lpetrich

A more likely scenario would be the creation of a state church, which might be called the Church of God the American.

Only CGA members will be allowed to hold public office, only the CGA will be supported with tax money, public schools will feature CGA services and classes in CGA doctrine -- or may be run by the CGA.

Non-CGA members will have none of the privileges of citizenship, though they will have all the responsibilities, such as paying taxes, military service, etc.

And to make the CGA complete, it ought to have no sacred books of foreign origin, such as the Bible. If God truly loves America above other nations, then he would not have revealed His Word to foreigners.

Beelzebub

If you learn anything from this incident, let it be trust no one. Teachers can be as biased and as wrong as anyone else. Take no ones word, check it out yourself. That is the path to a good education.

Jerry Smith

Small correction. James Madison was definitely a Presbyterian, and one with puritanical leanings. Nevertheless, he was the single most active of the framers of the constitution on the issue of disestablishment. The words of the 1st Amendment might have carried even stronger separation language had Madison had his way.

Godless Dave

Because he know he would be up a creek if a Christian denomination other than Presbyterianism had been the established religion. Another thing the fundies and the sheep don't understand about the first amendment.

ex-preacher

Do you have a source for this? I've spent the last hour or so looking for some verification of Madison's religious leanings. He said almost nothing about his own views so it's hard to establish. I have found sources in the II library (and other atheist websites) that call him a deist, but they have little evidence.

The best I've found was at this site:
<a href="http://www.au.org/churchstate/cs3013.htm" target="_blank">http://www.au.org/churchstate/cs3013.htm</a>

I would highly recommend this article for your teacher, Harumi. Here's an excerpt:

Some Religious Right advocates have even tried to portray Madison as an evangelical Christian. As a young man Madison did have an interest in theological matters and considered studying for the clergy, but his ardor quickly cooled. Although nominally a member of the Episcopal Church, Madison rarely talked about his religious beliefs. Leading biographers routinely refer to Madison as a "Deist."

I have seen him referred to as both Episcopalian and Deist, but nowhere named as a "Presbyterian with puritanical leanings." Source please!

Doug

ex-preacher,

As a doctoral candidate you should know better than to expect documentation for a definitive statement.

Toto

<a href="http://www.positiveatheism.org/hist/quotes/madison.htm" target="_blank">Quotes from Madison on Positive Atheism Site</a>

This page contains numerous quotes from Madison that support a strict separation of church and state.

E.g.

"Experience witnesseth that eccelsiastical establishments, instead of maintaining the purity and efficacy of Religion, have had a contrary operation. During almost fifteen centuries has the legal establishment of Christianity been on trial. What have been its fruits? More or less in all places, pride and indolence in the Clergy, ignorance and servility in the laity, in both, superstition, bigotry and persecution."

From A Memorial and Remonstrance Against Religious Assessments, addressed to the Virginia General Assemby, June 20, 1785

It also documents several fake quotes from Madison that are floating around the internet. It also gives this:

[ March 22, 2002: Message edited by: Toto ]</p>

excreationist

The OT only says to not worship other gods. You don't HAVE to worship Yahweh. (I think - well sometimes you might need to pay him lip service)

The Sabbath law only says to not do ANY work on the Sabbath (including gathering wood - see <a href="http://bible.gospelcom.net/cgi-bin/bible?passage=numbers+15:32-36&version=NIV-IBS&showfn=yes&showxref=yes&language=english" target="_blank">Numbers 15:32-36</a>), or else be put to death. There is no command to attend a worship service on the Sabbath. The true Sabbath day goes from sundown Friday to sundown Saturday. It was changed to Sunday for <a href="http://www.religioustolerance.org/sabbath.htm#move" target="_blank">unbiblical reasons</a> by Emperor Constantine in 321 CE.

Well because of this, Jews haven't even pronounced God's name for millenia... we know that God's name is YHWH, but that doesn't include the vowels. God's name *might* be Yahweh, but no-one can be certain.

Answerer

Hi I got an idea, why not Harumi , you go and ask his teacher to come to this forum and see how we bombarded her.

excreationist

The last commandment talks about not being jealous of anything that belongs to your neighbour including his servants.
But the constitution says that all men are created equal.
<a href="http://www.constitution.org/usconsti.htm" target="_blank">US Consitution</a>

I can't find the following words there:
steal
murder
cheat
kill
mother
father
parent
god
creator (I thought it was meant to talk about rights given by the creator!)

I could find these words:
witness - but nothing against people lying
life - only about treason, double jeopardy

So I don't see how anyone could seriously say that the constitution was based on the ten commandments. The ten commandments doesn't say anything about rights. Well I guess it talks about property rights, the right to life, the right to fair trial and the rights of parents but I don't see how the constitution's talk about religion has anything to do with the ten commandments.