Reply #8: I get real tired of hearing that one(please don't take my rant personally) [View All]

I just need to get this out.

our country *was* founded by people of faith.
Our country was founded by ignorant, uneducated, racist bigots, too.
But we've learned the error of our ways(for the most part) and apparently we're still learning when it comes to religion in our government.

I will never grok the *need* for some "christians" to force other people to believe the way they do. It boggles my mind that they can't see how completely antithetical to being just and fair this concept is.
In a country with unprecedented religious freedoms they feel the need to use the government and *everyones* tax dollars to promote *their* beliefs... and all the while pretend they aren't and are being persecuted for it along the way!
(I won't even go into how this goes against "what Jesus taught" since Jesus has been used to justify so many abhorent things and bible quotes are used to justify many of them, that "what Jesus taught" is completely meaningless at this point)

There were just as many, if not more, rapscallions, gold-diggers, trappers/hunters, ne'er-do-wells, outright criminals and *lawyers*(heh) who founded this country as "people of faith".
And let us not forget the slaves *owned* by those early American's who did much of the actual work.

I'm real tired of hearing this as a justification for the nonsense being peddled by the ultra-conservatives in power.
From where I stand, this is one last gasp of a dying social mindset that has no connection with reality.
You can't preach justice and equality with one hand and incite prejudice and hatred with the other.

I mean, did you *see* the conservative defense for outlawing gay marriage being that homosexuals are *unfit* to fulfill the "procreational function" of marriage??
WTF?
Are we not going to allow the infertile to marry now?
The post-reproductive?
GAH!

If this country was founded by "christians" then the definition of "christian" can mean almost anything.
People believed(and still believe) because it is more comforting to believe than to not believe.
People believed because there wasn't much of a socially acceptable alternative... in fact, quite the opposite.
And people believed because ultimately we're all alone on the world and that is a *damned* scary concept to come to terms with.

Ultimately the Europeans who conquered the Americas weren't here for "christian" reasons but for completely selfish and self-serving reasons.
They came here to exploit the natural resources of an untapped continent, to "make their way" in a new world because they couldn't in the old one and in many cases were *forced* to come here.

I tell people half-jokingly that America was founded by "christians" that everyone else in Europe kicked out.

{/rant}
Sorry for the mess. :D

There is also architecture featuring unclothed figures and this does not signify that government buildings are orgy temples.
You mean America *wasn't* founded by nekkid people?
Damn history books!
:D

Cletus