do the regular folks say?
The Oklahoma House voted 83-2 today to approve legislation authorizing a monument to display the Ten Commandments at the State Capitol. Great idea or violation of church and state?
Great idea (95 responses)
85.6%
Violation of church and state (13 responses)
11.7%
I'm not really sure (3 responses)
2.7%
111 total responses
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Comments: 114
so close your eyes
and while i'm athiest
i think it's pointless debate
an otherwise complete waste of time
but i feel that way about religion too
and i'm sure if god were real
she'd feel the same about me
That is where the line about the government not making any laws favoring one religion over another.
If you want the followers of Jesus to be able to enact their religious symbols then you must give equal time to the other religions.
I dont know about you but I prefer not to have some satanic religious symbol staring at me as I am walking into the court house to renew my drivers license. Not that I believe in the devil any more than Jesus but Satanists and their ways are just as creepy if not more so then zealot christians and their blank deer in the headlights look.
Shivers.
I accept any symbol. The pentagram, however, wouldn't last the day.
If it's been there for years, then it's a historical landmark and should stay.
and carol
i'm blushing
sure i love you as a person
but me a god
how can that work?
i believe in me
Satanists have a right but I'm not sure they would survive here. It's just a fact. Oklahoma is a Christian state just like our country used to be.
If we have to stand for people deciding our kids cannot mention Jesus when they're giving a validictorian speech, if we have to listen to the trash on regular TV and even on commercials, if our kids have to learn in school that being gay is normal, then doggone it, we have to stand up for something! Our forefathers did not say that there could be no mention of God in the government. What they said was that the government could not have a religion that they backed. Allowing the Ten Commandments to stay in a government building is not backing a religion. It is allowing us to be reminded of our roots.
It's good to believe in yourself. My point is I was not always a Christian. I believe in the occult. But some busy body Christians prayed for me, and like that proverbial bolt of lightening God touched me. If He hasn't touched you, that's not your fault. You be happy, and leave the rest to Him. Just watch out for those Ten Commandments.
I so agree. I couldn't handle the "Passion of the Christ." I don't do nails.
Dorian you are a romantic the Frankie Goes to Hollywood thing just gives it that little extra.
but need to go
why does god have to be a male?
and the fact that you capitolize his personal pronoun
kind of gives me the willies
i won't curse here
but boy i sure would love to
no
god didn't touch me
unless you mean me
and that's private
;)
have fun with that one
So when the majority isnt Christian any longer what then?
As for Satanists, they have their own holiday...it's April 1st.
Remember why 9/11 happened?
Muslims vs Christians.
It would be one thing if you people could find a way to co-exist but you cant. The Muslims feel they are the only true religion and the Christians feel they are the only true religion.
The problem is you dumb arses take the rest of us with you.
If you want to practise your religion fine do it where it belongs in your church.
Your belief is respected, but that's why I live here. As for Lori, our country was built on Judeo - Christian principles, ad I do realize the dangers of religious zealots. But if an Islamic say contained wisom would it be wrong to put it up as a sign? I wouldn't object? Is there something objectionable about the 10 Commandments? Not for me or the 86% of Oklaomans who agree with us.
GOD SAVE ME FROM YOUR FOLLOWERS
Needless to say I laughed my arse off. Ironic eh???
The constitution says that laws can't establish a state religion and protects the right of free exercise of the people. The way the constitution reads, if the majority of the people of a community or state want a cross on top of their capital, no law should prevent that free exercise by the people. The government is the people. Putting a cross on top of the capital is a free exercise of the people. Putting a cross on top of the capitol does automatically create a law to establish a religion. It;'s a free exercise by the people.
Actually Rome caved from liberalism just like Europe.
Rome went and so did Sodom and Gommorah. Do away with God, and the walls come tumbling down.
Well I am off to bed.
I don't know, it seems to me that the whole issue was a nut that was offended because a religious symbol was on a government building? Was he/she that insecure to need it removed? Did he/she not fit in because it was there?
I picture the complainer in the same context as the Miss America childish judge throwing a typical, liberal immature fit because he was offended. If my son behaved like that I would beat him. When are liberals going to do the world a favor and hold their breath until they get their way?
Jeff, I feel sorry enough for you but whoever you have authority over is in trouble like a worm in a vat of battery acid. Where did you ever get the idea that you can "beat" your idiocies into other thinking beings? Let me guess...
I never had to beat common sense into my son. He was more mature than Perez Hilton when he was 6. Now go hold your breath until you get your way.
All in all you're just desperate to perpetuate your own fears so as to never have to really face them.
If you think that the Perez Hilton fit, that he threw after Miss America agreed with Obama on gay marriage, was mature and the kind of behavior you hope your son would display in adulthood, that's you. I expected better from my son by the time he was 6 years old and I wasn't disappointed.
Now please, put the pot pipe down, quit acting like Perez Hilton, and answer my simple question.
"Miss America"? Never heard of him.
"Gay marriage"? Better bet your boots, buster!
"Mature"? Okay chief. You can define "maturity" for your son and emotionally dwarf him (just like dad! :) until you turn blue. I only sort of care. Fact is, your kid has truths that are escaping you because of your wilfull insecurities. Your kid will only gradually grow more corrupt by your influence because you fail to recognize the truth in his sometimes snotty independent streak. If I were you I would appreciate and learn all I can from innocence. He'll be indoctrinated even further soon enough. Comprende?
My son is 18, he's graduating at the top of his class in a month, and was a profound student athlete. He has committed 4 years to the Marines after this summer and is to the right of me politically. You would hate his political beliefs more than mine.
I suppose I could have tried the liberal approach but.......
It's true, I think people that suck on the teet of pop culture are depraved. I have a thousand links to things that actually matter but if you are actually stuck in the muddy rut of the snare of pop culture perhaps you should put your foot down.
Ron, if that was true, isn't a progressive tax unconstitutional? Like I said, putting a cross on top of a capital building does not violate any constitutional right. There is no constitutional right that protects the few anal retentive, camera hungry, atheists from being offended just like there isn't a constitutional right protecting the few rich people from paying a higher percentage of their earnings than the many. If you think the progressive tax is unconstitutional Ron I will give you points for intellectual honesty. If you don't you are nothing more than a talking point canned messenger.
The TEN COMMANDMENTS are a part of the history of the U.S. and what this country was founded on I believe; but all in all based on morals.
Since we ARE a melting pot of all nationalities; are the 10 commandments still valid?
Can we demand ALL shall have no other gods before our God? I guess this IS the great debate.
Honor your mother and father; does that say even if they beat you?
Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s goods. Pretty cut and dry.
AS is love thy neighbor.
The Sabbath can be really confusing to those who don't understand the Sabbath; yet do we demand everyone stand on one countries views.
So should we have the 10 COMMANDMENTS in or on a publicly owned building?
I say that SHOULD be debatable.
All I know is I stand on my morals as I understand them to be, EVER expanding with greater knowledge of the TRUTHS as I see them.
GREAT article!!
"unconstitutional" language is exactly what you're supposed to regurgitate. If you took a split second to look at the history of labor and the facts smooshing your face against a wall of bought-and-sold power worship you might have a clue. No way, not you! You haven't a clue except what you've been fed by sheep posing as "tough guys." Sorry to say, Jeff... your mentors were sissies. They hid behind power and beat the defensless. They sucked while pretending to blow. Sound familiar, Jeff? Your saints of capitalism were taking you for a ride and offering you an easy target to sneer at. You didn't even have to give it a first thought. Ready-made-ignorance in service to power. Now, if you can dream up a more true description of cowardice, I'd love to hear it. Not a F'n chance. We're dealing with cowards in wolves' clothing.
"unconstitutional" language is exactly what you're supposed to regurgitate.""""
Dorian if you could pull your head out of your ideological ass, I was making the point that the progressive tax ISN'T unconstitutional unless you believe Ron's world view that the few have a constitutional right to be protected from the many. I think Ron was the one regurgitating the language of the left.
I'll happily donate to get a Flying Spaghetti Monster statue for the Oklahoma State Capitol, like the one outside the Crossville, TN courthouse.
But if the folks in Oklahoma wouldn't be able to control their violent impulses with regard to a pentagram, I can't imagine how they might react to a religious monument dedicated to the Mother Goddess called The Vulva of Isis.
And, Leave them kids alone!
"Try not to look at my mess... Look over there!"
So that is the tactic employed by you who can't answer simple questions? Every time I make a point you go off in some incoherent tirade that makes no sense and bares no resemblance to reality. These tangents are just your small assumptive ideological world views that imprison you to the misery you blame people like me for. Wise up.
My dad is a bleeding heart liberal that probably agrees with more than me. So you are right......for once.......
So close your fricken eyes!
==============
I beleive in The TEN COMMANDMENTS, I do not always follow them, but I do beleive.
Weather they look at it or not Carol..What the frick difference is it going to make?
Love yah Tony, but try to move in on my little prop of land... I'll put you under! ;) LOL!!!
What, Jeff, after all, is your question? Or are you going to continue to pretend that everybody is as simple as Jeff?
I wonder what Jesus would say about it. Perhaps something along the lines of "render unto Caesar that which is Caesar's and unto God that which is God's." Of course I wouldn't know since I'm not a Christian though I did grow up in the church.
To state that our nation was not, in principle, a “Christian” nation would be an insult to history. To consider that as a point of pride would also be an insult to history. Many states had their own particular biases and were often hostile towards opposing religions. Christian Protestants often discriminated in law against Roman Catholics and Jews. Let us consider the simple history of one state and its attitude towards the denomination not in power. In Connecticut, Catholics were legally forbidden from holding public office or owning land, even in the 19th century. After ratification of the First Amendment in 1791, Catholics in the Constitution State had to wait nearly three decades for religious freedom.
But back to the issue at hand; the first thing to determine is the purpose and reason for anything. Why put up the 10 commandments in the first place? One could cite “historic” reasons, but then why not also the Magna Carta since it also had an equally important influence on American Jurisprudence? I would go even further, suggesting that the Constitution of the Iroquois Confederation also had an equally important influence as well.
If it is, however, simply because of religious and not historical then once can argue that at the very least it isn’t a prudent thing to do. Generally a symbol doesn’t “promote” but the inclusion of a symbol and the exclusion of another does provide strong bias. I have no objections to such symbols as long as it is clear there is neither promotion nor favoritism.
Because, frankly, seeing a symbol is a minor inconvenience compared to not being able to hold public office, or own land, or to worship (or not) as I saw fit, or to have a church not under government control. That was what the founding fathers objected to the most, not mere symbols which have no power whatsoever to restrict our inalienable rights.
So much for the attempt to enlighten the unenlightenable.
""I must admit moreover that it may not be easy, in every possible case, to trace the line of separation between the rights of religion and the Civil authority with such distinctness as to avoid collisions and doubts on unessential points. The tendency of a usurpation on one side or the other, or to a corrupting coalition or alliance between them, will be best guarded by an entire abstinence of the Government from interference in any way whatever, beyond the necessity of preserving public order, and protecting each sect against trespass on its legal rights by others." James Madison, author of the bill of rights
Weather they look at it or not Carol..What the frick difference is it going to make? "
First, I agree you don't always follow them. Second, I suspect your view might be different, if you or your children had to enter those buildings (and by the nature of government services there, many DO have to, to do business) and were subjected to quotes from the Koran on a regular basis. The golden rule rolls off you people's backs like water on a duck.
Who's God, yours, the Muslim's, the Jews? The establishment of this government from the start, was wholly an exercise in ridding government of religious influence, and the effort fared quite well, and has for over two hundred years. I doubt because that principle is reaffirmed, yet again, anyone's God will turn his back on us, if he hasn't decided on it's sin, by now. I think, rather, that he smiles upon it, as it reaffirms his own decision that we all, every one of us, has received from him the right to decide who or what we worship, from the very start. God grants rights that others would take away. Why does that not surprise me?
Ignorance. In God we trust was never a principle of this government, or this nation, though some folks managed to sneak that one onto our money, in what? the nineteen fifties? The date of our independence was hardly nineteen fifty anything.
If that isn't enough to divest yourself of this nation being established as a Christian, or any other religious one, then This might straighten you out, but I doubt it.
Myth. Our laws are inextricably linked to English Common law that preceded them by centuries. It has often been implied that those laws were based on Christianity, But Jefferson, and our founders knew better:
... Jefferson, who as a careful historian had made a study of the origin of the maxim [that the common law is inextricably linked with Christianity], challenged such an assertion. He noted that "the common law existed while the Anglo-Saxons were yet pagans, at a time when they had never yet heard the name of Christ pronounced or that such a character existed .... What a conspiracy this, between Church and State." (Leo Pfeffer, Religion, State, and the Burger Court, Buffalo, New York: Prometheus Books, 1984, p. 121.)
Mr. Jefferson was right, and English common law preceded the influence of Christianity in total.
Nice.