Kat Cooper has her rebuttal to last night’s opening post up; those of you who missed it should read her side before coming back here to read my next entry.

Back? Good. Shame on you if you didn’t go.

Down to business. The reception desks are now closed. We trust you readers to be adult enough to read both sides once you’re given a link

* * *

First of all, I really like Kat’s idea of referring to this as “a friendly exchange of ideas.” It does sound nicer and closer to the intent of this thing we’re doing. But my template for this post doesn’t like long titles, and I’ve already set up the category, so for continuity’s sake, it’ll have to remain Open Debate on my site. Just let’s all keep in mind that Kat’s right and “a friendly exchange of ideas” is indeed more accurate as a functional description.

One aspect I do want to bring up is the element of regionalism at play here. Kat lives in the “Bible belt south.” I’ve visited Florida once and Texas twice, and I do think that plays a factor in her perception of things. When you’re in an area that is heavily churched, being an atheist would make a person feel a bit more singled out.

Regionalism also plays a significant factor in my perception of things. Minnesota is the only stat not to vote for Ronald Reagan in the 49-state landslide of 1984. We’re almost as much of a blue state as New York or California. It has often been joked – and not without a basis in truth – that the average Minnesota Republican would be kicked out of the average Georgia Democratic Party — for being too liberal.

Now, I don’t want to go into overkill here with political comparisons. I am not trying to imply that all liberals are atheists are liberals and all conservatives are faith-based. That’s patently untrue. My only purpose is the set the scene of Minnesota, culturally. And in our state, which politically is solidly liberal, our culture of faith is also not as strong as our secular culture.

I don’t want to be presumptuous, but I suspect that in the average city in Florida, you’ll find more Bible-thumping evangelicals than in the entire state of Minnesota. The secular mindset is definitely the majority view up here, and perhaps the solution to the woes of both Kat and myself is a state-swap. My wife and I can move down to Florida and Kat can move up here to Minnesota and we’ll both feel a bit more “in the majority of the like-minded.”

Probably not, though.

Anyway, my point was to bring up how regional differences add to our perceptions. Point made for now. Moving on.

Kat brings up some good historical points on the emergence of religious expressions into the culture. In terms of those dates and the historical progression, I currently have no quibble. Her research is solid, so far as I can tell at the moment. Where we differ, however, is in the matter of interpretation of history.

I would agree that the founding fathers were perhaps closer to deists than modern Southern Baptists, although there are those who argue that the essence of what they believed is largely compatible with modern Christian faith movements.

But what I do take issue with is how this “wall of separation between church and state” Kat cites from the Thomas Jefferson letter to the Danbury Baptists should be interpretted. If you’ve never read it for yourself, you owe it to yourself to read it here. For a thorough and, from what I can tell, dispassionate and neutral analysis of the Danbury letter, read this essay, also from the Library of Congress.

The fact is, the phrase “separation of church and state” never appeared in the Constitution itself, but only in the Jefferson-Danbury letter, although it appeared again after that in 1810 in President James Madison’s essay, “Monopolies.” The actual First Amendment to the Constitution is:

“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.”

-Emphasis added

While atheists appropriately endorse the establishment clause, some tend to overlook the free exercise clause. This concept is even respected in the 1971 Supreme Court ruling that established the “Lemon Test” for laws that are inappropriately religious in nature, using the following three criteria:

To be constitutional, a law must:
* Have a secular purpose, and
* Be neutral towards religion – neither hindering nor advancing it, and
* Not result in excessive entanglements between the government and religion. (www.religioustolerance.org)

Again, the most passionate of the atheist crowd have no problem promoting the concept that government ought not advance any particular religion, but many, though organizations like the ACLU and People for the American Way, have certainly gone out of their way to hinder religious expression.

That is a brief summation of my perspective of how people of faith and secularists differ on interpreting the establishment clause. Now I’ll personalize the discussion a bit more to my own view.

Personally, I have no stake in proving whether America is particularly Christian or even Judeo-Christian in its origins. The wisdom of the founders is that they saw beyond their own brand of religious faith and established a principal of government neutrality toward matters of faith. And there is good reason for that neutrality. Most of the first settlers in America were Pilgrims by faith, with other brands of believers including Quakers, Anabaptists and, later, Jews and Catholics and so on. In other words, Kat’s right, America’s pretty much always been a melting pot. But those who founded this nation were also convinced that religion, with its tendency toward self-control, was a necessary balancing force to democracy, since democracy taken to its extreme, as proved by the fall of previous democracies in Greece and Rome, can lead to an utter lack of control and self-government.

In other words, without some self-control, democratic government can ultimately devolve into “vote for whatever you want, regardless of the consequences.” An example today? We all want free health care… and no tax increases in the bargain. Or locally here in Minnesota, a recent poll showed Minnesotans were all for building the best replacement bridge possible to replace the collapsed 35W bridge… and were even more in favor of no tax increase to cover the reconstruction costs.

While budget cuts elsewhere can often achieve such feats, it is also a demonstration of just how wastefully government collects and spends tax money that a few simple budget cuts can result in enough month for a $250B bridge project.

But I suspect I’ll surprise some folks when I say this: I don’t mind America being neutral toward religion, as long as it stays neutral and not hostile toward religious freedom. For me, the same neutrality that allows me to be a messianic in Minneapolis allows Kat to be an atheist in the Bible belt, and that’s as it ought to be in both our cases.

Unfortunately, what the laws are and what human behavior produces are two different beasts altogether. The founding principal is correct, but in Minneapolis-St. Paul, although I’m technically free to be a messianic, my life and the lives of those in our church is hardly free from harassment. This is especially true of messianics, who don’t fit in with either the Christian community or the Jewish community. Our temple has been broken into and defaced, some have been refused service at certain establishments.

Some of our kids are proselytized by replacement-theology Christians who are convinced we’re hell-bound because we observe the Torah laws, feasts and festivals – we’re “too Jewish” – or are treated with similar disrespect by a Jewish community afraid that we’re trying to “trick them” into Christianity. (Even though the truth is, the congregation I’m a part of does not overtly evangelize. Instead, we hold events, publicize them, and allow those interested to make their own decision whether to attend or not.)

And yet our congregation has been regularly subject to “invasions” by either Christians out to “prove” we’re a bunch of devil-worshipers, to Jewish “anti-missionaries” who attend under the guise of being a messianic, but end up trying to convince our members they’d be better off by far attending their orthodox (or reformed, or conservative) temple down the street… a level of predatory proselytizing we’ve never even considered, let alone carried out.

Kat has many of her own stories of what it’s like to be an atheist in the Bible belt, that she may or may not want to share; I’ll let her tell those at her own discretion. But do these things happen because the laws are right or wrong? Or do they occur because no matter whether your guide through life is the New Testament, the Torah, the Koran, or the Laws of the the State of Florida, there will always be idiots who don’t pay attention to, or do, what’s right?

I favor the latter suggestion. As Larry the Cable Guy says, “You can’t fix stupid,” and there are plenty of “stupid people” to be found, whether the group of people you are looking at are people of faith, people of atheism, or people gathered to watch a sporting event. The function of government when it comes to stupid people is criminal punishment. The function of most churches is a combination of eternal punishments, usually with a chance for some sort of redemption or forgiveness.

Perhaps this is not as much disagreement as some people hope for as they read along; but not all debates need to be about two people pulling in completely opposite directions on every point. Sometimes, as Kat has said, it’s more of a friendly exchange of ideas. But enough for now.

Tag, Kat. You’re up!