Religion and politics.

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This is an offshoot of the Benedict XVI thread, and I start by quoting and commenting Gnarff's last post. Since that thread was on the short way of being locked I figured a new thread for the discussion would be in order.

You should know that in time the political influence of the church has diminished several times, and while the political influence disappears the church becomes more united spiritually.

It can, and in Finland it almost has been achieved, which is very good. Even in EU when Turkey will join it the religious influence in EU will disappear even if it on national level unfortunately will remain. You should understand that the political and religious atmospheres in US and EU are very different. So just because the separation won't happen in US for a long while (even if I think you overestimate the part religion played in the last election) it does not mean it would not happen in Europe.

Yugoslavia is a perfect example of what happens when there are several influential religious groups with near equal power in the same country. All countries have somekind of religious majority and when you start pushing your religion over national borders you are bound to crash into an other religion that really does not appreciate your "intrusion" creating a conflict. The same thing can really happen within one country too and has happened several times. Religions should really concentrate on their own flocks, if people wish to change religion they will come to the priests/imam's/whatever.

I'm not however going to robb the people the right to live by their religion and vote for christian parties. That really can not be prevented and should not be either. It's just the Church influence on these I want to limit. Religions are not democratic and when they become political they become a threat for democracy since many people love their religion more than they love their freedom.

 

The Politics of England have nothing, or at least very little to do with the Church of England.

Because the Queen is the head of the Church and we are a constitutional Monarchy, politions are totaly separated from the chruch. and most know that doing anything overly religious is near electoral suicide.

 

The church can and should be separated from secular politics. In NZ, they would be considered to be quite separate, despite the efforts of various Christian political parties who collect about 1% of the total vote each election.

Of course, the politicians need to bear in mind the views of the church-going public but only in so far as they represent a portion of the total public opinion.

But the fact that NZ recently passed a law allowing homosexual marriage probably indicates that the wishes of the likes of the Catholic Church (or the very scary black-t-shirt-wearing Destiny Church) don't weigh that heavily.

 

The Separation of church and state is an illusion in any democracy. If the faithful of a region all vote the same way, then betraying those religeos views would also be political suicide. Politicians know that. They will listen to the doctrine of religeon if only to preserve their political hide.

Religeous organizations have as much right ot address issues as any other organization. Any thought to deny them that is hypocrisy as far as I'm concerned.

 

The separation of church and state is a separate debate if considered in the context of the US constitution and rather a debate about law and intent rather than democracy.

Religion is fundamentally flawed in democratic politics and so religious views must also be fundamentally flawed in democratic politics.

Religion is as an alternative to democracy, and aims to effectively replace it, by replacing our right to make law and judgement in terms of that law. There can in theory be no manmade laws since religious laws take precedent.

This is of course the case only when taken to extreme, but the argument holds up because religion aims to look after itself and it's followers whereas democracy is not about looking after certain people with certain views and 'moral' stand points.

@Mr Writer - Bringing up the UK as shining light in this respect is rather funny since the Queen is both the head of Church AND State. I know what you mean, but still.

 

There seems to be some confusion concerning secularization and laicism. The Pope or the curia certainly are in no lawgiving nor law enforcing position in any democacy. Neither are the Imams, the Rabbis, the Dalai Lama in such a position (in a democratic state, that is). Not even in Israel. And even India has purged the caste system from the constitution. I dare say we have seperation from church and state in our democracies.

Now, what Gnarfflinger says is that subjects of any state may still be religeous. And why shouldn't they? Each of us has a certain philosophy of life, politicians are no exception - hence there are some who value the Bible as a guiding factor (George who?) and others who don't but rather place importance on humansim, ecology and stuff. Dreamers, the lot of them!

The important factor is that there is some kind of diversity. The true horror would arise if all politicians were alike and just puppets waiting for signs from god. E.g. via the Vatican.

I'll grant Gnarfflinger that religion is deeply rooted in most western cultures. Germany is a good example for how difficult it still is for some people to accept that their believes are nothing that grants them chartered rights within our society - save the right to act according to their believes within the boundaries set by the state. France is a good way ahead of us in terms of laicism; no crosses in classrooms and all that.

In contrast to what Morgoroth said, I think it is valid to view the US as one of the most secular democracies of the world. Don't confuse personal believes with constitutional doctrine. You can perceive this secularization in the equality with which religeous groups of whatever couleur are treated in the US.

 

Darkthorne has granted me that the subjects of a state may be religeous. In a democracy, the government reflects the people (at least the majority of the voters). Religeous leaders preach the views of the church on various topics. They preach to the people, not the government. The Government, however, is elected by the people, therefore the Politicians who want to be in that government have to keep tabs on what the people believe. If the politicians push through a law on Gay Marriage, the devout of faiths that oppose that will not forget that...

 

Agreed. But as has been mentioned above, the reflection of religious opinion in legislation is based on the fact that people who happen to be religious have voted that way, not because there is anything inherently religious in the government.

Example: if everyone were forced to swear on the Bible in court, then this would be a religion being part of law. But if you could swear on any book you wanted, and the majority of people chose the Bible, then this is the law allowing freedom of choice and people choosing to do it religiously (rather than being forced to)

 

The republic of Ireland used to be dominated by religion, eg birthcontrol and homosexuality being outlawed, even in my lifetime and I am only 24! Abortion is still illegal, but this could change anytime.

 

Yes. And still: it has been done in democracies and will be done again. So your point is?

 

When I go to the polls to vote my moral beliefs are going to influence who I vote for. Separation of church and state is for the protection of both. One religion can't dominate and the state can't repress a religion. But individuals will vote the person they feel best represents their views/interests.

Religion will play an active part in this. Religious leaders will always have influence in a democracy. There is no way to avoid this. Politicians have to follow the desires of their constituency (sp?) if they wish to be re-elected.

 

What do you call it when the Catholic church went so far as to call fo excommunication for John Kerry and anyone who voted for him in the last election? IMO, that's way over the line and completely inappropriate. I can accept a church preparing a comparison of candidates' positions on different issues and making an endorsement based on that, but such an endorsement should be only one factor of many that individual voters use when making up their minds. When any church tries to explicitly dictate who its adherents vote for, that's gross interference.

 

Rally, you are correct it is gross interference but how do you stop it in a democracy that has laws separating church and state?

You can't pass a law forbiding it because that would be the state interfering with the church. Here the church has the upper hand.

 

Which is exactly what I would like to see. A church should have exactly the same obligations as all other groups to pay taxes for their income, religious groups should be no exception.

Rally really hit the point which I was trying to make whole the time in the Benedict XVI thread. Direct Church interference in that style is immoral, scaring people with damnation/excommunication/whatever if they vote for this or that is abuse of religious power. There is really no law you can have to prevent this unless it's a law inside the church and neither do I think there should be any such laws.

Churches have their parties representing their views in the political world, they themselves represent the spiritual world and I find it very unfortunate if they find the temptation of material power too much to resist.

 

The great irony in the US is that the SoCaS was erected to settle the fear and panic of evangelical Christians who were convinced at the time that atheism and progressive("enlightened") religious views would drive them to extinction. The southern baptists feared an atheistic & deitstic government pounding on their doors to confiscate their Bibles and crucifixes and Jefferson tried to reassure them with the "wall of seperation".
Then in the 1970s along comes Falwell and revisionist history. Seems the evangelicals saw that they were not the ones being protected from the majority by the SoCaS and decided we should get rid of it.

The southern baptists of today cannot even spell "Dansbury".

Anyways, today it is the Catholic church who are head and shoulders above everyone else on the 'Senselessometer'. They not only want to have their enormous political leverage to force barbarism down our throats in ways that would make Islamic fundies envious, but they want US to pay for it all!

 

Repealing the tax exempt status of churches is not that simple. At least not here in the USA. Churches are non-profit, charitable organizations (I know that opens another can of worms but let's keep to the topic). Non-profit charitable organizations are tax-exempt. Money donated to them is tax-exempt.

 

Thanks Nakia, that was my whole point. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints has a policy regarding politics. They never support an individual candidate from the Pulpit or any other position of authority, but they do speak out on issues.

This is the position that the Catholic church should have taken last November. Which begs the question of where the call for excommunication of John Kerry and his supporters came from?

A couple years ago, Jean Chretian was told by someone high up in the Catholic Church (Not sure who, maybe the Pope himself, but again, I'm not sure) that he would Burn in Hell if he brought in legislation legalizing Gay Marriage. This was out of line, but perhaps accurate. According to Christianity, we are accountable to God for our decisions (including those at the polls), and as leader of the nation, Jean Chretian will be held accountable to God for his government's actions. If he is still unrepentant before God at the last day, then he may not be forgiven.

While that may make them cower in fear of the government, it would be political suicide to do it. I don't know of too many people that would like to know that the Government is taking 35 cents out of every dollar that goes into the collection plate. Some religeons have donations of money that go directly to helping those in need. If you're going to tax that, why not have tax collectors follow around homeless people to take 35 cents from them every time someone gives them a dollar?

Any attempt to bring Religeon to heel is doomed to backfire on those that support it...

 

Granted, but here is the thing: there are a lot of non-religious charities(by non-religious, I mean that nothing about the orgnaizations activities is tied to any religion. The difference between a charity called Feed the Children and one called The Christian Children's Fund) and these charities pretty well NEVER run ad campaigns or allow their people to speak out for or against a candidate publicly.
But the 'religious' charities do this without a second thought!

I say that if you want the charity tax-exempt status, then you have to behave AS A CHARITY and that includes not speaking out for or against political entities/candidates. If you do ANY political preaching within your church then that church is not a "charity" and can be taxed. The churches need to learn how to seperate these two factors.

Does this mean that priests in churches WITH tax-exempt status can no longer preach the gospel under my utopian ideal?

No. They just have to stop the dishonest ploy of pretending that their own personal political opinions on matters ranging from abortion to gay marriage are part of their 'charitable works'. If you cannot muster this sort of maturity adn honesty thyen I submit that your religion was never worth the bother in the first place. Any theologian worth his salt should be able to find uplifting/positive things to preach to his like-minded fellows about without playing the 'Hell and Damnation card' on people who were raised with different teachings.
He is free to keep his hatred/bigotry/condemnation of course but he should not be able to call it a "charity" anymore than the KKK or Youth Aryan Movement can call themselves charities.

 

That's one thing. Taxing Pat Robertson's (y'know, the guy who had/has a business partnership with the Liberian dictator) organization would be quite another. For example.

'Course, I'm only assuming it isn't already taxed.