Originally posted by cmcdanal
Without religion, there would be no United States of America.
Incorrect. I dealt with this in
a previous thread.
To summarize, the Ten Commandments and Christianity in general have nothing to do with the laws of our country.
In the case of four of the commandments, our laws say the opposite:
"Worship no other gods" Our laws allow you to worship whomever you please. No penalty for worshipping Buddah instead of the Big Sky Daddy.
"Honor your father and mother" There are no laws forcing children to obey their parents. But just try to neglect or abuse your child and see what the law does.
"Make no graven images" Copyright law exists pretty much to protect your right to make images.
"Don't covet" The whole economy is based on coveting.
For three of them the law is neutral:
"Honor the sabbath" There exist a few odd local ordinances here and there that don't allow you to buy alcohol or sell cars. But federal law isn't going to stop you from dishonoring the sabbath.
"Don't take god's name in vain" Blasphemy is quite OK, apart from a few archaic "blue laws" that would be quickly struck down by the Supreme Court if it came to that.
"Don't commit adultery" Again, here and there you can find anti-adultery laws on the books. They're never enforced.
One of the commandments agrees somewhat with our laws:
"Don't lie" You can't lie in Court or to Congress or on official documents, but that's pretty much it. Your right to parody is protected--and parodies often boil down to lies. And lies that injure no one aren't prosecutable. Just announce to the world, "I'm King of France!" and see if you get arrested.
There's only two commandments that agree with our laws: "Don't kill" and "Don't steal."
Well thank you christianity! We'd never have figured out that you shouldn't steal or kill if it wasn't for those commandments!
Prohibitions against killing and stealing are common throughout nearly all cultures--christian and nonchristian.
Lesson learned: the Ten Commandments have no business being posted in a courthouse, since they have nothing to do with our laws.
And most of the Founding Fathers were anything BUT "devout christians". Their insipiration to create their documents arose from rational thought and the spirit of Enlightment rather than the pathetic ramblings of an archaic, backwards tome like the Bible.