Atheists want God taken out of Obama inaugeration

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http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090115/ap_on_go_ot/obama_under_god

President-elect Barack Obama wants to conclude his inaugural oath with the words "so help me God," but a group of atheists is asking a federal judge to stop him.
California atheist Michael Newdow sued Chief Justice John Roberts in federal court for an injunction barring the use of those words in the inaugural oath.
Newdow and other atheists and agnostics also want to stop the use of prayers during the inaugural celebration.
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I just don't care. Mention god all you want it means nothing to me until you try and start removing my rights.
 
So he wants to restrict Obama's freedom of speech?
 
Indeed.

President-elect Barack Obama wants to conclude his inaugural oath with the words "so help me God.
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Bunch of cry babies.
 
He can do what he wants yo.
 
You need more cliffs in America to throw people like that off....
 
President-elect Barack Obama wants to conclude his inaugural oath with the words "so help me God," but a group of atheists is asking a federal judge to stop him.
California atheist Michael Newdow sued Chief Justice John Roberts in federal court for an injunction barring the use of those words in the inaugural oath.
Newdow and other atheists and agnostics also want to stop the use of prayers during the inaugural celebration.
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"No, I don't know that atheists should be considered as citizens, nor should they be considered patriots. This is one nation under God."

- George H Bush





really this isnt that surprising if you just dig a little into his background:

Michael Arthur Newdow (born June 24, 1953) is an American attorney
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In 1997, he started an organization called FACTS (First Amendment Church of True Science), which advocates strong separation of church and state in public institutions.[2]
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it's technically no different than the civil rights group NAACP that actively challenged segregation legislation (Brown v Board of Education probably being the most famous case). By chipping away at segregation laws as unconstitutional they dismantled segregation. The issues are different (as is the importance of what they're doing) but the goal is the same
 
I would rather he didn't, but legal action? That's overstepping a whole lot of logical boundaries.
 
not really. it makes the most sense. they wish to seprarate church and state by removing any mention of religion from the state
 
If Obama wants to do it, that's fine. I don't care if some of the ceremony has religious influences as long as his policy and administration is not influenced by religion.
 
Raziaar said:
If Obama wants to do it, that's fine.
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you miss the point

Raziaar said:
I don't care if some of the ceremony has religious influences as long as his policy and administration is not influenced by religion.
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but that's not separation of church and state. they wish to remove all traces from the government. really is a completely secular US government such a bad thing?

this news report is framed in terms of atheists vs the church and even though technically that's true, its alarmist and paints atheists as petty and disrespectful. Sure it doesnt seem like a big deal to say the word "god" in a speech where the most powerful man in the world ascends to the throne but are you all truely ok with god and government coexisting, even if it is a few platitudes here and there or the placing of a politicians hand on a book which is supposed to mean something to someone somewhere (if that book were the true word of god you'd think most politicians would spontaneously combust as soon as they laid their hands on it)
 
Obama would never let this happen. Simply because starting your presidency by having some guy tell you what you can't say would be seen as a sign of weakness.
 
if they pushed the issue to the supreme court as to the constitutionality of a religious state they could force him and all other politicians to strike god from the law books. again is this such a bad thing?
 
so should a politician never mention anything that alludes to his religious beliefs while he is "on the job"? where does the line get drawn?

wah.
 
almost like when they have defendants place their hand on the bible....how is that allowed?
 
Seperation of Church and state should be strongly enforced.
 
nerdcorerocks said:
so should a politician never mention anything that alludes to his religious beliefs while he is "on the job"? where does the line get drawn?

wah.
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so should that include muslims, scientologists, doomsday cultists and pastafarians? or just jebus?


"In the Flying Spaghetti Monster we trust"

"In Xenu we trust"
 
CptStern said:
so should that include muslims, scientologists, doomsday cultists and pastafarians? or just jebus?


"In the Flying Spaghetti Monster we trust"

"In Xenu we trust"
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Lol i had a friend say that in court when he had to swear on the bible. Needless to say they weren't impress that he was making a mockery of the court.
 
heh bad idea: contempt of court can mean jail time
 
I agree with stern. Sure, this specific example is quite inconsequential by itself; but it's about the basic principal of church/state seperation and how the acceptance of the smallest reference to religion can ulitmately lead to a more severe blurring of the line between religion and government. Or perhaps, depending on your perspective, it's the greater acceptance of a religious government in general that leads to these smaller references cropping up and being seen as commonplace. So fighting the problem from it's center or from it's edges amounts to much the same thing, even though attacks of this nature may seem asinine at face value. Legally and in regards to the constitution, the original controversy that sparks debate or judicial review doesn't necessarily have to be terribly significant on a large scale. It just has to shine a light on the central issue.

In my opinion the public has a very skewed outlook on the entire issue of religion and government. It seems that people have come to view it as a case of the faithful versus the athiests, when truthfully this is not the case at all. Striking religious references and influence from state affairs isn't about the existence of god versus the non-existence of god; it's about what is god and who's god are we talking about? For example, Obama says "so help me god" or (as someone above pointed out) a person swears an oath on the bible. Well, who's god is he talking about and which bible (or religious text) is the person swearing on? The mormom god? The jewish god? The christian god? What version of the christian god? And why swear on the bible? Why not the Qur’an or some other religious document? The christian bible? Which one? Which translation? (they don't all agree with each other) New testament? Old testament?

Ultimately, seperating church and state is not denying the existence of god. It is actually about reaffirming our countries religious freedom by denying any one religion (or denomination) supremecy over the others.
 
CptStern said:
very well put, and welcome back :)
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:)

Thank you...I lurk from time to time. <.< >.>

Just couldn't resist a topic on religion AND politics, hehe.

Glad to see you still got things covered here :)
 
There is no clause or argument in the Constitution or any court precedent that denotes the US Government as one with separation between the church and state, it was only an idea expressed by the founding fathers.

The use of the word God alludes to any number of ideas or expressions, including the metaphorical God of gravity- an all encompassing and all-influencing unexplained phenomena. It is a tradition harking back to the foundation of the nation, and an important ceremony. It is a ceremony made and practiced by select few- it does not represent any moral or ethical issues. I mean, there are far greater problems than fearing that SOMEHOW in the FAR FUTURE a dark age state would emerge from this inconsequential phraseology.

Give it a rest- religion is a fad that is quickly going out of style. We will have to wait until the current generation of leaders simply dies off.
 
Pesmerga said:
There is no clause or argument in the Constitution or any court precedent that denotes the US Government as one with separation between the church and state, it was only an idea expressed by the founding fathers.
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It depends on how broad an interpretation one gives to the first amendment. And to what extent the words "establish" and "prohibit" are taken.
 
The first amendment would never, in my mind, automatically contradict the idea of a national religion. It would be the individual cases of oppression that were illegal, not the concept of a national religion. Sure, a nation run by strict fundamentalist Christians might start burning heretics or witches or whatever, but removing the word God from every political and cultural ceremony would cause way more trouble than it had hoped to quell.
 
Pesmerga said:
Give it a rest- religion is a fad that is quickly going out of style. We will have to wait until the current generation of leaders simply dies off.
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what? no ..people are far far more religious today then they were 20 years ago. It wasnt even an issue most of the time unless it came up during debates on abortion. the christian right's rise in popularity is a relatively new phenomenom
 
Meanwhile people with lives carry on living. :dozey:
 
Nah Stern you're wrong ya old curmudgeon.

It isn't an official part of the oath as laid down in the constitution, it's merely a tradition that most presidents choose to say it. It has no legal status or power, and is basically just a comment that can be added or not after swearing the real oath. If Obama chooses to say it, he shouldn't be stopped, just as he shouldn't be stopped if he instead chose to say "so help me Allah", "so help me Jaweh", "so help me Dawkins" or "so help me The Flying Spaghetti Monster".

A politician choosing to mention their beliefs has nothing to do with seperation of church and state.
 
Perhaps a more vocal senior vote is to blame for any semblance of rising religious tastes. 20 years isn't a lot of time for people to get born, get grown up, and then become a vocal and major voting force. Which means, people were already religious to begin with, they've just found a new crusade to campaign against (abortion rights, stem cell research, video game violence, television censoring, creationism) which are all relatively new advances with scary names. Somehow, I doubt the majority of average voters are born again Christians- they're just tagging along with Christian ideas because those behind American Christian organizations know exactly which strings to pluck to get people riled up about things.

I am convinced without a doubt that one or two generations gone by (considering all other things are equal) that Americans will be, on average, a population with greater political ideologies than religious ones.
 
Eejit said:
Nah Stern you're wrong ya old curmudgeon.

It isn't an official part of the oath as laid down in the constitution, it's merely a tradition that most presidents choose to say it. It has no legal status or power, and is basically just a comment that can be added or not after swearing the real oath. If Obama chooses to say it, he shouldn't be stopped, just as he shouldn't be stopped if he instead chose to say "so help me Allah", "so help me Jaweh", "so help me Dawkins" or "so help me The Flying Spaghetti Monster".

A politician choosing to mention their beliefs has nothing to do with seperation of church and state.
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I explained what their opinion was not mine. I didnt give an opinion besides commenting that it was somewhat frivilous and stating that the US governemnt could stand to be more secular. This is in no way to be interpreted into meaning I think obama shouldnt say God bless or whatever the hell it is he wants to say.
 
Eejit said:
Nah Stern you're wrong ya old curmudgeon.

It isn't an official part of the oath as laid down in the constitution, it's merely a tradition that most presidents choose to say it. It has no legal status or power, and is basically just a comment that can be added or not after swearing the real oath. If Obama chooses to say it, he shouldn't be stopped, just as he shouldn't be stopped if he instead chose to say "so help me Allah", "so help me Jaweh", "so help me Dawkins" or "so help me The Flying Spaghetti Monster".

A politician choosing to mention their beliefs has nothing to do with seperation of church and state.
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agreed.

if he wanted to say "so help me The Flying Speghetti Monster", then why should anyone stop him?...except he'd look ridiculous to almost everyone and not only just non-god believers.

anyone who agrees with the lawsuit...wah. not everyone is an athiest. deal with it.
 
PimpinPenguin said:
Lol i had a friend say that in court when he had to swear on the bible. Needless to say they weren't impress that he was making a mockery of the court.
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Once long ago when I had to be sworn in I spoke with my lawyers beforehand and they worked it out so that I could "affirm" instead of "swear to god". There was no bible involved, thankfully. They said it was the first time they'd had anyone request it.

As to adding so help me god to the oath of office, while it's traditional and not a huge thing, it is tiring to keep seeing god invoked in official government activities. He probably (rightly) expects a huge backlash from the godites if he didn't say it.

Interesting tidbit:

the bible said:
Various religious groups have objected to the taking of oaths, most notably the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) and Mennonites. This is principally based on Matthew 5:34-37, the Antithesis of the Law. Here, Christ is written to say "I say to you: 'Swear not at all'". The Apostle James stated in James 5:12, "Above all, my brothers, do not swear—not by heaven or by earth or by anything else. Let your "Yes" be yes, and your "No," no, or you will be condemned."
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i think cliff jumping without a parachute should be reserved for those who do not approve of this point.

separation of church and state end of point.


if obama want's, let him do it, but "so help me god" should not be an enforced rule.

the best way would be that this practice would be totally abandoned, but that won't happen anytime soon.
 
xcellerate said:
Obama would never let this happen. Simply because starting your presidency by having some guy tell you what you can't say would be seen as a sign of weakness.
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^This

The new president of the "land of the free". Oh the irony if the atheists succeed.
 
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