Background Probability

The Agnostic Popular Front has moved to its new home at Skeptic Ink, and will henceforth be known as Background Probability. Despite the relocation and rebranding, we will continue to spew the same low-fidelity high-quality bullshit that you've come to expect.

Tuesday, June 30, 2009

Oklahoma Proclamation for Religious Liberty

WHEREAS, Sally Kern and theocrats of her ilk have proclaimed that morality requires an abandonment of basic religious and civil liberties in favor universal acceptance of a particular ancient mythology; and

WHEREAS, they have abandoned historical scholarship, repeatedly taking the names of the Founding Fathers in vain and attributing to them many words which they had never spoken nor put to parchment; and

WHEREAS, Patrick Henry never claimed that “This great nation was founded not by religionists, but by Christians.”

WHEREAS, John Adams signed into law a treaty, ratified unanimously by the U.S. Senate, stating plainly that the “government of the United States is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion.” (1797)

WHEREAS, John Adams repeatedly criticized fundamental Christian doctrines, such as when he referred to the alleged mystery of the Trinity and Atonement as “a convenient cover for absurdity.” (1756)

WHEREAS, Thomas Jefferson also repeatedly criticized Christian doctrines, but wrote approvingly of his own efforts to establish religious freedom as broadly as possible, claiming that the Virginia Bill for religious freedom meant to encompass “within the mantle of its protection, the Jew and the Gentile, the Christian and Mohammedan, the Hindoo and Infidel of every denomination.” (1821)

WHEREAS, James Madison never wrote approvingly of the “Ten Commandments of God” as a guide to public policy, but was rather an indefatigable proponent of the separation of church and state and rightly noted that the effect of ecclesiastical establishments are these, “In some instances they have been seen to erect a spiritual tyranny on the ruins of the Civil authority; in many instances they have been seen upholding the thrones of political tyranny: in no instance have they been seen the guardians of the liberties of the people.” (1785)

WHEREAS, it is in fact impossible to find in the remarkably voluminous collected works of Washington, Adams, Jefferson, and Madison, a single line unequivocally affirming Jesus to be the incarnation of a deity or the Christ to whom they personally looked for salvation.

NOW THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED that all those who sign on to Sally Kern’s proclamation of Christian Nationalism, revising history to suit their theocratic agenda, are perpetuating a blatant fraud and a lie, libelously imputing to the Founders words which never they wrote nor spoke in a shameless affront to the very liberties they defended.

BE IT RESOLVED that the signatories are traitors to liberty, inasmuch as they solemnly declare that all Oklahomans must look to only one religion and one holy text, in violation of both the Federal and State Constitutional guarantees of complete religious liberty and freedom of conscience.

BE IT RESOLVED that those among them solemnly sworn to defend these Constitutions are oath-breakers, who ought never henceforth be trusted with elective office.

BE IT RESOLVED that whatever gods may exist will call these signatories to repentance for their repeated acts of bearing false witness against the Founding Fathers and their oath-breaking attacks upon our religious liberty. May they be given an awakening of righteousness as they repent of this great sin.

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