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Originally Posted by punky
I always thought that the separation between church and state, was meant that the country would be ruled by elected officials, not by the ledaer of the predominant religion. I.e. the opposite of what something like Iran has. That churches and religious clerics have no power in running the country.
Or have I got the wrong end of the stick? The first amendment seems to protect the right of free worship. The separation may not be in the constitution, but is surely preferable nonetheless?
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No power over the government for any religious authority, & also no power over any religion for the government (a "two way wall" of separation). No bias towards one faith or another, and so on.
And definitely preferable.
Have a look at the quote from TalkOrigins in this earlier post if you haven't already:
http://www.cableforum.co.uk/board/sh...5&postcount=14 - explains a lot there.
Also, I've just found this:
Introduction to the Principle of Separation of Church & State
Although the Constitution itself doesn't mention "separation of Church & State", the US Supreme Court has ruled on the issue more than once, & set precedent. And what they say goes. If they say something is or is not constitutional, then that's the way it is (unless a later ruling changes it of course, lol). So Justice Black's opinion (quoted earlier) is the law, it is effectively part of the Constitution, even if what he says it doesn't actually appear in the Constitution or Bill of Rights.
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Originally Posted by Russ D
Next they'll be demanding the word 'God' be removed from all religious institutions......
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Well, why would they? That's a completely different thing.
No one religion should be a state religion. But just because religion (of any kind/faith) should not be in goverment, doesn't mean that anyone would think that religion shouldn't be in, well, religion.
This is talking about someone removing "Under God" from something which never originally had the words in it anyway, & which shouldn't really have them. Why should non-Christian Americans have to say "Under God?" when they say the Pledge?
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Next time a couple of kids like those two idiots a few years back take their handguns to school and blast their fellow classmates to bits and someone asks "so where is your God now?", who'll be the first to turn around and say "don't blame us, you've been trying to remove Him from schools for years..."?
Sorry, just thought of that and had to say it 
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LOL, no need to say sorry to anyone