GOD & KING

Public School Prayer

The call to "Reinstate Prayer in Public Schools" suggests the misnomer that prayer isn't allowed in public schools. It is a First Amendment right that with an appropriate level of discretion students can pray whenever or wherever they want. However, public (government) school representatives (faculty, etc) are not allowed to lead or designate an official period for prayer. This is due to the same 'separation of church and state' clause and freedom of speech of The First Amendment from The Bill of Rights that protects the right to prayer in the first place...

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievance."

What guarantees our freedom of religion, speech, press, assembly, and to petition the government is not that these rights will be protected *BY* the government but *FROM* the government. To prevent government from suggesting to the people what beliefs are expected of us and when to practice them. That's between each one of us and our maker. We learned this lesson from the Pilgrims...

The Landing Of The Pilgrim Fathers In New England

by Felicia D. Hemans

The breaking waves dashed high

On a stern and rock-bound coast,

And the woods against a stormy sky

Their giant branches tossed:

And the heavy night hung dark

The hills and waters o'er,

When a band of exiles moored their bark

On the wild New England shore.

Not as the conqueror comes,

They, the true-hearted, came;

Not with the roll of the stirring drums,

And the trumpet that sings of fame:

Not as the flying come,

In silence and in fear;

They shook the depths of the desert gloom

With their hymns of lofty cheer.

Amidst the storm they sang,

And the stars heard, and the sea;

And the sounding aisles of the dim woods rang

To the anthem of the free.

The ocean eagle soared

From his nest by the white wave's foam,

And the rocking pines of the forest roared,-

This was their welcome home.

There were men with hoary hair

Amidst that pilgrim-band:

Why had they come to wither there,

Away from their childhood's land?

There was woman's fearless eye,

Lit by her deep love's truth;

There was manhood's brow serenely high,

And the fiery heart of youth.

What sought they thus afar?

Bright jewels of the mine?

The wealth of seas, the spoils of war?-

They sought a faith's pure shrine!

Ay, call it holy ground,

The soil where first they trod;

They have left unstained what there they found,-

Freedom to worship God.

GOOD vs. TRUTH

GOOD vs TRUTH

Pro-Life vs. Pro-Choice

The killing of any 'human' life is a serious matter whether or not you consider it a person such as with a human embryo or a brain dead adult on life support. But the morality of such killing is sometimes questioned with arguments that run contradictory with cultural practices and perceptions.

A pro-life argument for example is that the embryo or fetus should have the rights of a person and that abortion is 'murder'.  But as a culture in the U.S. there are no wakes or closed casket funerals for miscarriages of fetuses as there would be for an infant's funeral.  The mourning of such a loss may be no less poignant but society still draws a distinction between the death of a fetus and that of an infant.

A pro-choice argument is that the embryo or fetus are just tissue and shouldn't have the rights of 'personhood' at least until development allows for viability outside the womb. But dependence on the mother's life support isn't a definition of personhood, it is an effort to delineate a minimum practical threshold of when the fetus could be considered no longer just a part of the mother and therefor to also have some rights as an individual.

Some use a religious definition for a person as life with a soul and that upon conception the human embryo has a soul and is therefore a person.

A secular point of view is that an embryo may be a 'potential' person but is not one yet.  Personhood develops in stages and although at what stage a person is fully realized is debatable, birth has been accepted by society as the point for basic rights of personhood to be recognized.

What the argument really boils down to is the question if killing is worthy of absolution by society.  The courts grant absolution for killing in self defense.  Killing in State executions are absolved by the majority vote of its citizenry.  In war countries absolve their soldiers of killing, even in cases of civilian 'collateral damage'.

Majority opinion absolves the wrong of killing, at least in the eyes of the majority's representatives. Therefore more contentious issues such as mercy killing, assisted suicide, embryonic stem cell research, and abortion may someday rise to the same level of acceptability as war and State executions.

PREEMPTIVE STRIKE DOCTRINE

Photo Credit:U.S. Department of Energy 



Whether or not you believe this administration was acting in good faith believing Iraq had Weapons of Mass Destruction, it is obvious the Preemptive Strike Doctrine, the power to 'start' a war, should be held to the most stringent criteria of empirical evidence. Our American government is killing and mutilating thousands of 'collateral damage' civilians over nonexistent WMD! Spread the word, tell your congressperson, insist on a responsible and accountable First Strike Doctrine before we're wrong again!

EVOLUTION vs INTELLIGENT DESIGN

Photo Credit:US Fish and Wildlife Service


I got frustrated listening to NPR National Public Radio tonight so will make this my blog's first topic. They were playing the interview show, The Connection. The Kansans public school board was reviewing introduction of what they called "Intelligent Design Theory" to science classes. A doctrine suggesting supernatural origins to life to be taught along side Darwin's Evolution Theory. The interviewer was antagonistic and his guests on both sides of the issue spoke mostly sophistry and rhetoric. Even the scientist tossed around barbs undermining any logical arguments he would make.

The First Amendment issue regarding separation of Church and State aside the issue really came down to what is the definition of science and why wouldn't Intelligent Design qualify? Key aspects of Scientific Method are Hypothesis and Theory. Hypothesis is an explanation that proposes experiments to validate it. Theory is not only validated by experiments but also considered fact by the scientific community after peer review. Since there still isn't a test for the existence of god(s) it is a postulation, an assumed premise and not supported by Scientific Method. And don't even get me started about the name Christian Science:)