[Evangelicals] can no longer count on government to support traditional Biblical values.
- Rev. Robert Jeffress
Religious belief is without reason and without dignity, and its record is near-universally dreadful.
- Martin Amis, The Second Plane: 14 Responses to September 11
The separation of Church and State isn’t exactly new ground for me, but at times I feel almost compelled to rebut those whose purpose in life appears to be making their God everyone’s government. The astonishing arrogance and disrespect aside, there’s just so much wrong with the attitude of people like Jeffress…and there are SO many intolerant theocrats just who share his views and aspirations.
To begin with, there’s ample evidence in the words or writings of the Founding Fathers of the belief that the combination of God and government was nothing if not a recipe for disaster. Revisionist historians like David Barton aside, the original intent of the Founding Fathers was to create a firewall separating religion from governance. Zealots like Jeffress can’t understand that their desire to turn America into a de facto theocracy is to flirt with disaster. One would need only to look at places like Iran, Pakistan, Somalia, and Saudi Arabia to understand the potential perils of combining God and government.
I’ve written a lot about this in this past, so I’ll spare my gentle reader any unnecessary regurgitations. Y’all can google “Jefferson’s Letter to the Danbury Baptists,” the “Treaty of Tripoli,” or review the 1st Amendment’s Establishment Clause. No, the words “separation of Church and State” don’t appear in the Consitution, but there’s ample source material and precedent to make the intentions of the Founding Fathers quite clear.
That there are those who would without so much as a second though dismantle the Constitution in order that they might replace it with a Christian theocracy should scare the Hell (pun fully intended) out of anyone who loves this country. America has survived and thrived for 240 years, in no small parts because we’ve assiduously maintained the firewall separating Church from State. We cannot allow those with an authoritarian, hyper-religious, intolerant agenda impose their will (and their version of God) on all Americans, the vast majority of whom don’t share their values.
If you think I’m being alarmist, come back and talk to me when we become a Christian version of Iran.
