The threat of Christian desecularization, or de facto (socially acceptable but not legal) establishment of Christianity as the official religion in the United States, has been a legitimate problem since the late seventeenth century, when immigration to the US was spearheaded by the persecution of Christian sects by the Catholic and Protestant royalties of the different nations, especially England, where religious instability haunted the peasants. This affected Non-Protestants at first, and then it started to affect non-Christians, as they were treated with contempt from their Christian peers, such as the events leading up to Engel v. Vitale. This case ruled that schoolchildren could not be required to pray in school, nor could governments authorize prayers for schools because this violated the First Amendment’s Establishment Clause. This also led to the Bill of Rights in the Constitution stating that the country cannot establish one religion as its official one or prohibit other religious groups from worshipping in the US. Under the following proposal, any pastor who supports the Christian desecularization of the United States will have to fight to the death in modern day arenas with the atmosphere of the Roman Colosseum because America was founded as a secular haven for many religious beliefs, and is heading into the same mess that the European monarchies were with their de jure religious governments.
It is estimated that about ninety percent of the American population would disagree with this view of the problem because either A: They think that it is only a personal problem, pertaining solely to atheists and/or Satanists, B: It would not happen because the Bill of Rights states that “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;” (US Constitution, Amendment I), or C: They support the Christianization of the country, and see no problem with forcing their version of religion onto other people, or in their words, teaching people about the word of “God”. One would also ask them, “What denomination will this follow? There are over 100 denominations of Christianity”, or “Would citizens of the United States be required to switch churches every four to eight years as to belong to the same church as the sitting President was raised with? (an example would be a Lutheran taking office and then losing to a Catholic the next election cycle)” If so, this would remind some people of England before the 1701 Act of Settlement, which states that “That whosoever shall hereafter come to the possession of this Crown, shall join in communion with the Church of England, as by law established;” (12 and 13 Will III c 2). This Act was designed to bar Catholics from inheriting the throne, thus keeping the country in one status quo by establishing the Protestant Church of England as the official one. The act itself is also a pro-desecularization factor because there is a lack of tolerance towards other religions in practice and in who shall inherit the throne. A person defending this theory would also state that there are many Christian television stations (examples: EWTN, Daystar), musical artists, (ex. Skillet, Chasen, Mercyme), and radio stations (KLOVE), promoting faith for the Christian population but barely any other religious media for Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, etc. This is not fair, as people of other religions will not only miss the opportunity to teach children about their religion.
The people who solely think that it is only a personal problem should realize that this is a societal problem because there is religious intolerance in countries where one religion is official, especially theocracies such as Iran, who brutally enforce religious laws. Those who think that desecularization could not happen due to the Constitution need to realize that this establishment is not legal, but societal as many people are beginning to take God and Jesus Christ for granted. Finally, the people who support this movement is committing religious intolerance and enforcing a new Inquisition in the US if they manifest this doctrine into law.
There is also concern for the nation as politicians have been leading religious revivals such as Rick Perry’s Evangelical revival at Reliant Stadium in Houston, Texas. This revival was planned long before his campaign for President, but it has a significant impact not only on American politics, but on American society as well because this is an example of a politician endorsing Christianity and acting as a pastor, not the politician who is supposed to keep his religious views separate from his political views. Mark Halperin wrote for Time Magazine that, “As 30,000 faithful took refuge from triple digit heat in the air conditioned safety of Houston’s massive Reliant Stadium On August 6, Rick Perry was setting the place on fire. Mixing Bible passages with his own prayerful words, the Texas governor bowed his head…riding an almost visible wave of emotion in the crowd” (Halperin, 32).This passage shows that he is not only popular among evangelicals, but is a force in the evangelical community and shows the leadership necessary for his post. For people who defend the forthcoming proposal, it will be a nightmare if America elects Perry because they will have a religious president endorsing Christianity as a de facto official religion.
Another issue with desecularization is what is punishable under religious laws. For example, the Inquisition punished people with views that conflict those of the Catholic Church by burning at the stake. The inquisitors, especially in Spain, would torture people to obtain confessions by using tools such as the stretching rack or the strappado. The strappado is a torture device in which “the hands of the accused were tied behind his back and the rope looped over a brace in the ceiling of the chamber or attached to a pulley. Then the subject was raised until he was hanging from his arms. This might cause the shoulders to pull out of their sockets” (Freeman). The author explains that this torture dislocates the shoulders of the accused, and that is not the least of the tools that the Spanish used. The Aragon Wheel of Death, popularized on the television show Machines of Malice, is a wheel where the accused was strapped in a wheel that had spikes on the inside and was spun slowly so the spikes could impale him/her and make him/her confess to heresy. However, these were punishments used in religious inquisitions, not the plan that is being set forth. These inquisitions are a problem and secular laws can help prevent religious violence by providing religious equality for all.
My solution is to have all Christian religious authorities and politicians who support this radical theory fight to the death in an arena similar to the Colosseum in Rome. This is an effective way to control religious sentiment because it reduces the amount of influential religious leaders, thus preventing an uprising in a religious name. Some problems with this include
A: The religious right will have an uprising over it because not only does it decrease their influence, it is morally wrong.
B: Law enforcement may arrest government officials for murder due to the nature of the fights.
C: The Supreme Court may rule it unconstitutional because it violates the Eighth Amendment, and D: The United Nations may sanction us for our “persecution” of Christians.
The religious right will flip out over this solution by calling it morally wrong, but it has been evident that there are Americans who have a bloodlust for such events. An example is violence in professional ice hockey and baseball, where people have been known to cheer for fights. Dirty, Dangerous, and Unfun states that “After the hit on [Marc] Savard, the outcry against [Matt] Cooke was loud, sustained, sincere, and justified. Hockey is a physical game, but there’s no place for headshots like the one Savard suffered. But look where that’s gotten us: an expectation that somehow, the Bruins would retaliate. Would they go after Cooke? Would they go after Sidney Crosby, the Penguins’ star? Would retaliation take the form of a similar cheap hit, or a gloves-on-the-ice brawl?” (Dirty, Dangerous, and Unfun). The author states that hockey takes its place among the ancient bloodsports due to the fans’ expectation of retaliation against a cheap shot. Law enforcement may have a problem with this because they think that it is murder, but if it is governmentally sanctioned, it is legal. The Supreme Court would rule this unconstitutional because the Eighth Amendment to the Constitution states that, “Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted” (US Constitution, Amendment VIII). However, this solution of death matches would be an act not only to entertain, but to control religious sentiment among the population. By not being a legal punishment for a crime committed against the laws of the nation, the games would not violate the Eighth Amendment. A law criminalizing any attempt to desecularize this nation will be enacted with violations punishable by death through combat in an arena. Finally, the UN may call it persecution and genocide, to which we will respond by placing other radical religious leaders in the pit so that it is not against solely one religion, but all radical beliefs.
The Roman games, or munera, were established as sacrifices after a person’s death, but evolved as they became more political. Sir Thomas Browne writes that, “captured soldiers had been made to fight with their own weapons and in their particular style of combat. It was from these conscripted prisoners of war that the gladiators acquired their exotic appearance, a distinction being made between the weapons imagined to be used by defeated enemies and those of their Roman conquerors” (Browne). These games were successful because there were crowds packing the Colosseum every day to see this carnage and satisfy the bloodlust that they have.
This will affect not only leaders of different churches, but this will also affect the public opinion as the majority of the United States belongs to some form of Christianity. If any Christian cries persecution, he/she will be informed that it is not just them, and will not be just them as any other religion is fair game too. In the short term, there will be experiments on only Christian leaders, but if the experiment works, then it shall be enforced on all radical religions in a long term version around the country until there are few radical religious leaders left. It is logical because some people are sick of seeing Christian media everywhere, and it is practical because it will about 5 million dollars a year because the fights will happen at current facilities used by major sports teams with the owners getting as much revenue as they would with events such as concerts and shows; and the only costs will be for hand to hand weapons such as swords and knives, as firearms will be banned. The reason firearms will be banned is that people will not want to see a quick shot to the heart or head, but want to see hand to hand combat .There will also be costs for armor, as people want to see a prolonged, intense combat. This will NOT have to be voted on by the people, but by the representatives of Congress as we are a representative democracy, not a true one. I believe there will be a profit to this because there is a market for people who like this kind of action and brutality (just go to a hockey game and when a fight occurs, people will cheer. When a player is bloodied, people cheer more).
An example of Supreme Court cases that uphold the First Amendment is Engel v. Vitale, which states that, “Because of the prohibition of the First Amendment against the enactment of any law ‘respecting an establishment of religion,’ which is made applicable to the States by the Fourteenth Amendment, state officials may not compose an official state prayer and require that it be recited in the public schools of the State at the beginning of each school day -- even if the prayer is denominationally neutral and pupils who wish to do so may remain silent or be excused from the room while the prayer is being recited” (Pp. 422-436). This was because New York schoolchildren would say a state written prayer before class every day, and certain people found this unconstitutional. Another example is the case Larkin v. Grendel’s Den, in which the court ruled that churches in Massachusetts did not have a constitutional right to prevent alcohol licenses for businesses under 500 feet away from them. This stemmed from a bar called Grendel’s Den opening near a Catholic church only ten feet away. The church tried to ban the bar from obtaining an alcohol license, but the bar sued and won. The Massachusetts law places the regulation of alcohol with the churches, giving them government powers, and for that reason, plus the ruling in Engel v. Vitale, America should not have religion regulating bars or public schoolchildren.
The fear of desecularization is a problem because in today’s society and previous generations, Christianity has become such a major part of life that society itself is violating the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment by broadcasting Christian messages on TV, in music, and in movies. Although they have a constitutional right to do so, they should not be the only group to do so. The real problem behind this is religious domination, as America was founded by different religious groups immigrating to worship openly without the intolerance that occurred in the European monarchies that were either Catholic or Protestant. America also condemns the tortures of the Inquisition and prevents them with the Eighth Amendment.
The solution is proposed in the manner that it is because it is being proposed to shock and terrorize people. The solution would justify its implementation because it will help control religious fevers and maintain a secular nation, while also raising revenue for the government from fans of this “sport”. This solution in reality would not be worth the criticism because the government that implements this will be charged with genocide due to the many deaths of people of one religious/ethnic group. The societal cost of this solution would be many “innocent” lives sacrificed for the gratification of bloodthirsty, unstable people, just as in Rome.
Imagine that there are a Muslim and Catholic who turn on the television. Instead of their favorite station, they see that an Evangelical Christian station has taken over the airwaves of the former station. They then hear the doorbell ring and when they answer, there are (insert Christian sect here) missionaries who come to their door daily trying to scare them into joining their faith and once again “condemn” them to hell for not believing their version of Christianity, or in the Catholic’s case, for actions beyond that person’s control such as the sex abuse scandals. The Catholic and the Muslim should see to it that the missionaries’ leaders fight each other so that they do not have to constantly answer the door to hear the phrase “You’re going to hell unless you accept the ‘true word’ of ‘God’” (their version).
Works Cited
An Act for the Further Limitation of the Crown and Better Securing the Rights and Liberties of
the Subject, Parliament of the Kingdom of England §§ 12-13 Will III c2 (1701). Print.
Balse, Shyam. "Witches and Heretics." Machines of Malice. Discovery Channel. DSC,
21 Sept. 2009. Television.
Browne, Sir Thomas. "The Roman Gladiator." University of Chicago,2011. Web. 28 Nov. 2011.
"Dangerous, Dirty, and Unfun » Bloodlust." Dangerous, Dirty, and Unfun. 2011. Web.
30 Nov. 2011.
Freeman, Shanna. "HowStuffWorks ‘Torture and Punishment During the Spanish Inquisition’”
HowStuffWorks "History" Web. 30 Nov. 2011.
Halperin, Mark. "The Lone Star Warrior." Time Magazine 22 Aug. 2011: 32+. Web.
Larkin, et al. v. Grendel’s Den Inc. 459 U.S. 116 United States Supreme Court. 13 December 1982. Print.
Steven I. Engel, et al. v. William J. Vitale, Jr., et al. 370 U.S. 421 United States Supreme Court. 25 June 1962.
P. 422-436. Print.
United States Constitution, Amendments I and VIII
No comments:
Post a Comment