Judge wears robe with TEN COMMANDMENTS printed on it.

[Suburbanite]

it is not much different. I certainly equate them.
Sorry, the Bush administration is Christian, just as full-of-shit Christian as the people voting for them at least.

[Gorgo]

Again, the Nazis are a good example of what happens when state and church become one.

[Sonart]

I assume Judge McKathan's court will be closed on Fridays, which is the Moslem sabbath.

Quote by: Anniee RickSP, could you please point out specific scripture that directly conflicts in any way with the constitution?

10th Commandment; Verse 17 "Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbour's."

U.S. Constitution, Amendment XIII -- Section 1. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.


.

[Osborn F Enready]

Patrick said: Do you equate a swastika, symbol of the Nazi regime, with the Ten Commandments, Osborn?

I say: Pat, it has nothing to do with what I equate either the Nazi Regime, or the Ten Commandments. They are both "Icons" of a belief. Which belief it is, is beside the point.
People are expected to entrust their lives to a judge and jury and it is their JOB TO BE IMPARTIAL until weighing all evidence. By doing this, he is opening a can of worms to force a precedent to be set. The judge is not in court to make a fashion statement, a statement of belief or any other action that brings attention to himself, and away from the issues he is supposed to be focusing on.

Would you be comfortable in a situation where the Judge in your case, any case, were wearing one of the following?:

A robe that had embroidered the words of....
The Ten Commandments.
The Communist Manifesto
Verses from the Quaran
Verses from the Olde Testament
The Cuban National Anthem
Malcolm X quotes
Verses from Confuscious
An airbrushed picture of Stalin
Kim Jong Ill quotes

Would it affect the amount of trust you had in the judge?

If it is fair for a judge to wear his beliefs on his sleeve, (no pun intended) where is the line drawn, who draws it, and what procedure?

This line of logic is prelude to a disaster shake-up of the court system.

Patrick said: Most of you who claim to hate Christians or Christianity are likely opposed to the tyranny represented by the Bush regime. This is not a Christian outfit, rather, it is Satanic and has masqueraded as Christian to gain support from those who can't follow their stealthy policies, enmeshed as they are in the web of media lies. You are being taken in by misdirection, and your opposition should be more focused on politics than religion.

I say: This has nothing to do with my personal beliefs on Christianity, and I am the one that started the thread. I am not a God hater, but I don't believe in God as any Christian does, or any other religion that I have found either. (I highlighted the G for your sake, not mine.) This has to do with a judge making an unsolicited statement, through subtle means, while jeapordizing the trust a JUDGE is supposed to have with ALL CITIZENS OF THIS NATION.

In the nature of at least APPEARING impartial, they should check their fashion statements at the door.

Is it any wonder Christians feel as though they are being persecuted all the time, when they put themselves right between the crosshairs of their own accord?

[Milton Bradley]

Quote by: Anniee RickSP, could you please point out specific scripture that directly conflicts in any way with the constitution? By that I mean, where are the rules for living in the bible (please distinguish between old and new covenants/testaments) in any way conflict with the applications of the constitution. So far as I can see there's no conflict between the two; nothing that would make anyone judge unconstitutionally if they also believe the bible.

To swear the oath to become a Judge, your first allegience has to be to the Constitution of the United States. To believe the bible, your first allegience has to be to God. There is your conflict of interest.


I don't know book, and verse, but the bible tell you that a man cannot serve two masters.

[RickSp]

Quote by: Sonart 10th Commandment; Verse 17 "Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbour's." U.S. Constitution, Amendment XIII -- Section 1. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction. .

Yes. Yes. Yes. I had forgotten the most obvious. The 10th Commandment implictly endorses slavery, something not considered constitutional even if Alabama. Well most parts of Alabama anyway.

Thanks Sonart.

[crayola]

"Most of you who claim to hate Christians or Christianity are likely opposed to the tyranny represented by the Bush regime. This is not a Christian outfit, rather, it is Satanic and has masqueraded as Christian to gain support from those who can't follow their stealthy policies, enmeshed as they are in the web of media lies. You are being taken in by misdirection, and your opposition should be more focused on politics than religion."

The misdirection of thought is in thinking political instead of religious. It was the fundamentalist who cast the most votes for Dubya in expectation of his pushing the funday vision of Christ return. Anytime the fundies speak "the middle east", they are talking about Israeli interest. Bush has surrounded himself with Jewish advisors on his war in Iraq just for his Israeli interest. And this is one of the first excuses Bush used to pre-empt war on Iraq. Until that is, Nutenyahoo spilled the beans that Israel was not in any danger from Iraq or Iran, and this because Israel is nuclear ready.

Someone said that politics would always ride the course but religion in its extreme beliefs will detour another way every time. Bush has been on a Holy Ghost ride since the beginning of his term. And, Israel very well may not be in any danger but the rest of the world is made to sit on a powder keg while Bush waits for his next directions from his Gawd. Dubya is not masquerading and thinks he is really doing service to God.

Frightening people those Bushwhackers.

[Anniee]

Quote by: RickSp Any judge whose professional allegience is to the Bible and not the Constitution should be fired.

Rick; I realized you would likely turn it around (and say *I* had it backwards); but THIS is the specific quote I'm referring to. There is nothing in believing the bible that would cause him to judge a case *against* the constitution. I asked if there was anything you could point to that would actually go against the constitution and cause him to judge against the constitution; and so far I see no reason to even suspect it. Anyone who believes the bible and then takes an oath is bound by that oath biblically; there is one very good reason he would absolutely not rule against what he has sworn to uphold. An allegiance to the bible doesn't make one unfit to a judgeship and never has; nor was it ever thought to be so by the founders and leaders of this country until long after it was founded. Quite the opposite, in fact.

By the way, it doesn't even remotely approach a congressional establishment of religion.

And since when are hired employees (servants) analogous to what we now call slaves? Even when in the bible the word slave was used; it more accurately translates into what we now call employees. Not to mention taxation; which above approx. the 30 percent line makes us all into slaves of the government. Methinks that's nothing more than a strawman.

[Anniee]

Yes Milton, Jesus said you cannot serve both God and MONEY. Eye of a needle, rich man, all that. At any rate there is no conflict of interest between being a Christian and upholding the constitution. Our founders thought it was quite appropriate that the leadership (and the populace) be under the voluntary constraints of religion since we had such a great deal of liberty - without those internal constraints liberty becomes an instrument of evil. Just read almost any founder discussing self-government and the internal constraint of religion. I think Ben Franklin wrote a hell of a treatise on it.

Heh; George Washington was certainly unfit to be president (or hold any public office whatsoever) according to that warped logic. So were the majority of leaders in the first hundred years of the US.

Gorgo said:

Again, the Nazis are a good example of what happens when state and church become one.

I was wondering if you'd ever seen this: Wikipedia Godwin's Law

[Milton Bradley]

So how do you personally answer that question?


Would your first duty be to God, or the constitution?


Are you saying that no issue could ever arise for a Judge to rule in favor of his religious beliefs, or see his duty to his God first?


I guess I'm saying that a "true Christian" could not be a Judge. However, I believe that a "true Christian" would realize that is not his place to judge others. Christianity kind of puts a hamper on the old job desciption. Judge not, lest ye be judged.


I believe the bible also mentions not to get involved in politics. I can no longer quote book, and verse, but I have studied several bibles while doing comparitive religion. I would think this would preclude a true Christian from persuing this type of career.


I personally don't have a problem with a religeous person holding the position og Judge if he, or she can check those personal beliefs at the door. I find few, however, can.

[Anniee]

Again there is no reason for them to. You'd have to eliminate almost every great leader this country has ever had; starting with George Washington and continuing through most of the early and greatest leaders, right through to the present. It makes no sense at all.

I still find myself flabbergasted at how absolutely backwards people have this.

Here are some guys who JUST couldn't leave their religion at the door. Heh. http://216.239.63.104/search?q=cache...d+Barton&hl=en

[Suburbanite]

Your duty is always to Christ as a man, but as a Judge it is to America.

[Gorgo]

I think I have, but had forgotten about it. As it says, sometimes talking about Hitler makes sense, sometimes it doesn't. Hitler used religion as a means to an end, much like most politicians seem to.

Quote by: Anniee Gorgo said: I was wondering if you'd ever seen this: Wikipedia Godwin's Law

[RickSp]

Quote by: Anniee Rick; I realized you would likely turn it around (and say *I* had it backwards); but THIS is the specific quote I'm referring to. There is nothing in believing the bible that would cause him to judge a case *against* the constitution. I asked if there was anything you could point to that would actually go against the constitution and cause him to judge against the constitution; .

OK, so if you didn't get it backwards, the idiot judge definately did. His insistance on this public display of his religious views suggests his particular interpretation of the bible is indeed in violation of the Constitution.

The claim that this is a question of religion versus paganism or Christianity versus the "Christ haters" is simply wrong. It is all about specific Christian sects or denominations who fundamentally oppose the seperation between church and state.

The judge in question is almost certainly a fundamentalist of some variety whose intepretation of the scriptures is very different from the interpretation of the scriptures and the constitution that I grew up with. Most Christian churches in America support religion as deeply personal while at the same time supporting the tolerance and equality under law that is the basis for the constitutionally mandated separation between state and religion.

The fundamentalists do not share this view and want to impose their specific interpretation of the scriptures into public life. While not agreeing with them in the slightest, I have no problem with their perspective as long as they do not claim the right to do so from the bench of a court of law.

Quote by: Anniee And since when are hired employees (servants) analogous to what we now call slaves? Even when in the bible the word slave was used; it more accurately translates into what we now call employees. Not to mention taxation; which above approx. the 30 percent line makes us all into slaves of the government. Methinks that's nothing more than a strawman.

Employees? Excuse me? The reference to manservant and maidservants is generally considered to be a reference to slaves. Slavery was a many thousand year old institution which was only ended in the Western world in the early nineteenth century.

The King James Version translates the language as "manservant" and "maidservant" while both the New Revised Standard Version and Today's English Version (The Good News Bible) both translate the words as "slaves."

Text of the 10 Commandments

In both versions of the ethical Decalogue, manservants and maidservants are mentioned. So we should try to answer the question what the Decalogue's attitude is towards servants (slavery). In both versions of the ethical Decalogue, slavery is treated as something normal, hence justified. There is no commandment forbidding it. There are no words like "You shall not make your neighbour your manservant (slave)"; quite the opposite: the property rights of slave owners are protected. Recently mentioned last commandment forbids even coveting itself to take over somebody else's manservant or maidservant. Among the provisions of Moses Law complementing the ethical Decalogue, which find it normal and fully legal to buy and sell menservants or maidservants and treating them as physical objects. It was permitted to sell one's own daughter as a servant, although the provisions here were different than in the case of a slave, e.g. she must not have been sold to foreigners (Ex. 21, 7-11):

Historical Origins and Evolution of the Ten Commandments

[castille]

A Judge is the representative of the Law, he is the enforcer of the Law, and most importantly he IS the Law.

Religion is not the law. At least, not since the witch burnings.

[Sonart]

[CENTER]Commandment I -- "Thou shalt have no other gods before me"[/CENTER]

So, seeing this embroidered on the Judges robes, exactly how impartial can a Hindhu, a Sikh, a Wiccan, a Buddhist, an Animist, an Agnostic or, yes, an atheist, expect Judge McKathan's court to be?

[CENTER]Cammandment II --"Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me. And shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me, and keep my commandments." --[/CENTER]

I make graven images for a living. (As an artist of the popular online fantasy game, I illustrate many of the games pantheon of gods and demigods) Can I expect fairness from Judge McKathan? How about if I'm a Catholic?

[CENTER]Commandment III --"Thou shalt not take the name of the LORD thy God in vain; for the LORD will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain."--[/CENTER]

?????????

[CENTER]Commandment IV --"Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work: But the seventh day is the sabbath of the LORD thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates: For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it."--[/CENTER]

Which sabbath? As I mentioned, the Muslim sabbath is on Friday. Will Judge McKathan close his court on Fridays? Or will any Muslim be excused from appearing in court on Fridays?

[CENTER]Commandment V --"Honour thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long upon the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee."-- Commandment VI --"Thou shalt not kill."-- Commandment VII --"Thou shalt not commit adultery."-- Commandment VIII --"Thou shalt not steal."-- Commandment IX --"Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour."--[/CENTER]

All well and good. Are there cultures or beliefs that do NOT endorse these values?

[CENTER]Commandment X --"Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbour's."-- [/CENTER]

Already mentioned.

"Religious liberals believe that the original text included only the first seven words. That is because the word "house" by itself was assumed to include all of a man's possessions: his building, wife, male slaves, female slaves, children, animals, etc.

A woman, in biblical times, was considered to be the property first of her father and after marriage of her husband.

Many biblical translations shy away from the term "slave" and use a more ambiguous word like "manservant." We have even heard Christian radio programs refer to slaves as "butlers" and "maids." The Decalogue is not talking about servants here. A master could beat his slave so severely that she/he died within a few days, and not be charged with an offense. With the exception of a very few countries slavery has been abolished today. The many rules and regulations which condoned and governed slavery in the Bible are now ignored. There is a growing world-wide consensus that slavery, the owning of one person by another, is profoundly immoral; it was not considered as such by the Decalogue."

[Osborn F Enready]

Annie, that link you put up was a link to Pat Robertson, did you know this?

Is he a credible source?

The separation of church and state is the idea that governments should not have a religion, should not subscribe to religious beliefs, should not exhibit religious behaviors, and should not impose a religion or a lack of religion upon their citizens. The separation of church and state is related to the idea that all people should have freedom of religion as well as freedom from religion. Many countries grant citizens the freedom to worship or not to worship individually without intervention from government.

Check out this site for more information, and a ton of links for exactly what I am speaking of. In the body of links, you will also see writings from the forefathers CLEARLY expressing the seperation.

http://www.questia.com/Index.jsp?CRI...urch_and_state

If you would like to be informed about the forefathers and their TRUE beliefs on government and religion, check out this site.

http://www.wallbuilders.com/resource...p?ResourceID=9

Here is a snippet

In 1947, in the case Everson v. Board of Education, the Supreme Court declared, “The First Amendment has erected a wall between church and state. That wall must be kept high and impregnable. We could not approve the slightest breach.” The “separation of church and state” phrase which they invoked, and which has today become so familiar, was taken from an exchange of letters between President Thomas Jefferson and the Baptist Association of Danbury, Connecticut, shortly after Jefferson became President.

The election of Jefferson-America’s first Anti-Federalist President-elated many Baptists since that denomination, by-and-large, was also strongly Anti-Federalist. This political disposition of the Baptists was understandable, for from the early settlement of Rhode Island in the 1630s to the time of the federal Constitution in the 1780s, the Baptists had often found themselves suffering from the centralization of power.

Consequently, now having a President who not only had championed the rights of Baptists in Virginia but who also had advocated clear limits on the centralization of government powers, the Danbury Baptists wrote Jefferson a letter of praise on October 7, 1801, telling him:

Among the many millions in America and Europe who rejoice in your election to office, we embrace the first opportunity . . . to express our great satisfaction in your appointment to the Chief Magistracy in the United States. . . . [W]e have reason to believe that America’s God has raised you up to fill the Chair of State out of that goodwill which He bears to the millions which you preside over. May God strengthen you for the arduous task which providence and the voice of the people have called you. . . . And may the Lord preserve you safe from every evil and bring you at last to his Heavenly Kingdom through Jesus Christ our Glorious Mediator.1

However, in that same letter of congratulations, the Baptists also expressed to Jefferson their grave concern over the entire concept of the First Amendment, including of its guarantee for “the free exercise of religion”:

Our sentiments are uniformly on the side of religious liberty: that religion is at all times and places a matter between God and individuals, that no man ought to suffer in name, person, or effects on account of his religious opinions, [and] that the legitimate power of civil government extends no further than to punish the man who works ill to his neighbor. But sir, our constitution of government is not specific. . . . [T]herefore what religious privileges we enjoy (as a minor part of the State) we enjoy as favors granted, and not as inalienable rights. 2

In short, the inclusion of protection for the “free exercise of religion” in the constitution suggested to the Danbury Baptists that the right of religious expression was government-given (thus alienable) rather than God-given (hence inalienable), and that therefore the government might someday attempt to regulate religious expression. This was a possibility to which they strenuously objected-unless, as they had explained, someone’s religious practice caused him to “work ill to his neighbor.”

Jefferson understood their concern; it was also his own. In fact, he made numerous declarations about the constitutional inability of the federal government to regulate, restrict, or interfere with religious expression. For example:

[N]o power over the freedom of religion . . . [is] delegated to the United States by the Constitution.Kentucky Resolution, 1798 3

In matters of religion, I have considered that its free exercise is placed by the Constitution independent of the powers of the general [federal] government. Second Inaugural Address, 1805 4

[O]ur excellent Constitution . . . has not placed our religious rights under the power of any public functionary. Letter to the Methodist Episcopal Church, 1808 5

I consider the government of the United States as interdicted [prohibited] by the Constitution from intermeddling with religious institutions . . . or exercises. Letter to Samuel Millar, 1808 6

Jefferson believed that the government was to be powerless to interfere with religious expressions for a very simple reason: he had long witnessed the unhealthy tendency of government to encroach upon the free exercise of religion. As he explained to Noah Webster:

It had become an universal and almost uncontroverted position in the several States that the purposes of society do not require a surrender of all our rights to our ordinary governors . . . and which experience has nevertheless proved they [the government] will be constantly encroaching on if submitted to them; that there are also certain fences which experience has proved peculiarly efficacious [effective] against wrong and rarely obstructive of right, which yet the governing powers have ever shown a disposition to weaken and remove. Of the first kind, for instance, is freedom of religion. 7

Thomas Jefferson had no intention of allowing the government to limit, restrict, regulate, or interfere with public religious practices. He believed, along with the other Founders, that the First Amendment had been enacted only to prevent the federal establishment of a national denomination-a fact he made clear in a letter to fellow-signer of the Declaration of Independence Benjamin Rush:

[T]he clause of the Constitution which, while it secured the freedom of the press, covered also the freedom of religion, had given to the clergy a very favorite hope of obtaining an establishment of a particular form of Christianity through the United States; and as every sect believes its own form the true one, every one perhaps hoped for his own, but especially the Episcopalians and Congregationalists. The returning good sense of our country threatens abortion to their hopes and they believe that any portion of power confided to me will be exerted in opposition to their schemes. And they believe rightly. 8

Jefferson had committed himself as President to pursuing the purpose of the First Amendment: preventing the “establishment of a particular form of Christianity” by the Episcopalians, Congregationalists, or any other denomination.

snippet

[Osborn F Enready]

As a side note, this was in 1947 because they were struggling with the role of religion in all of the new "Unconstitutional" public funded services, positions, agencies and offices created by the New Deal in the mid 1930's.

[Chris]

Taking the term "wearing it on your sleeve" to a whole new level.