I was just thrilled to read about Judge Roy Moore's flirting with running as a 3rd Party candidate for President of the United States. Fredirick Clarkson gives a very credible rundown of the prospects in this diary.
Nothing would make me happier if Moore did in fact run on the Constitution Party or any other 3rd party ticket. Such a run would be very helpful towards putting a Democrat back in the White House in 2008.
But then I got to thinking about what has the Religious Right really got to be that upset about. So, below the fold, we'll take a look at some of these things....
Cross Posted at Street Prophets
Roy Moore got his rant spewed out in an op ed piece in the Washington Times. Moore's diatribe starts off with the ususal conservative complaints about the Bush Administration and the Republican controlled (up to now) Congress:
Wasteful government spending... illegal aliens coming across our borders... the widespread rejection of moral principles by many Republicans elected to office ... Bob Ney of Ohio resigned... Duke Cunningham left office after being convicted ,,, revelations of homosexuality, which forced Rep. Mark Foley of Florida to resign... and adultery, which caused Rep. Don Sherwood of Pennsylvania to lose his bid for re-election.
Please note Moore does not say anything about child moleatation as the reason for Foley's resignation. Apparently "revelations of homsexuality" was enoguh in Moore's view. Ok, but all these are reasons that true conservatives in favor of good government would be upset with elected Republicans. What has all this got to do with the Religious Right? Well here we come to it:
...the open affront to Christian principles that occurred when Mr. Bush appointed Mark Dybul, an admitted homosexual, as U.S. Global AIDS Coordinator... At Mr. Dybul's swearing-in ceremony, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice introduced his parents and his male "partner," Jason. Miss Rice then referred to Jason's mother as Mr. Dybul's "mother-in-law," showing disdain for traditional marriage and an open acceptance of homosexuality.
Moore's other big complaint with the Bush Administration:
The deafening silence of the White House regarding new Navy and Air Force regulations proposing to take away the right of Christian chaplains to pray in the name of Jesus reflect not only a misunderstanding of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, but also a failure to recognize our Godly heritage
.
So according to Moore, the specific religious compalints he has are:
an open acceptance of homosexuality.
and,
a failure to recognize our Godly heritage
Maybe an examination of some other complaints of the Religious Right could shed some light on how really dangerous these things have been to religious and secular life here in the US of A.
School Prayer, or maybe it should be called public prayer in public schools. Isn't prayer really a private affair between the prayer and his or her creator anyhow? No matter. School prayer has been outlawed for over 40 years now. Does anybody really believe the country has gone all to hell in that time? How about a decrease in church attendance - didn't happen. So what is all the fuss about?
Abortion is another big bugaboo for the Religious Right. More precisely, it should be called a woman's right to choose, or her right to privacy between a woman and her physician. Apparently it didn't matter to the Right to Life crowd that abortions were being performed way before Roe v Wade. As long as they were done "back alley" style, and an appropriate number of women died for their sins, that was OK by them. But to have the Supreme Court find that there was indeed a right to privacy in the Constitution, and that included a woman's right to make private medical decisions with her doctor, boy howdy look out. We are on the road to perdition now! Roe v Wade is now over 30 years old. Does anybody really believe the country has gone all to hell in that time? We've had abortion clinic bombings, and doctors being shot. We've even had a bombing at the Atlanta Olympic Games. All these were carried out by the Right to Life crowd. But other than that, well, we are still here waiting for the hail and brimstone to rain down.
So we have managed to survive school prayer and Roe V Wade. Let's take on Moore's current bugaboos:
Open acceptance of homosexuality. Man, that is a real stunner. Can you imagine that in the 21st Century of the Christian Era, that someone in an important position in a democracy could be guilty of such a thing. This one is really dangerous. Except that homesexuality has been around long enough in humans for the practice to be banned in the Old Testament. Despite the banning, it is apparently still around. Homesexual behavior has also been observed in animals. If this behavior was so abhorent, so unnatural, why would God allow it to occur among animals, much less humans? In any event, the practice of homosexuality has been around for thousands of years. To openly accept that as a fact should not be earth shattering. Also, we seemed to have survived, yet again. Does anybody really believe the world has gone all to hell in all that time?
And that brings us to
a failure to recognize our Godly heritage
The Establishment clause of the First Ammendment has been a part of the Constitution for well over 200 years now. It is one of the greatest achievments of our Founding Fathers, for it recognizes our right to practice our religions of choice free of government interference. To protect that right, the government is prohibited from establishing an official religion. That was, then, a unique declaration of one of the most basic rights of man. It was an absolute affirmment of our "godly heritage". The right to worship one's God in one's own way, without interference is "our godly heritage." It is those who would abrogate the Establishment clause in favor of their chosen brand of religion that have failed to "recognize our godly heritage."