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"I just have to say in all candor that since this nation was founded primarily on Christian principles ... personally, I prefer someone who I know who has a solid grounding in my faith."
You can probably imagine the uproar this has caused in the Jewish and Islamic communities. The America Jewish Committee said in a statement the following day, "To argue that America is a Christian nation, or that persons of a particular faith should by reason of their faith not seek high office, puts the very character of our country at stake."
The McCain camp has been working heavily on damage control, and he's been busily trying to "clarify" his remarks in public venues since then. At one recent event McCain said, "We are a nation that was based on Judeo-Christian values. That means respect for all of human rights and dignity. That's my principle values and ideas." He referred to this concept as being "almost Talmudic."
Religion should have no basis on someone’s ability to run a country. “Christian values” may be beneficial to one person, but hurtful to the next, so why be so biased as to use one religion’s teachings to affect political decisions, which will ultimately influence those of all faiths?
I live in Arizona. I deal with the embarrassment John McCain has made a career of dishing up on a day to day basis. He is a joke in his own State. On the other hand, I’m Pagan, and I VOTE! Otherwise, I couldn’t complain, or so I was brought up. At best, the man’s a goofball. At worst, he’s indicative of something that has gone very wrong with the definition of American Values!
Wow! McCain says things like that on a regular basis? Is his ignorance so deep he was afraid if he sounded pro-Muslim he’s be accused of being sympathetic to “terrorists”? How sad for all of us in this country. How can so many people conveniently forget that religious freedom is what attracted so many settlers to this country in the first place. The more the line between “Church and State” becomes blurred, the worse off this country becomes.
When the Founders wrote the nation’s Constitution, they specified that “no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States.” (Article 6, section 3) This provision was radical in its day– giving equal citizenship to believers and non-believers alike. They wanted to ensure that no single religion could make the claim of being the official, national religion, such as England had. Nowhere in the Constitution does it mention religion, except in exclusionary terms. The words “Jesus Christ, Christianity, Bible, and God” are never mentioned in the Constitution– not once.
Thomas Jefferson and company were largely deists and pre-Unitarian Universalists. My guess is the first ammendment was added to guarantee the safety and freedom of the founding fathers themselves against an onslaught of evangelicals as much as for any other group. Here is a site which gives significant insight into this viewpoint. Also, notice that it was the very first ammendment to be added, probably because they thought it was incredibly important.
I agree that Christianity should have nothing to do with anything. I personally believe that the majority of society has been “BRAINWASHED” by hundreds of years to believe only in Christianity but times are changing and people are starting to realize that the reason Christianity came about to begin with was mainly because the Catholic church wanted a way to control and surpress the masses. Henceforth if you control the people, you control the money, you control everything! And that is what it was about back then.
And by the way, most of the “christian” holidays that are celebrated today are NOT christian but based on Pagan beliefs from old. DUH, they are so dumb sometimes, they just modify things to make themselves feel better.