Good to see that you both have soul and can lighten up!

I’m not trying to defend an “it all started in the 1960’s” point. For example, we haven’t even discussed Freud in this thread, but he was dead before the 1960’s and 1970’s even though his influence was tremendous at that time.

Its just that I grew up in the 1970’s and things were both changing and contested. It just astounds me that anyone liberal, conservative of otherwise would deny it. It also peeplexes me that when liberals complain about Bush being the most extreme or stupid president we’ve had they forget so easily Ronald Reagan.

My friend’s mom was a hard core John Bircher and I remember her tears of joy when Reagan was elected and Birch Bayh,(the Devil and senator that I’d never heard of) from a far-away state was defeated.

So the backlash against the effort that wasn’t an effort started with people who were experiencing first-hand that non-effort.

Just because there never was a “golden age” of public religion doesn’t mean that we haven’t seen huge cultural changes, including standards for public religious discussion in the last 50 years.

There was no “effort in the 60’s and 70’s to drive Christianity out of public life.”

How would you characterize the school prayer cases? What about the first prong of the Lemon test (“government action must have a legitimate secular purpose”)? What about “non-discrimination on the basis of religion” as a requirement for almost all businesses (before that law was passed, many businesses made it clear that only certain churches/synagogues were acceptable for their employees)?

Steve Labonne, in his second post (#13) makes my point better than I could: nor is an “overtly Christian” government a realistic or desirable thing for a secular, religiously plural society. In 1955, no mainstream commenter would have referred to America as a secular society; a very common formulation would have been that America is a Christian nation, and our enemies (the Communists) are “godless”.

Were you too young, too old or in some seminary and missed out on John Lennon?

If I was so old in John Lennon’s time that I “missed out” on him, I’d be as dead as John, rest his soul, but from natural causes. I was never in a seminary, but my cousin was, around the time in question, (ordained in 1969, he’s a Monsignor now) and he was a Beatle fan.

Now you might quibble and say John Lennon’s lyrics below are “effortless” or that they are aimed at “private life” not public life

I might? Why would I make such vacuous, trivial, irrelevant arguments? Do you take me for a fool? How insulting!

but lighten up and have some soul.

And presumptuous as well. How dare you, sir?

Grrrrr uh Martin I uh apologize for my uncharitable words and forgive you for trespassing against me. Now back to the subject at hand.

I dare say the vast majority of American baby boomers can sing this song

And what’s so daring about saying that, I’d like to know?………..I mean, yes, on reflection, being a boomer myself, I think that might well be so.

and when I did I sure as there ain’t no hell meant to drive religion from life ( public, private or otherwise) when I did.

How sure is that? I’m sure as hell not “sure” that “there ain’t no hell.” Nor am I sure that there is, I hasten to add, though I more or less operate under that assumption. We’ll have to wait and see. But now I am quibbling. This message has become overlong. I do respect your views and hope to address them further below. (In the thread that is, not in hell. Heh.)

Now you might quibble and say John Lennon’s lyrics below are “effortless” or that they are aimed at “private life” not public life but lighten up and have some soul.

I dare say the vast majority of American baby boomers can sing this song and when I did I sure as there ain’t no hell meant to drive religion from life ( public, private or otherwise) when I did.

Were you too young, too old or in some seminary and missed out on John Lennon?

Imagine there’s no heaven,
It’s easy if you try,
No hell below us,
Above us only sky,
Imagine all the people
living for today…

Imagine there’s no countries,
It isnt hard to do,
Nothing to kill or die for,
No religion too,
Imagine all the people
living life in peace…

Imagine no possesions,
I wonder if you can,
No need for greed or hunger,
A brotherhood of man,
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world…

You may say Im a dreamer,
but Im not the only one,
I hope some day you’ll join us,
And the world will live as one.

There was no “effort in the 60’s and 70’s to drive Christianity out of public life.” Since the effort didn’t happen it could not have been successful. Similarly, the “Religious Right’s “fury” [better “fervor” or “zeal,” in my opinion] and political involvement” could not have begun in reaction to an effort that never was made.

This isn’t a species of interdenominational doctrinal dispute (e.g. infant v. adult baptism, Jesus was/wasn’t the Messiah) no “side” of which can be proved to the satisfaction of those who believe otherwise. Nor is it a matter of opinion on which reasonable people can differ. The statement “There was a (successful) effort in the 60’s and 70’s to drive Christianity out of public life” asserts a matter of fact. It’s false because the real facts are otherwise.

Propagation of this false claim is likely to generate, in those Christians who are persuaded to believe it, ill will against whoever is portrayed to have been responsible for this effort. To propagate such a falsehood is unethical. Catholicism would regard it as calumny, a grave sin. It’s my understanding that most Christian sects would take a similar position.

“Ray, I’m not saying that the Christians are a minority; but I’m assuming that Christians who genuinely feel that they are being harassed and oppressed for being Christians are a minority.”

They may not be terribly numerous, but I think the particular brand of Christians that hold serious political power here share the agenda and the basic moral outlook of that paranoid minority.

I’m not trying to make the case that the Christians don’t have power, I’m trying to get you to “feel their pain”. Listen to the feelings behind the grotesque hyperbole not the literal words.

For example, when the doctor spoke to my 6th grade class in 1976 and told us that masturbation was normal, it may not have been Christianity being driven from the public sphere, but it was a cultural change and it may have felt like Christianity being driven from the public sphere to the prudish.

As to abb1’s point about Spain, I agree, but the whole point is that the Christian Right sees Europe as the decadent abyss (and by golly isn’t decrying European decadence as American as apple pie) while most of the left sees Europe as a hoped for ideal.

As to Engel’s 3 points, the point is they ain’t the point. Imagine a standard like the sexual harassment in the workplace standard. If they FEEL like they are being harassed, then they are being harassed.

As for Kvetch, I see the matter much more as identity politics than actual policies. They don’t want people to conform, they want the cultural stnading to stigmatize people who don’t conform on a guilt-free basis.

Here is an even more absurd take on the matter. Part of the appeal of the Christian Right is it’s anti-authority authoritarianism. The sefl-righteousness of challenging certain taboos against intolerance.

I’m arguing that just because its only an inch deep doesn’t mean its not miles and miles wide.

“People are interested to know why I picked Harriet Miers,” Bush told reporters at the White House. “Part of Harriet Miers’ life is her religion.“

Bush, speaking at the conclusion of an Oval Office meeting with visiting Polish President Aleksander Kwasniewski, said that his advisers were reaching out to conservatives who oppose her nomination “just to explain the facts.” He spoke on a day in which conservative James Dobson, founder of Focus on Family, said he had discussed the nominee’s religious views with presidential aide Karl Rove.

Martin, on the day that when a US President chooses an atheist as a Supreme Court nominee, and then states publicly that said nominee’s atheism was a factor in his choice…

…or, for that matter, on the day when the President’s advisors consult with the head of the ACLU, or of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, in order to reassure them of the Supreme Court nominee’s atheism…

…then you may have a point.

The simple, undeniable fact is that evangelical Christians hold an enormous amount of real political power in the US right now. Nonetheless, there are many Americans who stubbornly continue to think and live in ways that those evangelical Christians find inappropriate. And this is maddening to them. And they see their continued inability to impose their own beliefs on the population as a whole as evidence of their “oppression.”