tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10688185.post4358985653513000700..comments2023-06-19T03:56:14.131-04:00Comments on Life on the Spiral: What goes around comes around...Sue Densmorehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00682551595454364410noreply@blogger.comBlogger1125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10688185.post-81572915956642775382007-07-09T13:25:00.000-04:002007-07-09T13:25:00.000-04:00Excellent post, Sue.After reading this, I'm forced...Excellent post, Sue.<BR/><BR/>After reading this, I'm forced to reflect on how wise our Founding Fathers really were.<BR/><BR/>It is a common misconception that the idea of "church-state separation" was a notion meant to protect government from religion; when, in fact, it was meant to accomplish the opposite - keep government out of religious affairs.<BR/><BR/>The term "usurped" is apt. Politicians have campaigned to the Evangelicals so long, and so hard that their affiliation has become so inextricably linked that the general populous cannot separate the message of God from the political stump speech of a hardliner compaigning to their base.<BR/><BR/>Partisan politics, with all their negative connotation, can be a positive force in our national discourse. There are times when bi-partisan compromise is NOT a good thing. (Do ANY of us wish there had been a compromise with the slave states rather than fighting for what was truly right?) However, when the very complicated ideas of God and religion are boiled down to a bumper sticker for a campaign, it hurts both the political discourse ("You're either with me, or against God") and, more importantly, religion.<BR/><BR/>Politicians are great at taking complicated ideas and simplifying them for general consumption in a campaign. It was once said that politicians campaign in poetry and govern in prose. As far as poetry and religion goes, I'd happily leave that to John Donne, rather than George Bush.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com