[Osx-nutters] War on Christianity?

[David Cake]

>
>Of course not. Black South Africans suffered real oppression. 
>American Christian Fundamentalists tend to have below average income 
>and status. I do think that if  I had tried to argue that there 
>status was analogous to that of South African Blacks it wouldn't 
>have been much more extreme than your notion that they define the 
>cultural norms of America.

	Christians define the cultural norm of America. Christian 
Fundamentalists (however you define it) make up a significantly 
smaller sub-group.

At 6:39 PM -0700 11/2/07, Chris Gehlker wrote:
>You seem to be buying into the notion that somehow the US is a 
>'Christian Nation' which is something that the Christian 
>Fundamentalists are always promoting. In fact we are a secular 
>democracy.

	Cultural norm is not the same as legal basis.
	Seriously, it mentions god on your money, in the pledge of 
allegiance, god gets thanked by practically anyone who ever gets an 
opportunity to thank anybody. Christianity is seriously the cultural 
norm, with a large minority who don't identify as Christian but who 
come from a Christian background, and many smaller minority groups 
who follow other religion. US society is officially secular, 
moderately pluralist in fact, but still overwhelmingly Christian.

At 6:39 PM -0700 11/2/07, Chris Gehlker wrote:
>The fundies have this idea that the US was a 'Christian' nation in 
>the sense that Saudi Arabia is an 'Islamic' nation or 13th century 
>Spain was a 'Catholic' nation. Then they work themselves into a 
>lather about how secular it has become. The  fact is that it was 
>secular from the beginning.

	The US is a Christian nation in the same sense as Iraq under 
Saddam was an Islamic one.

At 11:49 AM +0900 12/2/07, David Cake wrote:
>You seem to be buying into the notion that somehow the US is a 
>'Christian Nation' which is something that the Christian 
>Fundamentalists are always promoting.



>My point was and is simply that the main stream culture tolerates 
>treating Christian Fundamentalists as objects of ridicule or 
>derision to a greater extent than they would of any other religion. 
>Do you seriously doubt that? Have you been reading this list?

	Yes, mainstream culture does tolerate mocking Christian 
Fundamentalists.
	In part, its because they don't see deriding Christian 
Fundamentalism as being deriding another religion - they see it as 
ridiculing an attitude. And I think thats completely fair.
	Also, mainstream culture might be predominately Christian, 
but it also acknowledges the value of satire and the principle of 
free speech. It is possible to be both Christian, and somewhat 
tolerant of criticism, and I think mainstream US culture is.

At 8:24 PM -0500 11/2/07, Jeffrey Hergan wrote:
>  I also think we need to be clear about what we mean when we say 
>'Christian Fundamentalists.'

	Yes, and its quite difficult to define, really.
	Are all biblical literalists Fundamentalists? A biblical 
literalist would be regarded as a fundamentalist in most countries - 
but by survey, its about 50% of US Christians.

At 6:39 PM -0700 11/2/07, Chris Gehlker wrote:
>Yes, 'Christian' is an ambiguous term. If you ask them, I suppose 
>Presbyterians who go to church once a year or less will say they are 
>"Christian". They clearly are not Christian in the sense of 
>belonging to the Christian subculture that has it's own TV and Radio 
>stations,
>it own books and music, and sends it's children to its own school 
>and camps. I'll try to remember to use the word 'Evangelical' from 
>now on. It's just that members of the subculture that we are 
>discussing call themselves "Christians". I don't think they mean to 
>include the Episcopalians.

	That pretty much is the half the argument right there - where 
Roger says 'Christian', you seem to assume he means 'nutty 
Evangelical'.

Chris said
>Jefferson cut all references to God out of the Bible on which he 
>took the oath of office.

	Really? How odd. It must have been rather a hole-y document 
(ba-doom-tish!).


	Cheers
		David