Religion and Living in the US

Christmas is almost here. Today is Karen’s last day before a week off. Justin is taking the day off to shop. Galen is back together with her long term boy friend (more on this later) and Morgan (who cannot get away from work over the holidays this year – and as a result will not be home for Christmas for the first time) is going to visit for 3 days right after New Year’s.

Tis the season, so they say. And it is beginning to feel like Christmas. I guess that’s why those are such popular songs. They embody truths that never fade. Sort of like the Declaration of Independence and the US constitution – that is a funny comparison: Johnny Mathis and the poet John Ceiriog Hughes* with Thomas Jefferson and James Madison.

I do not view this as a religious holiday. Since my family was never affiliated with any religion when our kids were growing up and several holidays were considered very kid-oriented, we celebrate in a very secular way.

I was raised in a similar household (without the spiritual awareness aspect that Karen and I have tried to inject) so that background informs my belief that the country we live in is also similarly secular.

It is also my opinion that the founding fathers (and I mainly mean Jefferson, his protégé Madison and Franklin when I say that – which is probably inaccurate, but for now let’s just stick to my opinion – I don’t want to break my flow) had the good sense to build a decidedly secular foundation into our constitution.

I have decided that (this is going to sound rather soundbite-ish, but I really have a lot of depth behind this opinion, so please bear with me) the separation of church and state was built into the constitution because the government didn’t want the competition.

I am really talking about an economic competition but it can be extended to include a competition for hearts and minds (please ignore the fact that this has become cliché – read it for what it says: if the church has unrestricted ability to control the beliefs and emotions of the government then the government cannot be representative of the people because not all the people are going to agree with one belief or emotional trigger – no matter what the advertisers want us to believe).

You may have seen the bumper stickers that say something to the effect of “Don’t Steal, the Government doesn’t like competition.” It is not really that sentiment, more like the church in the late 1700s was a big corporate interest; one with a tremendous brand loyalty. So in order to create a republic that could effectively govern they sought to eliminate undue influence my limiting religious involvement in the US government. Too bad they didn’t realize that corporations would gain even more power than the church in the coming centuries (see the film, The Corporation (Achbar, 2004) for a good overview of the history of corporate charter –that is subject for another discussion).

Back to my feelings about religion and living in the US…

Now the subject of keeping Government out of religion and religion out of government has become very muddy.

I am writing this mainly because I realize that I am disturbed by what I view as an overt attempt by secular interests to hijack the secular country that I thought I was living in.

I craft that sentence specifically so because I also realize that my point of view is biased. The country may not have ever been as secular as I was led to believe- I am the product of my parents and my geo-political, socio-economic upbringing (which is a fancy way of saying my parents were fairly liberal agnostics and the area of the suburban Northeastern US that I lived in from the late 50s to mid 70s was a fairly affluent, non-religious, integrated, educated area). I also suspect that there are political forces, motivated by money (the only true motivation it seems) that are leveraging these non-secular viewpoints to create dissension between groups who basically believe in the same thing. A divide and conquer strategy if you will, that drives wedges between the citizens as a means of weakening coalitions before they can even recognize themselves. It pisses me off. The very language used is a way to separate and antagonize.

I get emails from relations who are campaigning for the eradication of the ACLU on the grounds that it is anti-religion. Christ, if you look solely at me seeing only my constitutionalists point of view I am anti religion. That is not the same thing. I listen to pro-choice and pro-life arguments and I am further frustrated by the obvious elements that are missing from the conversation (mainly that the folks who are interested in preserving a separation of our US system of laws from religious laws are called pro-choice and are de facto labeled by the opposition as anti-life & the people who say they are trying to protect the sanctity of human life have no clue how many human lives they are responsible for killing themselves) both sides (to varying degrees) are clueless pawns in a power struggle. It pisses me off that both sides lack the education to properly debate and discuss the subject. That the media plays on this fact and contributes to it and the majority of people (watching the sideshow performance art called cable news) don’t even know what they are hearing. Citizens should be able to govern themselves. That means they must be well versed in subterfuge, the politics of power, logic, debate, history (all humanities!), how to read, how to write (and not just words on a page but understanding subtext and communication). People are lazy because they have been convinced to be lazy. I cannot decide if it was planned or if it is just another massive under-calculation by lazy legislators. What a mess!

I vacillate between wanting to devote my life to education so I can help change this discussion and wanting to buy a big sailboat and run away from the mess. The problem is that there is really nowhere to run. <sigh>

There are people who get different parts of this but few who can see a whole. They see their own parts of the “elephant in the room” (to mix several metaphors – I love English, it is such a delight) but they lack the overview, the historical perspective that allows navigation to a solution. And I am not talking about the soundbite political process either; I am referring to a new kind of politico-academic citizen.

Our country needs a better educational system which somehow combines classical truth with street smart truth. Once there is a critical mass of this sort of thinking, legislative office holders would be better suited to chart this route to real solutions (and in theory, they would be supported by a similarly educated constituency). They would have to be politically savvy; understanding the way the system does work and the way the system was designed to work and being able to tread the narrow path between. Weed out the waste, close the loopholes and prevent them from being opened again as part of the checks and balances that were built into the governing framework. It requires a systems/holistic approach, not a symptoms based, reductionist approach. And to implement such approaches the general population would have to be able to understand the difference and support the one over the other. Rather than being ruled by fear and ignorance we would be ruled by reason and understanding. Government could have a chance to operate as the constitution say “By the people, for the people.” Not by the power hungry and greedy over the lazy, ignorant, duped and cowering masses.

Do you think such a thing is possible? How would one begin? What is the quickest path to market for these life affirming/nation altering ideas? How does one present these ideas that essentially say I must live a primarily agnostic/atheistic life in order to reserve my own beliefs (and allow all people to reserve theirs) for the systems of life and government to operate to everyone’s best interest (as a whole, almost species centric rather than individual centric while still celebrating the individual) ?

Are these inescapable paradoxes or would a broader point of view show their unification?

I know one thing. The situation as it stands is fucked up. And if I have learned one thing in my life it is that everything has a reason- and that understanding the reason gives us a clearer path to change. This mess can be changed, improved, bettered. I just wonder what I am supposed to do to help.

*John Ceiriog Hughes (25 September 1832 – 23 April 1887), was a Welsh poet and well-known collector of Welsh folk tunes. Sometimes referred to as the ‘Robert Burns of Wales’ thought to be the author of the first published lyrics to the song “Deck The Halls“