Christian Attacks over their Targets (Buddhists, America, church, Revelation)

[LuminousTruth]

I'm using the word "attack" and "target" as loosely as the fundamentalist Christians use it (although they use it by bias and for propaganda, I use them for education through example, comparison, and highlighting their hyperbole)

Would anyone like to list and/or analyze a few of the cultural and legal targets that Christians have attacked and won or lost against in the United States and else-where?

I have a few:

• Tax breaks for holdings of religiously affiliated property in Secularizing Western Nations (I believe newly private religious institutions, as religion had been state-government funded and/or controlled)
  
• "God With Us" adopted as Motto by Nazis in Germany before WWII.
  
• "In God We Trust" added to 1864 coins by the Federal Government to battle the South's pathetic attempt at economic warfare through currency disruption.
  
• Adoption of "Star-spangled Banner" as official anthem in 1931, who's fourth (often only the first is sung) stanza claims "out motto is 'In God is our Trust'"

  Blest with vict'ry and peace, may the Heav'n rescued land
  Praise the Power that hath made and preserved us a nation!
  Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just,
  And this be our motto: "In God is our trust."

• Adding "Under God" in 1954 to the 1945 pledge, a pledge which had been secular from its 1892 creation and usage.
  
• "In God We Trust" established as National motto in 1956 instead of 1776 Seal's "E Pluribus Unum."
  
• Roe v. Wade
  
• Proposition 8

...etc

[hljc]

America is blessed because of Christianity , as you take out God of Christianity and America would be a completely broke third world country with a murder rate three times as bad or more ............. See God will put in the country what the country puts in with God , just as God will lift His hand when people put God out , and the blessing will be gone just like God left counties like Iraq and Syria and some others which now have a death cycle on the nations and this cycle will continue until Christians pray and have God go back there

[Vizio]

Originally Posted by LuminousTruth

I'm using the word "attack" and "target" as loosely as the fundamentalist Christians use it (although they use it by bias and for propaganda, I use them for education through example, comparison, and highlighting their hyperbole)

Would anyone like to list and/or analyze a few of the cultural and legal targets that Christians have attacked and won or lost against in the United States and else-where?

I have a few:

• Tax breaks for holdings of religiously affiliated property in Secularizing Western Nations (I believe newly private religious institutions, as religion had been state-government funded and/or controlled)
  
• "God With Us" adopted as Motto by Nazis in Germany before WWII.
  
• "In God We Trust" added to 1864 coins by the Federal Government to battle the South's pathetic attempt at economic warfare through currency disruption.
  
• Adoption of "Star-spangled Banner" as official anthem in 1931, who's fourth (often only the first is sung) stanza claims "out motto is 'In God is our Trust'"
  
• Adding "Under God" in 1954 to the 1945 pledge, a pledge which had been secular from its 1892 creation and usage.
  
• "In God We Trust" established as National motto in 1956 instead of 1776 Seal's "E Pluribus Unum."
  
• Roe v. Wade
  
• Proposition 8

...etc

* gasp! * Christians are citizens and we actually participate in the political and legal process??

[Floorist]

Originally Posted by LuminousTruth

I'm using the word "attack" and "target" as loosely as the fundamentalist Christians use it (although they use it by bias and for propaganda, I use them for education through example, comparison, and highlighting their hyperbole)

Would anyone like to list and/or analyze a few of the cultural and legal targets that Christians have attacked and won or lost against in the United States and else-where?

I have a few:

• Tax breaks for holdings of religiously affiliated property in Secularizing Western Nations (I believe newly private religious institutions, as religion had been state-government funded and/or controlled)
  
• "God With Us" adopted as Motto by Nazis in Germany before WWII.
  
• "In God We Trust" added to 1864 coins by the Federal Government to battle the South's pathetic attempt at economic warfare through currency disruption.
  
• Adoption of "Star-spangled Banner" as official anthem in 1931, who's fourth (often only the first is sung) stanza claims "out motto is 'In God is our Trust'"
  
• Adding "Under God" in 1954 to the 1945 pledge, a pledge which had been secular from its 1892 creation and usage.
  
• "In God We Trust" established as National motto in 1956 instead of 1776 Seal's "E Pluribus Unum."
  
• Roe v. Wade
  
• Proposition 8

...etc

"Under God" was added to the pledge during the communist witch hunt. They thought that they could ferret out spies because being Atheists they would refuse to say "Under God". Typical stupid politician.

[eddie gein]

I wonder when courts began forcing you to "swear" on a bible? And "so help me God" at the end of your oath?

[mensaguy]

Originally Posted by eddie gein

I wonder when courts began forcing you to "swear" on a bible? And "so help me God" at the end of your oath?

That started with George Washington. When he was preparing for his first inauguration, he sent someone to get a Bible from a New York masonic lodge, because he was used to placing his hand on a Bible when he took the oath of office to become Master of his Masonic Lodge, and he added "so help me God" for the same reason, that is, the was he was accustomed to doing it.

Courts don't FORCE you to do that.

[jrpuff]

Originally Posted by hljc

America is blessed because of Christianity , as you take out God of Christianity and America would be a completely broke third world country with a murder rate three times as bad or more ............. See God will put in the country what the country puts in with God , just as God will lift His hand when people put God out , and the blessing will be gone just like God left counties like Iraq and Syria and some others which now have a death cycle on the nations and this cycle will continue until Christians pray and have God go back there

Tell that to all the indigenous tribes whose lives and culture have been suppressed by Christian ministers that told them their way was savage or pagan.


Or how about all innocent people that were murdered during the inquisition?

[bUU]

Originally Posted by LuminousTruth

Would anyone like to list and/or analyze a few of the cultural and legal targets that Christians have attacked and won or lost against in the United States and else-where?

Please let me make a minor observation about the premise: Our nation was never perfect. As a matter of fact, it started with a certain level of imperfection and generally over time that level of imperfection has decreased. Now: There are certain cases where Christians have tried to rollback prior improvements - those are clear "attacks" - but most of the unjust Christian privilege in the United States is that which started that way, and simply has yet to be rectified.

Originally Posted by hljc

America is blessed because of Christianity

False. The United States is blessed because of post-Christianity... the realization that Christianity is fatally flawed, a relic of an earlier, more barbaric and corrupt time... the realization that we are on an ongoing journey toward ever-increasing compassion and consideration of others. Many of the founders of our nation were members of my religion, and you would assuredly not consider us Christian. One of the most pivotal decisions related to the founding of our nation was the decision to not establish a national church, and firmly establish our nation as a secular nation where all could enjoy the blessings of liberty and the freedom to practice their own religion with equal protection under the law.

Jesus' story was just one small step for humanity, but just one step. Jesus' teachings effectively superseded ("fulfilled") the beliefs that preceded them. That ratified ongoing revelation. One of the biggest travesties of Western society is how it got bogged down for centuries due to the notion that the beliefs of the past were better than beliefs shaped by the greater wisdom of the modern age. That's not what Jesus did. Jesus saw the beliefs of his past for what they were - perishable and expiring. Even today many people still cling to the notion that their decrepit way of believing in God should prevail over evolving more vital, constructive, collaborative, coexistence-driven ways of believing in God. It's like a child who wants everyone to watch them play instead of recognizing that what's "right" is everyone playing. It surely isn't what Jesus would do today.

Originally Posted by hljc

as you take out God of Christianity and America would be a completely broke third world country with a murder rate three times as bad or more

That's self-ratifying nonsense. What we're seeing is that European nations that have placed Christianity where it belongs (in a lesser position in society) have thrived in comparison to the United States on myriad measures. Dominionists have to cripple their own ability to care about others in order to make the rationalization you've made, rejecting the notion that (for example) Buddhists have value. Christianity's big problem these days is that it was crafted, and has been effectively locked into, a pattern of behaviors that make it utterly incompatible with the realities of living in community with *others*. So for Christianity, the only endgame is either the corruption of murdering aggression or oblivion. The more Christianity works to lock itself into this false dichotomy, the more it is signing its own death warrant.

Originally Posted by hljc

See God will put in the country what the country puts in with God...

Empty platitudes won't save Christianity. Making Christianity respectful of other paths to God will.

[FredNotBob]

Originally Posted by mensaguy

That started with George Washington. When he was preparing for his first inauguration, he sent someone to get a Bible from a New York masonic lodge, because he was used to placing his hand on a Bible when he took the oath of office to become Master of his Masonic Lodge, and he added "so help me God" for the same reason, that is, the was he was accustomed to doing it.

Courts don't FORCE you to do that.

Indeed, they don't. In fact, under the Criminal Procedures Act of 1977 (section 163, 'Affirmation in Lieu of Oath'), there are legal allowances for those that object to swearing the oath 'as written':

(1) Any person who is or may be
required to take the oath and-

(a) who objects to taking the oath;

(b) who objects to taking the oath in the prescribed form;

(c) who does not consider the oath in the prescribed form to be binding on his
conscience; or

(d) who informs the presiding judge or, as the case may be, the presiding
judicial officer, that he has no religious belief or that the taking of the oath
is contrary to his religious belief,

shall make an affirmation in the following words in lieu of the oath and at the direction of the presiding judicial officer or, in the case of a superior court, the presiding judge or the registrar of the court:

'I solemnly affirm that the evidence that I shall give, shall be the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth'.

(2) Such affirmation shall have the same legal force and effect as if the person making it had taken the oath.

(3) The validity of an oath duly taken by a witness shall not be affected if such witness does not on any of the grounds referred to in subsection (1) decline to take
the oath

At no point is any written document mentioned; the 'swearing on a Bible' is partly a Hollywood affectation and partly a formality, as Mensaguy described.

[jacqueg]

Originally Posted by eddie gein

I wonder when courts began forcing you to "swear" on a bible? And "so help me God" at the end of your oath?

Which american courts force people to swear on the bible or say "so help me god"? (Hint - they don't.)