"Political divisions along religious lines"

[Gordon James Klingenschmitt]

If Professor Lund said, "someone in the government (whether the courts or otherwise) will have to decide what gets said and who gets to say it," then if logically the more powerful half of government gets to dictate and limit the content of religious speech by the lesser half of the government.  
   
  If that's true, why doesn't the Democrat majority simply outlaw speeches by the Republican minority in Congress?  
   
  By dictating the acceptable content of religious speech by the Christian minority, the non-sectarian majority causes great jealousy, and the urge to mobilize Christians to vote them out.  
   
  Like we just did in Baker City, Oregon, here, and below:  
  http://www.persuade.tv/Frenzy13/BakerCityPrayerVictory23Jul08.pdf
   
  In Jesus,
  Chaplain K.
   
  Council decides prayers will continue
  Published: July 23, 2008
  By MIKE FERGUSON
  Baker City Herald
   
  The prospect of taking away the prayer that opens many Baker
  City Council meetings, it turns out, never had a prayer.
   
  Speaker after speaker urged city councilors Tuesday to keep
  the prayer as part of city council meetings and not to refer the
  matter to voters. In the end, councilors voted unanimously to
  remove the word "non-sectarian" from the council's five
  "Invocation Guidelines" and determined by consensus not to
  send the issue to the November ballot.
   
  Roger Scovil, pastor of the Baker City Christian Church, said
  that prayer is important in every aspect of human activity "and
  that certainly includes the human activity of government."
  "Prayer is the sacred opportunity to call upon the creator of all
  things, the God of the Holy Bible," Scovil said. "God establishes
  all governments, and honors and blesses the governments that
  look to him for protection."
   
  Noting that the U.S. House of Representatives and Senate both
  open their sessions with prayers, Scovil paraphrased Benjamin
  Franklin when, he said, a similar debate raged during the
  founding of the republic: "Do we imagine we no longer need
  God's assistance?"
   
  "You invite people to pray according to their conscience, in the
  way we are instructed," he said. "A Muslim will pray in the
  name of Allah, a Buddhist according to the teachings of
  Buddha. I won't feel excluded if you invite people of other
  beliefs to pray at this meeting.
   
  "In the name of freedom," Scovil said just before a loud
  ovation, "allow people to pray according to the teachings of
  their faith and their conscience."
   
  Don Williams said he worried that instructing people how to
  pray would "make God generic, a meaningless and uninvited
  guest to this forum."
   
  Even allowing sectarian prayers, he said, shows "a broad
  tolerance of what this country is about."
   
  "You have been very tolerant of all prayers, and now you're
  being asked to be intolerant," Williams said.
   
  He warned that if councilors give up the practice of opening
  meetings with prayer, churches would stop entering floats in
  parades and offering Easter sunrise services in public parks.
   
  Bill Harvey, who lives in Haines but owns a Baker City
  construction business, called it "a joy" to pray for "wisdom,
  guidance, strength and help."
   
  "I am human, and I can't make all the decisions on my own,"
  he said. "I am sure tonight that many are praying for our city."
  Gary Dielman, who sparked Tuesday's discussion when he
  criticized a prayer offered by Bob Vanderbilt to open the July 8
  City Council meeting —Vanderbilt closed his prayer with the
  words "In Jesus' name, amen," — did not attend Tuesday's
  meeting.
   
  Dielman declined to comment until he'd heard a tape of
  Tuesday's meeting.
   
  Councilor Terry Schumacher said he hoped Dielman would take
  the hint from the outpouring of public support for prayer at
  council meetings "and quit coming back and doing this."
   
  But Councilor Beverly Calder said that dissent is "an American
  right" and "quite often represents other unspoken voices."
  Councilor Andrew Bryan was one of the few who "saw the logic"
  of putting a charter change on the ballot to let voters decide
  whether to include prayer and the reciting of the Pledge of
  Allegiance on City Council meeting agendas.
   
  "If we want an invocation and the Pledge, we want to set it on
  the hardest rock we have," he said. "If people really want the
  invocation and Pledge, the best way to assure that is to put it
  in the charter."
   
  "You can put it in the charter or paint it on a wall," countered
  Councilor Dennis Dorrah. "That still won't change Mr. Dielman
  or someone else coming in here and raising heck about it."
  At least the issue drew a crowd to Tuesday night's meeting,
  Calder noted.
   
  "You came because this matter is important to you," she told
  the full house. "It's nice to have full council chambers. I wish
  we could have something this meaty at every meeting."
  

 

       
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