Tuesday, September 18, 2012

The Role of Religion in America

Religious America


                The role of religion in America is quite a significant one. I think that religion can be good in some instances but when in gets to your government you have to be completley unbiased. When you run a country you cannot treat any religions differently, which in this country they do. For example on the holiest day of the entire jewish religion the government overlooks this and people still have to work, as opposed to one of Christianity's holiest days, Christmas. The government calls it a national holiday and everyone gets off work, school or anything else. I think that Christianity all but almost runs our country, even though we say there is religious freedom, you can't walk by a church without someone trying to get you to join, not to mention all of the annoying phone calls. The government made the rule that public schools can't teach anything about religion, which is a step in the right direction but they still do so many other things that doesn't neccassarily talks about religion but puts the idea in the heads of kids. Even our pledge of alligience  is religion based with the phrase "under god", this phrase strongly takes away religious freedom, and in public schools the kids have to say the pledge of alligience every day in school, that is hardly religious freedom and absolutely not seperation of church and state. I think that a country based on religious freedom as one of the bases of this country would be much less suggestive of Christianity or even religion in general. I am not saying that religion is bad, all I am saying is that until the kids are old enough to make there own choices the parents should decide whether to make the kid religious or not, it shouldn't be our government or our schools.

4 comments:

  1. Nice post Josh. I've come across very similar conversations as I have been researching for my latest US History Research Seminar project about what it means to be an American. I go to a private school where they teach religion, and I've found that learning different religions help me distinguish what points I believe in and what points I don't and somehow it starts to break down the religion barrier as I realize many religions are very similar. Do you think that teaching religion in public schools can also help students identify their beliefs?

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  2. I do agree with you that religion is too much a part of our country. We are hypocritical in saying there is freedom of religion and then we favor Christianity. Why did our predecessors add the phrase “one nation under God” to our pledge of allegiance?

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  3. Christianity was what this country was built on so it will probably be favored. They try to emphasize freedom of religion. We should be happy you can practice any religion you want and not be persecuted or murdered. However, we always find something to complain about and be unhappy with. Be happy with your country and proud of it.

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  4. I agree with Cthom13, our nation was built on Christianity and in my opinion is favored. The people who practice different religions are lucky that we allow other religions to be practiced such as Muslim. In other countries people would be killed for doing so. Seems like people seldom agree on anything nowadays. I don't think we should criticize our founding fathers for mentioning God. They had their opinions and views just like we do today. Also what was mentioned above, just be happy to live in a country as blessed as ours, we really do have more than we appreciate.

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