I have long believed in separation of church and state, as the Baptists did in this country some 400 years ago, see Roger Williams. Southern Baptists since then have espoused separation of church and state until some wackos and predators, including Paige Patterson and Paul Pressler took over the Southern Baptist convention about years ago. One cult religion, christian nationalists, seek to destroy that separation by claiming falsely that the US is a christian nation (anyone who reads the constitution knows that is not true) If religious organizations wish to be part of the world and receive taxpayer money, I believe they should be taxed like everyone else.
It’s funny that there are christian religions that don’t just hate on muslims, buddhists, atheists, etc but also consider other so-called christian religions to be cults, like Mormons or Catholics. There are so many flavors of these sects that no one idealogy can take precedent over others.
Here, I want to talk about the muslim religon, because, frankly, the way Republicans carry on about them is bigoted. Being clear that I am any of these religions and believe that religion, with it’s practice of not investigating the underpinnings of belief, can create people who fall prey to con artists, like Trump. However, I loathe the way the Republican party treats anyone of any other religion, as if they cannot believe something different based, quite often, simply on where they happened to be born and their family connections.
I saw on a number of flyers for voting, including Dewayne Burns, some ugly rhetoric, including menacing pictures showing people presumably coming to the United States from other countries, but the big thing that stuck out was his justification for why he voted against school vouchers. I was initially happy to see that he supported public education, unlike Helen Kerwin or revenge-seeking Abbott, but that joy went away when he brought up that one reason he was not for vouchers was because taxpayer money could to to a person or group that sought to create a muslim-teaching school.
OF COURSE that would happen “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech…” and it would also include other philosophies and religions, including the Satanic Church. Since this country has freedom of religion, people and especially government elected people, cannot pick and choose which religion they think should be deserving. Or be bigoted against other religions (and nationalities due to their skin color, apparently). Well, I take that back. people like Burns can sure be bigoted against other religions if they want in their personal life (because belief in a flawed book that encourages bigotry is their right) but as a United States citizen, they are not entitled to prevent others from also sharing in the funds provided to others through taxpayers. Burns is just wrong to try to scare people into his position by *othering* people who do not worship the same way he does.
Some examples:
Greg Abbott attempted in a lawsuit to prevent a winter solstice exhibit in the Texas capitol. He lost PDF
What about Jews, who also believe in religious freedom and support religious rights to an abortion?
