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From: jim@ISM780B.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.politics
Subject: Re: Re: Jerry Falwell and the Moral(?) M
Message-ID: <39000027@ISM780B.UUCP>
Date: Sun, 24-Nov-85 15:30:00 EST
Article-I.D.: ISM780B.39000027
Posted: Sun Nov 24 15:30:00 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 29-Nov-85 22:07:11 EST
References: <63@yale.UUCP>
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Nf-From: ISM780B!jim    Nov 24 15:30:00 1985


Jefferson, Paine, Franklin, and some of the others were Deists.
They held the post-Newton clockwork view of the universe;
they believed that God set the clock running and then went off to do
other things.  They were not Christians!  Jefferson believed
in Christ's moral message but not his divinity.
His phrase "... endowed by their Creator ..." is fairly neutral, not
the Lord God or something like that.  "In God we trust" was added
by some Christian nearly century later.  As long as House and Senate members
can have access to a chaplain or equivalent regardless of their religion
I don't see it as a violation of CvsS.  But government agencies paying for
public religious displays seems to me a clear violation of the BofR.
I get three Christian TV channels all the time, a couple more at night,
and it is just about the only thing on on Sunday evening.  Plus all the
radio stations.  I think they can afford to put up their own displays.

-- Jim Balter (ima!jim)