Home › Opinion › Opinion
Larsen: Misreading U.S. society
Church-state separation helps facilitate religion
STORY TOOLS 
More from OpinionPope Benedict XVI got it wrong last week. And he got it wrong in the same way conservative evangelical Christians or any group professing to know what code of conduct everyone should follow get it wrong.
After a Wednesday visit to the White House, the pope spoke before a gathering of bishops in Washington, D.C., and praised the United States for allowing a strong religious belief and a secular society to coexist.
And praise this nation deserves, for few other countries in this world allow people such a wide latitude of religious beliefs, from strongly fundamental to no belief at all.
But the pope could not leave well enough alone, and that is when he got it wrong.
"Perhaps America's brand of secularism poses a particular problem," The New York Times quoted the pope in Thursday's edition. "It allows for professing belief in God and respects the public role of religion and the churches, but at the same time can subtly reduce religious belief to a lowest common denominator. The result is a growing separation of faith from life."
Translation: Secular society must always take a back seat when a religion decides its moral and social beliefs must take precedence.
Sorry, that is not the way this society works and it is not the intention of the doctrine of church-state separation. The very freedom to worship the faith of your choice and the very freedom to integrate that faith into your life comes as an inalienable right, as does the freedom to reject any and all religions.
But the pope, and too many other religious leaders, cannot accept that, a view Benedict reiterated on the last day of his visit. Sunday, before 60,000 people at Yankee Stadium in New York, the pope said religious belief must be about "overcoming every separation between faith and life, and countering false gospels of freedom and happiness."
It seems more than hypocritical to say, in effect, love how your freedom gives us free reign, hate the way it's exercised because it won't let religion shape society according to religious belief. The pope was not talking about the basic tenets of a religion or the underlying principles of beliefs people embrace, but of the church's fear too many of its flock are separating matters of faith from matters of life.
Matters of faith would include delving into the nature of God and his, hers or its relationship to all that exists. Matters of life would include when and who to marry and how many, if any, children to have.
If people are making choices in life that a religion feels go against faith, the fault does not lie with secular society, but with that religion, either for failing to adequately explain the reason a specific behavior is preferred or because its leaders want to dictate every aspect of people's lives — from the food they eat to the clothes they wear to the books they read.
The entire idea of a secular society stems from the premise that the government does not come into the pulpit to dictate to the preacher what to preach. The corollary, then, is that the preacher does not step into the halls of Congress and dictate what laws legislators must write.
Without that separation, the religion that has the most influence or the greatest number of members would slowly insert its beliefs into the fabric of this nation and religions of lesser influence and size would slowly fade away.
For example, some religions believe marriage exists to raise a family and reject the use of birth control for fear even one child would not be conceived. If they gained enough influence and power to lessen considerably or even stop the use of birth control, how would that affect a religion with less influence and fewer members that accepts the use of birth control because it believes marriage is based on love and that the birth of a child should be the expression of that love, not an ordained duty?
If you think such speculation far-fetched, consider how close right-wing conservative Christians came in the last presidential election to exerting an undue influence over the laws and policies of this nation.
In matters of faith, people can and should respect the leaders of all major religions. But when those leaders begin thinking of people as nothing more than sheep who must be told what to believe and how to act, those leaders must be challenged as vigorously as people throughout history have challenged any authority who turns dogma into autocratic rule.
The Founding Fathers knew this. They rose up against autocratic rule. Their actions, not the dictates of Catholicism, Protestantism or Judaism, allow you the free exercise of your beliefs.
— Richard Larsen is a deputy opinion page editor at The Star. His e-mail address is rlarsen@VenturaCountyStar.com.
Download this story as a podcast!
Posted by shaver_one on April 22, 2008 at 9:24 a.m. (Suggest removal)
Freedom of religion is also freedom from religion.
For, if America becomes a devoutly one-sided sectarian nation (fundamentalist Christian, for example), and all laws were to be based upon that sectarian belief, America would be no better than the fundamentalist Islamic countries that the Bush/Cheney Regime is spending so much money on to defeat.
How would Catholics feel if they were forced, by law, to forsake Jesus as Saviour, and adhere to the Torah? Would Orthodox Jews be comfortable using the Bhavaghat Gita as their only book of inspiration? Could the Southern Baptist recognize the Qoran as their only source of the teachings of God?
A secular nation is the ONLY nation that allows all religions, all beliefs to flourish. A secular nation is the ONLY nation that allows its people the freedom to practice their moral and ethical principals without fear of reprisal. A secular nation is the ONLY nation that administers its law equally, without aspects of the 'Thought Police'.
When a nation moves to sectarianism, rights and freedoms are automatically eliminated, and replaced with dogma. That dogma favors only the believers.
Posted by sslocal on April 22, 2008 at 10:17 a.m. (Suggest removal)
As long as secularism doesn't result in hedonism I'm with you shaver.
Posted by del on April 22, 2008 at 12:29 p.m. (Suggest removal)
Hedonism and(I would add)altruism are two evils that should always be rooted out and exposed.
Posted by sslocal on April 22, 2008 at 1:12 p.m. (Suggest removal)
I have to assume your being sarcastic with regards to altruism del.
Altruism: unselfish regard for or devotion to the welfare of others.
What, pray tell, is wrong with this?
Mind you, I fully support self sufficiency and would encourage others to adopt it as a life style. However, helping those who are unable to help themselves is a good thing.
Posted by allblacks on April 22, 2008 at 1:38 p.m. (Suggest removal)
Larsen's column would have been much shorter if he had just written "I hate Catholics."
"In matters of faith, people can and should respect the leaders of all major religions. But when those leaders begin thinking of people as nothing more than sheep who must be told what to believe and how to act, those leaders must be challenged as vigorously as people throughout history have challenged any authority who turns dogma into autocratic rule."
This sounds more like your typical Imam these days than any leader of a Christian-Judeo religion. Why doesn't Larsen hit on them? Scared of getting his head cut off, I think.
Posted by cassandra on April 22, 2008 at 2:03 p.m. (Suggest removal)
I'd like to say a word for hedonism. People enjoying themselves and each other are not out bombing Basra or blowing themselves and others up in partisan fervor of one sort or another. Altruistic devotion to the cause (whichever one that might be) has done more evil than any selfish abandonment.
As an inveterate contrarian, I'd like to point out that Saddam's Iraq allowed great freedom of religion. He personally funded a new roof for one group of Baghdad Presbyterians. Women chose their own costumes according to their own sensibilities. whether pious or western style. I think this would be dangerous to do nowadays. True, the dude was a bit nuts and had a habit of killing and imprisoning his fellow citizens without legal process, but then, so has the occupation.
Posted by bbbdugout on April 23, 2008 at 8:43 a.m. (Suggest removal)
shaver - well said - the same way they say they speak of peace - but only in their way - bad for non-believers - gays - or any one else whom might think or act differently
Posted by GuideDog on April 23, 2008 at 10:44 a.m. (Suggest removal)
I am a Catholic, but see a very sad contradiction in what His Holiness has said.
The crisis of widespread child abuse by members of the Catholic clergy over several decades in this country was directly the result of the belief that the secular had no jurisdiction in matters which the Church leaders viewed as purely religious. The Church viewed these incidents purely as individual sins of the flesh by individual members of their clergy. As such they could be forgiven by confession, penance and a statement by the sinner that he would not sin again. On the other hand, the secular world viewed such matters as criminal felonies against defenseless children.
Bishops and archbishops who took the primacy of religion point of view provided these sinners and criminals with a near occasion of sin and an opportunity to continue their crimes again and again against innocent children. Some of these "shepherds" still remain in authority over their flocks although hopefully the secular courts have forced them to take a broader view of their responsibilities in the future.
Personally, I believe this Pope means what he says about preventing such a crisis and the scandal of neglect connected with it from ever being allowed to happen again. However, it appears to be time that the religious leaders of all churches think a bit more about getting back to basics on this subject as Jesus apparently had a more balanced view:
"Give unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's and unto God the things that are God's."
(Requires free registration.)
Comments on this site are to be used for the discussion and/or debate of issues related to our stories and editorials.
Comments should not stray from the subject of the story or editorial.
We don't allow the following:
We reserve the right to delete comments and/or ban users for these or other reasons we deem necessary.
Comments are the sole responsibility of the person posting them. You agree not to post comments that are off topic, defamatory, obscene, abusive, threatening or an invasion of privacy. Violators may be banned. Click here for our full user agreement.