Although too
early to tell as the vote has not been called, it appears a majority of Supreme Court justices are inclined to offer
(albeit a lukewarm support) their support allowing a Maryland war memorial in the shape of a Latin
cross to remain on public property.
During seventy
minutes of oral arguments, most justices appeared to accept the view that the
monument was historically significant and its Latin cross design reflected the
nationwide trend at the time the monument was erected to honor war dead with
community memorials. Yet, there remained
complaints about separation of church and state.
In toto, the First
Amendment to the constitution of the United States says 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 grievances.
In part (the part we are interested in) the First Amendment states Congress shall make no law respecting an
establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.
Inscribed at the
base of the monument are four words: Valor, Endurance, Courage, and Devotion.
There are no written references to God, Christianity, or religion. Using this as a yardstick to measure the
monument’s intent, it is supposed the consensus vote will be the cross is "sectarian"
in nature and shall remain in the Blandensberg circle.
Our nation was predicated on
unalienable rights with governance through family, church and community, each
rightfully sovereign within its sphere. Human
dignity, legal equality and personal freedom reflect biblical values imparted
on Western Civilization, which retains these values in secular form while
expunging their Author from public discourse.[1]
At this point, I
would like to take a moment to bring everything to the front. Remember; I am not the ultimate authority on
this topic. Historically our court
systems have reviewed laws and court decisions as they pertain to a fair
application of our legal system. In
other words, our courts interpret lot of laws.
Though there is
no all-for-one-and-one-for-all way to interpret laws, I think the simplest
thing we can do as Americans is start with what makes sense – to me, what makes
sense is do not complicate. Since this
is only a question about religion and our government’s responsibility, we will
only look at that part of the first amendment.
Congress shall make no law
respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise
thereof. And, there is no mention of
separation of church from state. In
fact, there is no mention anywhere in the Constitution of the United States
about separation of church and state. Go
ahead, fact check me – I dare you!
Let’s go a
different direction for just a short while, and – those of you that know me
will not be surprised to hear this from me - (again).
Have you ever
heard of Liberal Tolerance? The top
definition I found in the online urban dictionary for Liberal Tolerance is the belief that it doesn't matter what race,
gender, religion, or sexual orientation a person is, as long as they never,
ever disagree with you, and as long as that religion isn't Christianity. Another definition I like is tolerance of anything from the left and no
tolerance of anything from the right.
Now for the
biggie; have you ever heard of Conservative Tolerance? Go ahead, look it up. I did and all I could find was an article
written by someone named GrafZeppelin127. The
article was pejoratively written and named
The Conservative Notion of Tolerance. I
was not at all surprised at the style of reporting used by the author. I think the theme here is that if there is a
Liberal Tolerance, then by definition alone, there can be no Conservative
Tolerance. So, if we Conservatives allow
the left to enforce their definition of tolerance, we will always have
misunderstandings such as the misunderstanding that our Constitution guarantees
separationn of church from state.
What is the
answer? I am convinced the answer lies
with knowledge. Always know what you are
talking about. Too many times we tend to
think we just do not have time to do something correctly. One of the smartest people I ever knew told
me there is never time enough to do something the proper way, but you always
have to find time to fix it if you do not do it correctly in the first
place. We must do many things starting
immediately. Some of those many things
include:
·
become
the authority on our history, our background, why we came to America in the
first place,
·
know
of the sacrifices made daily by scores of thousands of American men and women
around the world; in every clime and
place,
·
study
the Constitution of the United States of America and not just the Bill of
Rights but all the Amendments to the Constitution of the United States,
·
learn
about the Declaration of Independence and the Gettysburg Address and the
history of our Immigration and Naturalization Service here in America,
·
learn
the difference between an immigrant and a refugee and an asylum seeker, and
what monetary impact either or all can have on all of us Americans by
birthright or Americans that have been Naturalized,
·
figure
out your budget and then figure out how you can afford to give your share to
those that feel no compulsion to work but think they have an entitlement to
your hard-earned money,
·
make
no excuses; every day we are fight a war on terrorism around the world while we
battle daily about things so many call Liberal Tolerance and Matters of
Socialism and social unrest amongst the we and the they,
·
NEVER
SAY YOU DO NOT HAVE THE TIME!
I just at this
exact minute (1623 28 February, 2019) googled how much does the average
American read daily. I was astounded to
find the average American spends 166.2 minutes on average per day that
Americans spent watching television in 2017 was almost ten times as much
as the 16.8 minutes they spent on average reading.[2] That is so scary! On the other hand, I did hear with reading all
the texting and emails and facebook and instagrams, the average adult American
reads the equivalent of a 200-page novel each day. Sounds like some of us should recalculate our
priorities.
We should all
know sometime in June of 2019 the Supreme Court’s decision concerning the
Blandensburg, MD World War One Peace Cross.
Stay tuned!
[1] https://www.forbes.com/sites/billflax/2011/07/09/the-true-meaning-of-separation-of-church-and-state/#3d4daf2b5d02
[2] https://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/terence-p-jeffrey/americans-read-average-168-minutes-day
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