Sep of Church and state?

[musturde]

I can see both sides of the issue but I don't like it when evangelicals argue it. In one school forced kids to pray before lunch (which I am totally against at a pubic school) and the teacher would read the Bible to the kids. I believe that you should be able to express yourself but I am completely against forcing people to do something. It's just like taking your kid to a public school and the teacher forced your kids to thank a pagan God or force his or her beliefs upon you. That's not fair at all. This school is trying to fight sep of Church and State and when one woman was asked about the other faiths of people and if people would get offended she answered simply "Well Jesus will get mad at them and they will know he is mad when he comes again". I think enforcing religion is even worse than suspending religious practice.

[jezic]

i think they tried this on the debate board.

[Guest Eremite]

[quote]1. A sense of the dignity of the human person has been impressing itself more and more deeply on the consciousness of contemporary man,(1) and the demand is increasingly made that men should act on their own judgment, enjoying and making use of a responsible freedom, not driven by coercion but motivated by a sense of duty. The demand is likewise made that constitutional limits should be set to the powers of government, in order that there may be no encroachment on the rightful freedom of the person and of associations. This demand for freedom in human society chiefly regards the quest for the values proper to the human spirit. It regards, in the first place, the free exercise of religion in society. This Vatican Council takes careful note of these desires in the minds of men. It proposes to declare them to be greatly in accord with truth and justice. To this end, it searches into the sacred tradition and doctrine of the Church-the treasury out of which the Church continually brings forth new things that are in harmony with the things that are old.

First, the council professes its belief that God Himself has made known to mankind the way in which men are to serve Him, and thus be saved in Christ and come to blessedness. We believe that this one true religion subsists in the Catholic and Apostolic Church, to which the Lord Jesus committed the duty of spreading it abroad among all men. Thus He spoke to the Apostles: "Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have enjoined upon you" (Matt. 28: 19-20). On their part, all men are bound to seek the truth, especially in what concerns God and His Church, and to embrace the truth they come to know, and to hold fast to it.

This Vatican Council likewise professes its belief that it is upon the human conscience that these obligations fall and exert their binding force. The truth cannot impose itself except by virtue of its own truth, as it makes its entrance into the mind at once quietly and with power.

Religious freedom, in turn, which men demand as necessary to fulfill their duty to worship God, has to do with immunity from coercion in civil society. Therefore it leaves untouched traditional Catholic doctrine on the moral duty of men and societies toward the true religion and toward the one Church of Christ.

Over and above all this, the council intends to develop the doctrine of recent popes on the inviolable rights of the human person and the constitutional order of society.

2. This Vatican Council declares that the human person has a right to religious freedom. This freedom means that all men are to be immune from coercion on the part of individuals or of social groups and of any human power, in such wise that no one is to be forced to act in a manner contrary to his own beliefs, whether privately or publicly, whether alone or in association with others, within due limits.

The council further declares that the right to religious freedom has its foundation in the very dignity of the human person as this dignity is known through the revealed word of God and by reason itself.(2) This right of the human person to religious freedom is to be recognized in the constitutional law whereby society is governed and thus it is to become a civil right.

(Second Vatican Ecumenical Council, "Dignitatis Humanae")[/quote]

[Didacus]

I believe that they should not be seperate. A godless state is a state without morals and that wil value secularism above all. (gee, what countries fall into that category?) I for one hold greater allegiance to the papacy than my country.

musturde, I believe your comments do not rely so heavily on the seperation of church and state as much as the application of Catholic Doctrine.

I agree that Catholicism or any religion should not be forced on an individual.

[dspen2005]

i am for separation so long as we live in a predominantly prot nation.... if this were a catholic nation, then the social reign of christ would be manifested to the point that the separation of Church and state would be a moot point. it would be a non-issue.....

[journeyman]

[quote name='Didacus' date='Jun 10 2005, 12:10 PM']I believe that they should not be seperate.  A godless state is a state without morals and that wil value secularism above all.  (gee, what countries fall into that category?)  I for one hold greater allegiance to the papacy than my country.

musturde, I believe your comments do not rely so heavily on the seperation of church and state as much as the application of Catholic Doctrine.

I agree that Catholicism or any religion should not be forced on an individual.
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When Church and State are inextricably intertwined, there is no freedom for other religion - the established church in the European and American tradition (look at Maryland state history as control of the state flipped between the Catholic founder and the Protestant "come laters"); the muslim church/states of today are examples of that.

What many forget is that the founders were not seeking freedom FROM religion, but freedom OF religion . . . Virginia, birthplace of Thomas Jefferson, writer of the Declaration of Independence, President of the United States, founder of the University of Virginia (oh well, two out of three isn't bad) had a constitiutional (state) prohibition against issuing corporate charters for churches, which stemmed from Jefferson's and Madison's concerns about involvement of the state in the affairs of the church. That feature of the state constitution was struck in 2002 by a federal court. Jefferson, who was also the author of the statute of religious freedom, still in the Virginia Code today, and copied by several other states, mentioned the phrase "separation of church and state" in a letter to a baptist congregation worried about continued persecution of its congregation . . . and it has grown from there.

[KizlarAgha]

I didn't find my answer choice in the poll:

Separation of Church and state is a fallacy. All laws must be based on an absolute morality and therefore they are all founded upon religious belief of one sort or another.

[1337 k4th0l1x0r]

How do you define church? Taken in the context of the framers of the constitution, 'church' meant the structure in England where the state ran the chuch and church leaders had influence in state legislation. There was only one religion represented in government. To people today 'church' in the context of separation of church and state means any kind of faith. I do not believe the American government should have authority over the church nor do I believe bishops (or any clergy of any religion) should have any constitutionally mandated obligation to participate in government. There is no such thing as separation of religion and state (or faith and state or spirituality and state, etc.), which is how some people read the constitution now. God and religious beliefs do have a place in government and any attempt to keep them out can be considered a government endorsement of atheism.

[ThyWillBeDone]

Pope Pius IX put together a "Syllabus of Errors" it was list of teaching that were rejected by the church. Included in this list was the following error
"55. The Church ought to be separated from the State, and the State from the Church"
If you get a chance it is an intresting list to read, many error on the list still present in modern society and some have grown much more common since his time.
God Bless

[MC Just]

Seperation of Church and State is not even in the constitution, it was a totally seperate document (more like a letter). it does not mean what the liberal demoncrats are making it out to mean either. They are masters of misenterpretation. I dont remember fully but i beleive it was a letter by thomas jefferson to the dunkard baptists? who wanted their church to be the state religion. It wasnt to outlaw Christianity and religiion from the public square. (Thats more like old pagan rome).

Edited June 10, 2005 by MC Just

[Fidei Defensor]

The state should be seperate from the Church unless the Church is the state, but the state should never interfere with the Church in a country.

[MC Just]

Whats the deal with this? [url="http://www.papalencyclicals.net/Pius09/p9syll.htm"]http://www.papalencyclicals.net/Pius09/p9syll.htm[/url]

Edited June 10, 2005 by MC Just

[Pio Nono]

JMJ
6/10 - Tenth Friday

[quote name='fidei defensor' date='Jun 10 2005, 06:27 PM']The state should be seperate from the Church unless the Church is the state, but the state should never interfere with the Church in a country.
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It may not be my place to answer, but a couple of quotes might do us good. I don't know anything about this author (Orestes Brownson), but he lived during the papacy of Bl. Pius IX (aka Pio Nono ). Brownson offers,

[quote]The Syllabus, as such, has no dogmatic authority, but the condemnation of the several propositions has all the authority, and no more, of the original document from which the proposition is extracted.[/quote]

[quote]We read in the Syllabus, as a condemned proposition, “The church ought to be separated from the state, and the state from the church.”  This professes to be taken from the allocution, Acerbissimum, Sept. 27th, 1852.  This allocution, which we have not within our reach, we have seen it stated, had reference to the state of affairs at the time, and simply censured the movement of the Liberals to abolish the union of church and state in that country where it long had and still existed.[/quote]

[quote]Taking the modern world as it is, we believe the best condition of the Church is that of independence of the state, and freedom to administer her own affairs, and to exercise her own discipline on her own subjects, without let or hindrance from the civil power.  We are aware of no infallible decision of the pope against this, and we think there can be none, for Catholics are permitted to hold office under our government, and to take the prescribed oath to support and defend the constitution.[/quote]

[quote]The rule is, when a proposition is condemned as heretical, to take its exact contradictory as de fide;  but this rule holds only with regard to those propositions expressly or formally condemned as heretical...The pope, in censuring, is doing all in his power to save modern civilization from its aberrations, to aid social progress, and to promote science.  Let the principles censured become dominant, and society would inevitably lapse into barbarism...The civil power is bound to obey the law of God, and forfeits its authority in going contrary to it.  We shall not suffer those who refuse to believe the infallibility of the pope, to assert the infallibility of Caesar of the state.[/quote]

This can be found here -

[url="http://orestesbrownson.com/index.php?id=72"]http://orestesbrownson.com/index.php?id=72[/url]

[Matty_boy]

This poll isn't accurate. Some people argue that the State should even touch anything that has even the same properties or characteristics as religion, while others say that the State was founded on certain religious principles. If by "separation of Church and State" you mean that the Church and the State shouldn't be run by the same people, then I am for the separation of Church and State. Otherwise you have England and the Anglican Church, or Iran and Islam. I believe that the State should rule by natural law which was created by God which all civilized cultures recognize. These laws are that murder is bad, don't steal, don't make people into slaves, etc.

[azaelia]

[quote]Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, Religion and Morality are indispensable supports. And let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion. Can it be that Providence has not connected the permanent felicity of a Nation with its virtue? - George Washington[/quote]

Hm, well then.