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The Republican plan to nullify the courts and establish Christian theocracy
Posted by N4CMChristian Right Watch21 Nov 2011
By William Saletan | 21 November 2011
Slate
Slate
“Is the United States sliding toward theocracy? That’s what Republican presidential candidates have told us for more than a year. Radical Islam, they’ve argued, is on the verge of taking over our country through Sharia law. But this weekend, at an Iowa forum sparsely covered by the press, the candidates made clear that they don’t mind theocracy—in fact, they’d like to impose it—as long as it’s Christian.”
Cassi Creek:
I’ve always considered the Southern Poverty Law Center an ally in prevention of a Christian theocratic coup in this nation. There are too few other groups who are willing to point out the imminent danger this nation faces at the hands of the Christian evangelicals. Network for Church Monitoring is a welcome addition to the protective band of people who wish the United States to remain the secular nation it was intended to be.
We revere our histories that relate the voyage and tribulations of the Puritans as they searched for a location where they might practice their religion without suppression by the Crown or by the Church of England. Those histories have been revised, as has much of our foundation mythos. In fact, the Puritans were hounded from England and from Holland because they were so intolerant of other faiths that no one could live along side them. Those Puritans were the evangelicals of their day, insistent upon forcing their neighbors and everyone else they might dwell near into practicing their “purified” uncompromising practice of Christianity.
Today’s evangelicals are the linear descendants of those smug, petty, and highly intolerant puritans. They are the American Taliban; ready to return to the Inquisition, witch trials, blue laws, and to exclude science from our educational programs.
We’ve used the Afghani Taliban as a reason for ten years of foreign war. Yet we harbor the American Taliban even as they are instrumental in beginning and extending our war with Afghanistan’s fundamentalists. Corner our Taliban and many of them will admit they wish to wipe out Islam as a faith wherever it exists. Push them farther and they will admit that they believe no other religion but evangelical Christianity should be allowed, practiced, or protected in the U.S.
Pogo famously stated that the enemy is ourselves. In this case, our enemy is among us and we’d best begin to realize that fact. We’d better read the un-revised history about religious freedom and religious persecution in the foundation of our nation. In addition, we’d better understand that the 1st Amendment guarantees us freedom from religion, but only if we recognize and work to overcome those internal threats that continually gnaw away at our Constitutional right to avoid being forcibly converted and forced to practice a religion we neither want nor believe in. Those who demand prayer in schools, Christmas pageants, and other such displays can find them at private schools. They should not expect public funding of their religion. If they want, Christmas light displays on private property, subject to zoning and safety. However, we should not use any public funds to pay for Christmas displays or those of any other faith on public lands. Christmas, and Easter should be removed from the list of federal holidays. Of course, this post will seem to some as another round in the “War on Christianity/Christmas.” It’s not. It is another battle in the war against mandatory Christianity. Join it at will.
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