#freedom of conscience

[intelligentchristianlady]

"Project 2025 [is] the plan to gut the nonpartisan federal government and replace it with a dominant president and a team of loyalists who will impose religious rule on the United States." 

There is so much of this post that I wanted to quote, I decided to just urge you to read it for yourself, especially the long quote by Thomas Jefferson.

This is what awaits us if the Republicans prevail in November. Please vote blue.

[infinitysisters]

"I have one consistency, which is being against the totalitarian - on the left and on the right. The totalitarian, to me, is the enemy; the one that's absolute, the one that wants control over the inside of your head, not just your actions and your taxes.”

\\Christopher Hitchens

[triadic]

But, according to Hoedemaker, the Reformed had always held that there is no permissible coercion of conscience–freedom of religion is something entirely different from freedom of conscience. And here, absolute freedom of religion is impossible if one seeks to have a society. Citizens have individual freedom of religion, subject to what is required from public order, the freedom of others, and the character of the nation and its institutions, but one cannot use religion to overthrow the foundations of society. Some religion will always be recognized as the reference for truth in a given society; such a religion will be distinguished from others.

James Wood, on a contemporary of Kuyper. How Abraham Kuyper Lost the Nation and Sidelined the Church - Ad Fontes

[allthinky]

God it just never occurred to me that I could sit it out. By high school I stood without speaking, and I'd left "under g-d" out since I was 12 or so.

Wow.

[world-v-you-blog]

The Tapestry of History, 13 – The Rise of the West, 8 – The Reformation, 4 – Outcomes

(Image credit – Canadian Mennonite Magazine – The birth of Anabaptism in fire and water) The Protestant Reformation changed Europe, and hence the West, forever. As we’ve previously noted in this series, the monopoly of religious faith held by the Roman Catholic Church ended. The Protestant Reformers had not intended to form a whole new, third major branch of Christianity, the first two being…

[penguinlover27]

It should not be surprising in the least for Christians in the USA that there is a backlash to their never-ending efforts to maintain and expand their privilege to impose their beliefs on the rest of us. In fact, it is about damn time for it.

I strongly support and cherish the freedom to religion, which is not only a civil right enshrined in our Constitution, but is also a core human right: the right to one’s own conscience.

But that right, as with all rights, has limits. It comes down to this: your rights end where mine begin, and vice versa.

To paraphrase Thomas Jefferson, it neither breaks my leg nor picks my pocket for my fellow citizens to hold religious and political beliefs that differ from mine. They should be allowed to practice their religion as they want and live as they choose, but what they cannot and should not be allowed to do is impose those beliefs on the rest of us.

For example, if your religion holds that abortion is wrong or sinful, then don’t abort your own pregnancy. If your religion says that same-sex marriage is forbidden, then don’t marry someone of your same sex.

It does not impose anything on people of faith if the rights to abortion and marriage equality are upheld. They would never be forced to engage on those acts, nor is anyone asking them to celebrate or approve of them. What they are asked, however, is to recognize that those rights exist and are embraced by other people.

With every advance made by minority groups, there have always been Christians there to demand exceptions to maintain their privilege. Case in point, the very person shown in the photo accompanying the article. He, along with others, have successfully convinced SCOTUS that the requirement that they serve all members of the public without discrimination is a violation of their faith. Once again, their faith was held up as being more important than the civil rights of the people against whom they want to discriminate.

In any case, Christians should indeed expect to lose ground and privilege as the Boomer generation dies off and Gen X and younger Americans step up. While I do not want to see Christians persecuted or their right to conscience and worship curtailed, they are going to have to accept the reality that they are but one of many competing faiths and ideologies. They are going to have to find a way to exist in a multi-cultural society. 

It may benefit them to look at how others have handled this in the past, such as the Amish and other groups who choose to live in parallel to mainstream society but still segregate themselves into their own communities. That is certainly one of many options they can take, but the simplest is for them to be a bit more humble and recognize that the rights they enjoy are the same for us all and that all viewpoints are equally valid in the eyes of the law.

[itsadventageous]

In AD 1888 Senator Henry W Blair (et al.) attempted a religious National Sunday Law (NSL). A. T. (Alonzo Trevier) Jones (et al.) stood up against it's unConstitutionality. The Bill was defeated. There are persons attempting again, this time more subtly. There are several countries already onboard with such a thing, and even at the U.N. level there are plans in place. This will bring about total tyranny, and the final events.

[blogquantumreality]

These same people banning books now would, back in the 1970s and 1980s, unironically dump all over the Soviet Union for censoring the hell out of literature.

[immaculatasknight]

David vs Goliath

[philosophybits]

Apart from the intelligence, the only human faculty which has an interest in public freedom of expression is that point in the heart which cries out against evil.

Simone Weil, "Human Personality"

[mangocheesecakes]

i keep thinking surely these americans and westerners "despairing" because their protests don't seem to be making an effect, surely they will start taking up arms against their government soon, but then i remember they're still trying to convince each other not to vote for the people sending the bombs

[laniidae-passerine]

there is something so entirely fucked about Louis’ psyche… look at it all! the physical beatings to an obscene degree, the damaging affairs, the psychological warfare, the public humiliation, the participation in the murder of their only beloved daughter. Lestat does this all to him, or a significant amount even if memory is playing its wicked games. Lestat is a vicious horrible thing with his teeth marks on every part of Louis and yet even with decades of freedom, a new partner, the ability to recognise and condemn cruelty and abusive actions, Louis still wants him back. Knowing what he is, what he can do, Louis wants him back. It never mattered if vampires can dream, for Lestat haunts his waking days, a torturous vision of the only living one Louis really loves.

[jilted-love]

White people don't have the same history with colonialism and oppression that BIPOC have that's why Neil Gaiman can say "Israel has a right to exist" in 2015 and still stand by it in 2023 and his fans suck that up despite him not having a word on decolonization of Palestine.

And these whiteys don't even know how uneducated they are about colonialism. They grew up in comfort while the rest of us who embrace history are taught about colonial mentality and how to be anti colonial.

[chaiaurchaandni]

[bugs-inamber]

Good friends, good books and a sleepy conscience: this is the ideal life.

-Mark Twain

[tamlindudley]

Always and forever going to stand with people who are opressed and stay by their side when they resort to violence after trying everything else under the sky and coming to the horrifying conclusion that the only language the oppressor understands is violence.