{"id":699,"date":"2014-05-07T08:59:00","date_gmt":"2014-05-07T08:59:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/rhetoricraceandreligion\/2014\/05\/with-the-supreme-courts-help-religion-creeps-toward-the-state.html"},"modified":"2014-05-07T08:59:00","modified_gmt":"2014-05-07T08:59:00","slug":"with-the-supreme-courts-help-religion-creeps-toward-the-state","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/rhetoricraceandreligion\/2014\/05\/with-the-supreme-courts-help-religion-creeps-toward-the-state.html","title":{"rendered":"With the Supreme Court’s Help, Religion Creeps Toward the State"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>
Americans like to debate the \u201cwall of separation\u201d between church and state. Conservatives denounce it as an invention of that sinister Francophile Thomas Jefferson. Liberals point out its roots in American religion going back to 1644.\u00a0<\/span><\/div>\n

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But there is no wall. There may never have been one, and in any case there hasn\u2019t been one for some time. There is merely an ill-defined grassy verge between the domain of majority religion on the one hand and that of dissent on the other. The new growth on the government-sponsored-religion side is distinctly invasive\u2014the habitat of the majority moves relentlessly forward, while the sphere of solitary conscience retreats.<\/span><\/div>\n
Majority religion took another small step forward Monday, when the Courtdecided<\/a>, 5-4, that the town of Greece, New York, did not violate the Establishment Clause when it chose to begin its town-board meetings with explicitly Christian prayers, in which local clergy asked citizens to bow their heads, acknowledge \u201cthe saving sacrifice of Jesus,\u201d and signify assent by saying \u201camen.\u201d<\/span><\/div>\n

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The result will dismay those who believe, like Justice Elena Kagan, that \u201cwhen citizens go before the government, they go not as Christians or Muslims or Jews (or what have you), but just as Americans.\u201d Kagan believes that so strongly that she repeated the idea no fewer than four times in a spirited dissent from the majority opinion, which was written by Justice Anthony Kennedy.<\/span><\/div>\n

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Read the rest here<\/a><\/span><\/div>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Americans like to debate the \u201cwall of separation\u201d between church and state. Conservatives denounce it as an invention of that sinister Francophile Thomas Jefferson. Liberals point out its roots in American religion going back to 1644.\u00a0 But there is no wall. There may never have been one, and in any case there hasn\u2019t been one […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-699","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nWith the Supreme Court's Help, Religion Creeps Toward the State<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Americans like to debate the \u201cwall of separation\u201d between church and state. 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