What Jefferson Got Wrong About Freedom of Religion

[watsup]

We don't just live. We live in society.

Discussing changes to the Constitution don't matter until we come to a mutual understanding about how it ought to be changed.

We have to start with proposals for consideration, otherwise there is no discussion. And thus, what is your proposal for changing the Constitution?

 

[watsup]

The only way Catholicism works is if you mandate it upon everyone.

It's like a prisoner's dilemma. Catholics are cooperators. Those who advocate freedom of religion are defectors. You either mandate cooperation or defection takes over.

It is interesting that almost none of what you say makes even the least bit of sense.

 

[XDU]

Catholicism seems to work just fine without being mandated. It's survived into the age of secular governance and it's still alive and kicking. In fact I would argue that there are other religious sects which are much more controlling in nature. Although that is not to say that catholicism does not have its own problems in this regard. That is where religious freedom becomes important, to prevent one faith from growing too powerful and suppressing the others.

If you want to talk about "work" I'd strongly disagree: https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2016/10/11/how-income-varies-among-u-s-religious-groups/?amp=1

Catholics are below average when it comes to income in society.

If you really meant membership maintenance: https://news.gallup.com/poll/248837/church-membership-down-sharply-past-two-decades.aspx

Even historically, Catholics have been oppressed since they started immigrating en masses during the Melting Pot era from the Padrone System. Lawyers hate Catholics as well because the legal system in America is based on denying universally idealistic principled common sense and replacing it with psychological head games over manipulating preferences, popularity, and power.

We know this is true from the obsession with case law, precedent, how lawyers shop around for preferred courts and judges, as well as how the indeterminancy debate in legal theory does not believe legislators can compel adjudicators to rule in a certain manner (nevermind the usage of arbitration to circumvent this).

 

[JasperL]

The only way Catholicism works is if you mandate it upon everyone.

It's like a prisoner's dilemma. Catholics are cooperators. Those who advocate freedom of religion are defectors. You either mandate cooperation or defection takes over.

Is there any particular reason why we are supposed to care if Catholicism works? I don't care even a little bit, if making it works means mandating that religion on everyone. If that's required, then it should fail, and good riddance IMO.

 

[JasperL]

If you want to talk about "work" I'd strongly disagree: https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2016/10/11/how-income-varies-among-u-s-religious-groups/?amp=1

Catholics are below average when it comes to income in society.

The table indicates they are almost exactly average.... The difference between "All U.S. adults" and "Catholic" is statistically zero I'm sure. The survey was in 2016 and I'm sure part of that is immigrants from Central and South America are heavily Catholic and are typically poorer than average.

If you really meant membership maintenance: https://news.gallup.com/poll/248837/church-membership-down-sharply-past-two-decades.aspx

Even historically, Catholics have been oppressed since they started immigrating en masses during the Melting Pot era from the Padrone System. Lawyers hate Catholics as well because the legal system in America is based on denying universally idealistic principled common sense and replacing it with psychological head games over manipulating preferences, popularity, and power.

 

[XDU]

Is there any particular reason why we are supposed to care if Catholicism works? I don't care even a little bit, if making it works means mandating that religion on everyone. If that's required, then it should fail, and good riddance IMO.

...because if you don't, then people will play favorites among one another to manipulate the law towards their preferred clique.

 

[XDU]

The table indicates they are almost exactly average.... The difference between "All U.S. adults" and "Catholic" is statistically zero I'm sure. The survey was in 2016 and I'm sure part of that is immigrants from Central and South America are heavily Catholic and are typically poorer than average.

You realize Latin America is poorer because of how freedom of religion was used as an excuse by the U.S. to impose its will upon Latin America? Whether we're talking about Manifest Destiny and the Mexican American war and Texan Revolution, or the Roosevelt Corollary alongside Gunboat and Dollar Diplomacy, it's all the same.

 

[JasperL]

...because if you don't, then people will play favorites among one another to manipulate the law towards their preferred clique.

You didn't answer my question and I have no idea who these "people" are or how they "play favorites" to favor an unknown "clique."

But in general, that state of affairs is what 'freedom of religion' does a good job of eliminating. As I pointed out, there's a stretch of main road about 3 miles from me on which a dozen or so different religions and/or denominations all peacefully coexist, including Catholics, Jews, Baptists, etc. That is a good thing, IMO, and I'm not particularly religious.

To be sure, that is being challenged in this era. There's a thread about a local Methodist organization that is state supported and Tennessee passed a law giving these organizations and others the legal authority to discriminate against people based on their religion. They refused to allow a Jewish couple to adopt, because they are Jewish. They're being sued, as is the state, and I hope the Methodist org and the state lose. I don't have to like what private orgs decide to do, but I don't believe my taxes should support bigotry and discrimination based on religion.

 

[JasperL]

You realize Latin America is poorer because of how freedom of religion was used as an excuse by the U.S. to impose its will upon Latin America? Whether we're talking about Manifest Destiny and the Mexican American war and Texan Revolution, or the Roosevelt Corollary alongside Gunboat and Dollar Diplomacy, it's all the same.

OK, whatever. You made a BS claim about "below average" and now want to move the goal posts. Fine. I'd suggest our policy in Latin America was as is typical about money, money, money, power, power, power. Had nothing to do with "freedom of religion" at all. You might have an argument not facially ridiculous if you asserted this country found it easier to impose our will because of religious discrimination, religious intolerance, against Catholics. I don't buy that but the idea our actions often supporting dictators to our south was motivated by 'freedom of' religion is just nonsense.

And if you want to talk about religion and Latin America, start with Columbus, agent of the Catholic Church, and the genocide that followed his "discovery" of "America."

 

[OrphanSlug]

Does anyone know what the proposal is to change the Constitution, or are we just arguing about degree of flaw when it comes to Religion?

(Following this thread has made me want to hit the Bourbon a little early today.)

 

[JasperL]

Does anyone know what the proposal is to change the Constitution, or are we just arguing about degree of flaw when it comes to Religion?

(Following this thread has made me want to hit the Bourbon a little early today.)

I can't even figure out what the OP thinks is the problem, other than something about Catholics, high and low, something something. But I did learn our policies toward South and Central America was/is rooted in "freedom of religion." Oh, wait,

 

[XDU]

You didn't answer my question and I have no idea who these "people" are or how they "play favorites" to favor an unknown "clique."

But in general, that state of affairs is what 'freedom of religion' does a good job of eliminating. As I pointed out, there's a stretch of main road about 3 miles from me on which a dozen or so different religions and/or denominations all peacefully coexist, including Catholics, Jews, Baptists, etc. That is a good thing, IMO, and I'm not particularly religious.

To be sure, that is being challenged in this era. There's a thread about a local Methodist organization that is state supported and Tennessee passed a law giving these organizations and others the legal authority to discriminate against people based on their religion. They refused to allow a Jewish couple to adopt, because they are Jewish. They're being sued, as is the state, and I hope the Methodist org and the state lose. I don't have to like what private orgs decide to do, but I don't believe my taxes should support bigotry and discrimination based on religion.

I did answer your question. It's an extremely basic, obvious, and simple problem.

Just because people can peacefully coexist doesn't mean they will. We don't establish mandates to ensure against what must go wrong. We establish them to ensure against what can go wrong.

I'm not talking about denominations here. I'm talking about personalities. Some people in society just don't care. You need mandates to address that. That way, when careless people go about ruining others through corruption of due process in refusing to hold people accountable for abuse or using due process to tyrannize others into abuse, you have a direct justification to confront them so the people don't get awkward about that confrontation.

 

[XDU]

OK, whatever. You made a BS claim about "below average" and now want to move the goal posts. Fine. I'd suggest our policy in Latin America was as is typical about money, money, money, power, power, power. Had nothing to do with "freedom of religion" at all. You might have an argument not facially ridiculous if you asserted this country found it easier to impose our will because of religious discrimination, religious intolerance, against Catholics. I don't buy that but the idea our actions often supporting dictators to our south was motivated by 'freedom of' religion is just nonsense.

And if you want to talk about religion and Latin America, start with Columbus, agent of the Catholic Church, and the genocide that followed his "discovery" of "America."

There's nothing BS about seeing how Catholics are below average there.

I didn't say it was about money.

I said it was about freedom of religion.

The Texan Revolution was about how a bunch of particularist Baptist slaveholding migrants refused to comply with Mexico's Constitutional mandate of belonging to the Roman Catholic Church. Those migrants insisted on having the right to judge others' good works instead of realizing how good works reveal themselves in mysterious ways.

Manifest Destiny was based on how people believed Americans had a predestined calling to dominate the North American continent.

The Roosevelt Corollary was based on Roosevelt's own Presbyterian and Dutch Reformed faith combined with the Progressive Social Gospel established in those faiths. We know this because Roosevelt was a pragmatist (not to mention Reformed faith is not only pragmatic, but the source of (American) pragmatism) such that he should be judged not based on his officially stated policies, but based on the consequences of those policies.

The consequences of his policies were he targeted the Catholic Spanish Empire first before targeting the rest of Catholic Latin America.

We can see this especially when it comes to how his cohort, Taft, advocated interventions in Mexico which provoked the Mexican Revolution and explicitly anti-Catholic Cristero War.

What should drive us nuts here is historically, the Dutch revolted against the Spanish because of religion, but not only did Spain go through its own revolts through the Carlist Wars, but the Latin American colonies revolted against Spain as well.

Roosevelt should have seen his targets as no longer carrying the same attitude as the monarchs who oppressed his homeland's republic centuries prior, but he didn't. He counter-generalized against those who didn't generalize in the first place, but rather believed in treating people with respect in general.

 

[JasperL]

I did answer your question. It's an extremely basic, obvious, and simple problem.

Just because people can peacefully coexist doesn't mean they will. We don't establish mandates to ensure against what must go wrong. We establish them to ensure against what can go wrong.

I'm not talking about denominations here. I'm talking about personalities. Some people in society just don't care. You need mandates to address that. That way, when careless people go about ruining others through corruption of due process in refusing to hold people accountable for abuse or using due process to tyrannize others into abuse, you have a direct justification to confront them so the people don't get awkward about that confrontation.

I'm sorry but I have no idea what you're talking about or what your point is. Yes, "some people"_______________ [insert literally anything - don't care, do care, care very little, care a lot, do drugs, murder, rape, kill kittens for fun, etc...... ]. You say - "don't care" and of course that's correct because it can mean they don't care about A or B or AAA or ZYZA or anything. How we address people "not caring" about ?????? is a mystery. Same problem with "abuse" which is undefined.

 

[pinqy]

...because if you don't, then people will play favorites among one another to manipulate the law towards their preferred clique.

Which is exactly what you are proposing: changing the so only your "preferred clique" has any legal status.

Of course your main problem is how can you mandate Catholicism when it has been expressly forbidden?
"Though We desire this unceasing prayer to rise to God from the whole Mystical Body in common, that all the straying sheep may hasten to enter the one fold of Jesus Christ, yet We recognize that this must be done of their own free will; for no one believes unless he wills to believe. Hence they are most certainly not genuine Christians who against their belief are forced to go into a church, to approach the altar and to receive the Sacraments; for the "faith without which it is impossible to please God"is an entirely free "submission of intellect and will."Therefore, whenever it happens, despite the constant teaching of this Apostolic See, that anyone is compelled to embrace the Catholic faith against his will, Our sense of duty demands that We condemn the act....
MYSTICI CORPORIS CHRISTI, Encyclical of Pope Plus XII (para 104).

 

[JasperL]

There's nothing BS about seeing how Catholics are below average there.

I didn't say it was about money.

I said it was about freedom of religion.

The Texan Revolution was about how a bunch of particularist Baptist slaveholding migrants refused to comply with Mexico's Constitutional mandate of belonging to the Roman Catholic Church. Those migrants insisted on having the right to judge others' good works instead of realizing how good works reveal themselves in mysterious ways.

Manifest Destiny was based on how people believed Americans had a predestined calling to dominate the North American continent.

The Roosevelt Corollary was based on Roosevelt's own Presbyterian and Dutch Reformed faith combined with the Progressive Social Gospel established in those faiths. We know this because Roosevelt was a pragmatist (not to mention Reformed faith is not only pragmatic, but the source of (American) pragmatism) such that he should be judged not based on his officially stated policies, but based on the consequences of those policies.

The consequences of his policies were he targeted the Catholic Spanish Empire first before targeting the rest of Catholic Latin America.

We can see this especially when it comes to how his cohort, Taft, advocated interventions in Mexico which provoked the Mexican Revolution and explicitly anti-Catholic Cristero War.

What should drive us nuts here is historically, the Dutch revolted against the Spanish because of religion, but not only did Spain go through its own revolts through the Carlist Wars, but the Latin American colonies revolted against Spain as well.

Roosevelt should have seen his targets as no longer carrying the same attitude as the monarchs who oppressed his homeland's republic centuries prior, but he didn't. He counter-generalized against those who didn't generalize in the first place, but rather believed in treating people with respect in general.

If you say so.... I really don't see how any of this is an argument against freedom of religion. It appears you're in favor of state mandated religion. I'm not and never will be, so if that's where the differences are they are unresolvable.

 

[XDU]

Which is exactly what you are proposing: changing the so only your "preferred clique" has any legal status.

Of course your main problem is how can you mandate Catholicism when it has been expressly forbidden?
"Though We desire this unceasing prayer to rise to God from the whole Mystical Body in common, that all the straying sheep may hasten to enter the one fold of Jesus Christ, yet We recognize that this must be done of their own free will; for no one believes unless he wills to believe. Hence they are most certainly not genuine Christians who against their belief are forced to go into a church, to approach the altar and to receive the Sacraments; for the "faith without which it is impossible to please God"is an entirely free "submission of intellect and will."Therefore, whenever it happens, despite the constant teaching of this Apostolic See, that anyone is compelled to embrace the Catholic faith against his will, Our sense of duty demands that We condemn the act....
MYSTICI CORPORIS CHRISTI, Encyclical of Pope Plus XII (para 104).

That doesn't make sense.

"Catholic" means universal in Greek. It has no clique.

 

[XDU]

If you say so.... I really don't see how any of this is an argument against freedom of religion. It appears you're in favor of state mandated religion. I'm not and never will be, so if that's where the differences are they are unresolvable.

If you don't believe in state mandated religion, then how do you reconcile how substantive and procedural law are a trade-off?

In law, we have two types of rights - civil rights which are upheld from substantive law and political rights which are upheld from procedural law.

If you give people freedom of religion, that gives them political rights, but political rights include the right to not uphold due process fairly for everyone, forsaking the substantive law of civil rights.

 

[watsup]

If you don't believe in state mandated religion, then how do you reconcile how substantive and procedural law are a trade-off?

In law, we have two types of rights - civil rights which are upheld from substantive law and political rights which are upheld from procedural law.

If you give people freedom of religion, that gives them political rights, but political rights include the right to not uphold due process fairly for everyone, forsaking the substantive law of civil rights.

You still have no idea as to what you are talking about.

 

[XDU]

You still have no idea as to what you are talking about.

That's not a constructive criticism. People can say that when others really do know what's talked about. It doesn't discern between one and the other.

 

[pinqy]

If you don't believe in state mandated religion, then how do you reconcile how substantive and procedural law are a trade-off?

They’re not. Procedural law is the method through which substantive law is effected.

In law, we have two types of rights - civil rights which are upheld from substantive law and political rights which are upheld from procedural law.

Except procedural law is how civil rights are enforced and protected.

If you give people freedom of religion, that gives them political rights, but political rights include the right to not uphold due process fairly for everyone, forsaking the substantive law of civil rights.

No they don’t. Perhaps you have an example of how you think this is true? I can’t figure out your reasoning.

 

[watsup]

That's not a constructive criticism. People can say that when others really do know what's talked about. It doesn't discern between one and the other.

It’s not a constructive criticism because you are not making constructive posts. They are all nonsense.

 

[XDU]

It’s not a constructive criticism because you are not making constructive posts. They are all nonsense.

Again, that's not a constructive criticism. It can be said whether something's nonsense or not.

 

[pinqy]

That doesn't make sense.

"Catholic" means universal in Greek. It has no clique.

Let me rephrase, then: “Which is exactly what you are proposing: changing the law only your preferred religion has any legal status.

 

[XDU]

Let me rephrase, then: “Which is exactly what you are proposing: changing the law only your preferred religion has any legal status.

To be clear, I get what you're saying, but the question is wrong.

Possession has no place in religion.
Preferences have no place in religion.
The law follows grace, not the other way around.

When you understand these points, you'll get what I'm really saying.