Is A Secular Government Always Eventually Hostile to Religion?
Pseudodionysius ·
August 30, 2011 at 2:27am
Inspired by Claire, swamped by deadlines and intrigued by Brian Watt's comments on the Modern Idolatry thread, I'd like to extend the argument. Leave aside the question of whether or not America's founders believed the Republic to be secular or not. Two questions arise:
- Is the US legislature, judiciary and executive -- taken in toto -- now "de facto" secularist?
- Corollary: See the title to this post.
Fascinating question, no?
Update Bonus Round Question: If yes, is it equally hostile to all religions or is it more hostile to some religions rather than others?
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May '11
Re: Is A Secular Government Always Eventually Hostile to Religion?
Roberto: There has always been conflict between government and religion. The Mormons were harassed during the 19th century because of polygamy. Some religions smoke peyote for religious reasons and that's against the law. Their is no simple answer to your scenerio. My default position is to be more sympathetic to the parent and their determination for what is best for their child. Does this vaccine inoculate against a contagious disease? Many variables can be added to your thought provoking scenerio.
May '10
Re: Is A Secular Government Always Eventually Hostile to Religion?
To your first question: there are grave differences that should not be overlooked between religion and religion. Most significantly, Christianity teaches freedom of religion; it opposes all coercion in religious matters; it endorses the separation of church and state. The same cannot be said for Islam. Hence, an Islamic government is much more threatening to other religions than a Christian government.
To your second question: more distinction are needed. But, without going into those, let me just say that I think a compelling case (historically and philosophically) could be made that the best and freest society is one rooted in judeo-Christian values and traditions, in which the civil government conscientiously refrains from the interfering with the practice of religion, provided that practice doesn't conflict with the basic tenets of a free and humane society.
Jun '10
Re: Is A Secular Government Always Eventually Hostile to Religion?
Roberto
One would have to say yes. You are being somewhat inflammatory in your examples but using one as a basis let us posit a case. Say a new vaccine is developed and some government official decides to mandate that children should be inoculated. If a parent has a moral objection, perhaps it was manufactured using embryonic stem cells, and because of their faith rejects the treatment should the state be able to override a parent's decision on what's best for their child?
Not being inflammatory at all. The federal government disallows polygamy and Mormons can no longer practice it. There have been cases where parents have kept their children from receiving life-saving help because they felt this would be a violation of their religious beliefs. Should society tolerate these religious practices?
Islam calls for the killing of apostates and homosexuals. Should we be "hostile" to this religious practice?
My examples are rooted in history and current events.
May '10
Re: Is A Secular Government Always Eventually Hostile to Religion?
Brian Watt
The federal government disallows polygamy and Mormons can no longer practice it. There have been cases where parents have kept their children from receiving life-saving help because they felt this would be a violation of their religious beliefs. Should society tolerate these religious practices?
Islam calls for the killing of apostates and homosexuals. Should we be "hostile" to this religious practice?
My examples are rooted in history and current events. · Aug 29 at 5:02pm
This goes to show that there is a moral content on which a free and humane society must be grounded, and by which we judge whether particular religious customs and practice are acceptable.
E.g., no practice the violates a person's unalienable rights is acceptable.
Granted, there are tricky cases in the concrete realm. That's why we need Common Law, and tradition. And public officials with a lot of wisdom and prudence and humility.
Jun '10
Re: Is A Secular Government Always Eventually Hostile to Religion?
katievs
Brian Watt
The federal government disallows polygamy and Mormons can no longer practice it. There have been cases where parents have kept their children from receiving life-saving help because they felt this would be a violation of their religious beliefs. Should society tolerate these religious practices?
Islam calls for the killing of apostates and homosexuals. Should we be "hostile" to this religious practice?
My examples are rooted in history and current events. · Aug 29 at 5:02pm
This goes to show that there is a moral content on which a free and humane society must be grounded, and by which we judge whether particular religious customs and practice are acceptable.
E.g., no practice the violates a person's unalienable rights is acceptable.
Granted, there are tricky cases in the concrete realm. That's why we need Common Law, and tradition. And public officials with a lot of wisdom and prudence and humility. · Aug 29 at 5:18pm
Yes, indeed.
May '10
Re: Is A Secular Government Always Eventually Hostile to Religion?
Brian Watt
Granted, there are tricky cases in the concrete realm. That's why we need Common Law, and tradition. And public officials with a lot of wisdom and prudence and humility. · Aug 29 at 5:18pm
Yes, indeed. · Aug 29 at 5:22pm
I would say the case of life-saving treatment for a child whose parents oppose it on religious grounds is a very tricky one.
Stoning of homosexuals not tricky.
Polygamy not tricky, though not as absolutely clear and indisputable as killing homosexuals, or throwing widows on to funeral pyres, or honor killings, or coerced abortion. Maybe more in a line with female genital mutilation and Jim Crow laws.
Jun '10
Re: Is A Secular Government Always Eventually Hostile to Religion?
Some folks on the left think that Federalist is another word for fascist, and Evangelical is another word for theocrat. Neither is true. And of course many on the left know it's not true, but say it anyway. If somebody desperately wants a smaller more limited federal government, then they're certainly not fascists or theocrats. Are there any small government fascists, or theocrats? I don't think so.
Jun '10
Re: Is A Secular Government Always Eventually Hostile to Religion?
katievs
Brian Watt
Granted, there are tricky cases in the concrete realm. That's why we need Common Law, and tradition. And public officials with a lot of wisdom and prudence and humility. · Aug 29 at 5:18pm
Yes, indeed. · Aug 29 at 5:22pm
I would say the case of life-saving treatment for a child whose parents oppose it on religious grounds is a very tricky one.
Sometimes not that tricky. See the following stories here, here, here, here, here, and here...as well as this quick, albeit dated (1997) abstract from the Journal of American Pediatrics here.
Sep '10
Re: Is A Secular Government Always Eventually Hostile to Religion?
Regardless of our understanding of the Founders' system as religious or secular, it was certainly less secular than the current. Consider Washington's letter to the Hebrew Congregation at Newport:
"...It is now no more that toleration is spoken of as if it were the indulgence of one class of people that another enjoyed the exercise of their inherent natural rights, for, happily, the Government of the United States, which gives to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance, requires only that they who live under its protection should demean themselves as good citizens in giving it on all occasions their effectual support..."
Hard to imagine a less hostile secular government than that.
Mar '11
Re: Is A Secular Government Always Eventually Hostile to Religion?
If we get a copy of American Progressivism and read the actual documents put forward to explain their position all of this becomes crystal clear. They were amazingly open about their goals and intentions. This series of discussions centered around secularism are just a series of pieces of phony baloney to side track us off the main theme.
The secualarists are opposed to our form of government and wish to diminish the authority of the the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. As those are based on claims of natural law they wish to repudiate any basis for accepting natural law. That leads them to attack religion and religion's God.
Further, if you study the relationship between religion, any religion, and either the Fascists, Nazis, Communists or Maoist, among others, you will find the relationships are much the same as the Secularist (really the Progressives) relationship to our religions in America and for much the same core reasons.
Like I said go read their founding documents in American Progressivism. Those documents explain it all. Lets quit being chumps for phoney baloney political propaganda.
Jun '10
Re: Is A Secular Government Always Eventually Hostile to Religion?
Update Bonus Round Question: If yes, is it equally hostile to all religions or is it more hostile to some religions rather than others?
This must be looked at historically. Mormons even in the pre-polygamy days (especially in Missouri), were denied basic civil rights (including an extermination order signed by the governor of Missouri). In the polygamy era, government was hostile to Mormonism (but its hostility was in reaction to a practice that was out of the mainstream of the shared moral code and unlawful). In its effort to ban the practice, the government, in my opinion, went beyond the reasonable limits of law enforcement. Today, however, I am unaware of any specific government hostility that is unique to Mormonism. I certainly have never felt any kind of animus from government.
I believe many policies of the current administration are a direct shot at Catholic hospitals and charities. It's a different form of some of the anti-Catholicism of prior eras.
If we trek through history, various groups were ill-treated at times.
Ironically, the religion that is treated with kid gloves today in America is Islam.
Jun '10
Re: Is A Secular Government Always Eventually Hostile to Religion?
tabula rasa: Update Bonus Round Question: If yes, is it equally hostile to all religions or is it more hostile to some religions rather than others?
[...]
I believe many policies of the current administration are a direct shot at Catholic hospitals and charities. It's a different form of some of the anti-Catholicism of prior eras.
If we trek through history, various groups were ill-treated at times...... · Aug 29 at 6:18pm
In both Ireland and Australia there are proposals to require priests to break the seal of confession in cases where penitents admit the abuse of children. The motives may be good, but the effect will be to keep sick troubled people out of the confessional, and away from any counseling at all. The priest doesn't just say, "that's fine my son." They tell them that they can only be forgiven when they go to the legal authorities and accept responsibility for what they've done. That's how they prove that they're remorseful. Apart from being counterproductive, these proposed laws for priests who hear confessions would no doubt expand over time to cover other crimes. Thin edge of the wedge. First step.
Jan '11
Re: Is A Secular Government Always Eventually Hostile to Religion?
I think Katievs hit on a crucial distinction between religion and morality.
Cultures are mixtures of (among other things) a political system, a religious system, a moral system, etc. We don't really have hard and fast definitions, and certainly no firewalls, between the systems. (OK, "system" is too precise a description. They're not really systems in the engineering sense. They're just all part of the General-Mish-Mash.)
It's funny. We separate church and state - but do we separate morality and state? Even if we could, shouldn't we realistically admit that most of us get our morality from our religion?
It's kind of a mess, when you look at it ...
Dec '10
Re: Is A Secular Government Always Eventually Hostile to Religion?
“Central to the social reality of major western religion is the distinction made by Émile Durkheim between the sacred and the profane.
The profane world consists of all that we can know through our senses; it is the natural world of everyday life that we experience as either comprehensible or at least ultimately knowable.
In contrast, the sacred, or sacrum in Latin, encompasses all that exists beyond the everyday, natural world that we experience with our senses. As such, the sacred inspires feelings of awe because it is regarded as ultimately unknowable and beyond limited human abilities to perceive and comprehend. Religion is organized primarily around the sacred elements of human life and provides a collective attempt to bridge the gap between the sacred and the profane.”
So long as secular government eschews the sacred in its natural pursuit of extending its power over the profane, religion thrives safely outside of secular government’s authority.
Hostile conflict will occur with religion if secular government appropriates for itself a part of life that is sacred, i.e. “ultimately unknowable and beyond limited human abilities to perceive and comprehend.”
Church or mosque trespassing on the estate of government is the greater threat.
May '11
Re: Is A Secular Government Always Eventually Hostile to Religion?
Yes, absolutely it is secular and has always been designed to be secular.
In the 1970's and 1980's I remember the various churches insisting on a secular government because they believed the government had no business in their churches.
Nov '10
Re: Is A Secular Government Always Eventually Hostile to Religion?
etoiledunord
In both Ireland and Australia there are proposals to require priests to break the seal of confession in cases where penitents admit the abuse of children. The motives may be good, but the effect will be to keep sick troubled people out of the confessional, and away from any counseling at all. The priest doesn't just say, "that's fine my son." They tell them that they can only be forgiven when they go to the legal authorities and accept responsibility for what they've done. That's how they prove that they're remorseful. Apart from being counterproductive, these proposed laws for priests who hear confessions would no doubt expand over time to cover other crimes. Thin edge of the wedge. First step.
My understanding of the Catholic church is that this would be a cause for civil disobedience; am I right?
Sep '10
Re: Is A Secular Government Always Eventually Hostile to Religion?
Lucy Pevensie
etoiledunord
In both Ireland and Australia there are proposals to require priests to break the seal of confession in cases where penitents admit the abuse of children. The motives may be good, but the effect will be to keep sick troubled people out of the confessional, and away from any counseling at all. The priest doesn't just say, "that's fine my son." They tell them that they can only be forgiven when they go to the legal authorities and accept responsibility for what they've done. That's how they prove that they're remorseful. Apart from being counterproductive, these proposed laws for priests who hear confessions would no doubt expand over time to cover other crimes. Thin edge of the wedge. First step.
My understanding of the Catholic church is that this would be a cause for civil disobedience; am I right? · Aug 30 at 2:13pm
You are right.