Arfa

I am an atheist living in the UK and as such have very little exposure to a "religious right" and serious breaches of government policy by the church. Tony Blair has made no secret of his faith yet appears to apply rationality and constraint before applying these beliefs. The Religious community within the UK is largely silent and religious individuals consider their faith a very private matter. The recent controversy in the UK concerning creationist science being taught in a private school was quickly delt with in favour of the secular community, with no outcry from the established church when the majority favoured evolutionary principles being taught as the standard. My question is why do our relative countries ( UK and America ),handle the subject of religion so differently and why America as a whole has embraced and enforced its version of christianity upon its own people. As I understand America was not built upon chrisitian principles yet they are prevalent throughout not only the majority of its citizenship but more worringly its leadership. As an atheist in the UK I do not have to fear speaking out or expressing my "godless" views, I may have to explain myself more thoroughly but I do not worry of intimidation or personal attack, but I feel this is not generally the case in America where the term seems to be "Closet Atheist" and if it wasn't for organisations like the Secular Web, atheism would be talked about in hushed tones. I of course in my ignorance may have misread the situation , but it would still be interesting to know why there exists such differences in attitude and acceptance of religion.

Jamie_L

I live in U.S., and I don't think you've misread the situation at all. I'm not sure why things are the way they are, but I wish they weren't.

Jamie

free12thinker

Jamie is right as you are. The UK, and Europe in general is a lot more laid back than the US in many areas, notably religion and culture. The only reason I can come up with is our societies strive for perfection (please don't misread this as stating we are perfect and everyone else is not). But those with an influence in Washington and in the churches deem religion and domination as the backbone to being the 'strongest' nation. To them, having the church slip away and having old-fashion values slip away is a sign of weakness and a sign that the US's symbol as the example to the world would signal the end of greatness.

I, of course, don't buy it. I have traveled to Europe on a number of occasions and I love their tolerance, their open mindedness (both religiously and culturally), and personally believe that such open mindedness and tolerance leads to greater freedoms for people. So while our country may be more dominant in terms of Gross National Product and the size of our guns, we are severely lacking in tolerance and overall humanity.

It's really sad.......

Buffman

Arfa,

Perhaps if you examine your own history back far enough, and study the dominance of the Anglican Church-State relationship, you will begin to appreciate what is happening here.

My question is why do our relative countries ( UK and America ),handle the subject of religion so differently and why America as a whole has embraced and enforced its version of christianity upon its own people.

I wish there were a simple answer. There isn't. Perhaps an appropriate place to start seeking one would be with finding accurate answers to the following questions: "What is a true Christian? Are only 'Born Again' Christians true Christians? Which religious faith denominations seek government funding and why? Which specific religious dogmas gain the most by collusion with the government? Do the various Christian sects/cults trust each other?"

Here is an interesting analysis by many religious faith groups of whom the majority call themselves Christians. Why do these Christians see problems with any form of government sponsored religious, whether financial or other, assistance?

<a href="http://www.interfaithalliance.org/Initiatives/gfr.html" target="_blank">http://www.interfaithalliance.org/Initiatives/gfr.html</a>

The biggest problem I see is that our Fourth Estate has failed, miserably, to provide the kind of accurate knowledge necessary for an informed citizenry. (The sources of our information are no longer independent. The Net may be our last best hope...but only if the readers are capable of critical reasoning ability.)

<a href="http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/jefferson/quotations/jeff1600.htm" target="_blank">http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/jefferson/quotations/jeff1600.htm</a>

[ May 24, 2002: Message edited by: Buffman ]</p>

French

Dear Arfa : you do not need to go so far to have different points of view about religion among english-speaking countries. Just go in Ireland.
Catholicism there has played a so important role in the construction of this country and in the fight against the british domination that its "values" dominate the political debate.

In fact, catholism has survived in Ireland and marxism has survived in France for the same reason, they have payed a role in the organisation of the revolt against the invadors (english or german).

Dear free12thinker : You said "I have traveled to Europe on a number of occasions and I love their tolerance, their open mindedness (both religiously and culturally), and personally believe that such open mindedness and tolerance leads to greater freedoms for people." . Well, you know, it is true atheists, jews and buddhists are very well accepted by the european society, but many religious minorities, especialy muslims, are rejected and victim of discriminations in Europe quite more than they are in America. Again, the origin of the problem is certainly political. Buddhism is accepted because it is not considered as a religion that contradicts the european way of life and Islam is not accepted because there has been a political conflict between Europe and Islam for 1200 years.

Camille