132
You say these things don't happen when they do. Case in point, the notorious Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (9/11 mastermind and behind Daniel Pearl's execution) who WAS jailed in Egypt early in his life, had to flee Bosnia when intelligence had pinpointed him, and was finally captured and turned over to the US by Pakistan. In other words, he was targeted by Muslim ...
129
You are looking at this through the eyes of a modern. Time for some history:
One of the oldest European settlements on North America was made by Puritans, who were fleeing... government religious persecution*. One of the most influential groups in the formation of America were the Quakers, who came to America fleeing... government religious persecution.
...
82
A bit of background is necessary. Recently India passed the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA). It allows only non-Muslim illegal immigrants from Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Afghanistan to get citizenship on the grounds of religious persecution. The CAA itself is controversial because they exclude Muslims. Also, to understand the full power of CAA, you need to ...
79
very few people – just 4% of all U.S. adults – think contraception is immoral. 5% Democrats and 4% of Republicans
- Pew poll, September 2016.
In other words,
There is no conservative argument against contraception...
... because an overwhelming majority of conservatives and conservative movement as a whole ...
... are NOT against contraception in the first ...
71
No, it isn't a contradiction under US law. This has been tested in the Federal Courts, see for example O'Hair v. Blumenthal, and Aronow v. United States. The basic reasoning is summarized in this paragraph from the Anonow case:
It is quite obvious that the national motto and the slogan on coinage and currency "In God We Trust" has nothing whatsoever to ...
58
While the United States doesn't have a national religion, the US has fairly deep religious liberty roots, and it has lead to a few twists and turns in the religious sentiment
Religious Refugees
Every year, Americans celebrate Thanksgiving (a major US holiday), and most children could tell you some version of the story of the Pilgrims and Native Americans. ...
52
Answering this question properly would require a broad discussion of the religious tensions and transformations in England during the 16th and 17th centuries, starting with the English Reformation where the Church of England broke off from the authority of the Pope. Suffice it to say (for our purposes) that this move created a religious power vacuum in which ...
51
The question you added in comments I think is more specifically interesting; We mostly know why the CCP does what it does in Xinjiang (GC Campbell comment), but following that logic, it would do the same in Tibet.
The answer is they did! And the same Party member that was in charge of developing the surveilllance state and re-education camps in Tibet (Chen ...
49
Is this customary?
Yes, there is a whole wiki on it. Obama had pastor Rick Warren at his inauguration.
How does this align with a secular government? Isn't it one?
The government is still secular. What makes the government secular is that a religious component is not a mandated component. You can become president without prayers. More importantly no ...
answered Jan 20 '17 at 17:11
David says Reinstate Monica
10.2k2 gold badges36 silver badges64 bronze badges
47
It's a political act, not something that people do to obtain some kind of material or social advantage. If someone in Poland has been baptized, then they are automatically counted on the rolls of their local parish, regardless of whether they actually believe in Catholicism.
The background here is that post-communist Poland has veered into right-wing ...
42
History
Since 1933, prayer has been a consistent part of presidential inaugurations in America [Source: Newdow v Bush, Civil Action. Pg.7] . Since 1933 the President-Elect has visited a church for prayer prior to taking the oath of office, but since 1937 actual prayers have been offered during the inauguration itself.
Secularism
As noted in the question, ...
42
The main reason is game-theoretical asymmetry.
If you "identify" (officially, as per self-label) as a Christian - or any other religion - non-religious people would most likely not decide to avoid voting for you based on that.
There may be a small sliver of atheist zealots who would, but I seriously doubt it is enough to matter, especially in US First ...
38
Disclaimer: I'm not that versed in history, so the following might have factual mistakes.
To understand the source of the American separation of church and state, you'll have to take a dive into history.
Between the 16th and 18th century, Europe was in a state of religious turmoil. The ruler decided which religion his subjects would have to follow (Cuius ...
37
It depends on your definition of communism - AND religion.
Marx, as another answerer noted, officially denounced religion. This was for three distinct reasons:
Organized religion (church) for hundreds of years was either a political power, or co-opted by another power (monarchs) to help pacify the oppressed lower classes.
The official version of what was ...
37
Many Germans who have friends and family really enjoy the fact that there is one "common day off" in the week which is the same for all family members. Going to church together has become rather uncommon, but the benefit for the family remains.
Of course one cannot go shopping together on this "common day off," but that's where the golden rule comes in -- ...
37
I would take a somewhat less cynical view than @JamesK, who frames the matter as a Machiavellian motivated action in his answer, rather than as a legitimate ideological stance and policy with intellectual merit.
But, the bottom line is that the official doctrine of the Chinese Communist Party, which has been in place since its inception, which was central to ...
36
The Church is a source of authority other than the Communist Party of China. One of the basic principles of the PRC, even as it moves from war to peace and from Cultural Revolution to Xi Jinping Thought, is that the only source of authority can be the Communist Party. It is anathema that an organisation can claim authority entirely independent of the CCP.
...
34
Without any stats to back my speculations, here are a few reasons why I would expect it to be that way:
Stating the obvious but recent immigration to Europe included many people from countries where Islam is an important component of the culture (North Africa, West Africa, Turkey…)
Christianity is on the retreat and losing ground to irreligion. To some ...
31
Let's assume that the United States is one of the countries where church and state are separated. Politicians can still care about papal opinion because some of their voters do. According to Wikipedia, roughly 20-25% of Americans are Catholic. That's more than are black or Hispanic, and those groups have political influence.
In the US, five or six of ...
30
"Separation of church and state" is not actually required by the US Constitution.
Wikipedia says that the phrase "separation of church and state" was first used by Thomas Jefferson in this letter in 1802, when he was President:
Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between
Man & his God, that he owes account to none other ...
28
The Citizenship Act of 2019 gives refugees who have fled persecution in Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan a path to Indian citizenship, but it only applies to Hindu, Sikh, Buddhist, Jain, Parsi, and Christian refugees. Muslims are not eligible. This is a charged issue because many people living in India have no documentary proof of their citizenship. It ...
26
There is no provision for delaying the outgoing president's departure.
It would be possible for the outgoing vice president to resign and allow the incoming president to become vice president prior to the Sabbath. Then the outgoing president could resign and allow the incoming president to take office early. The outgoing president could choose to do ...
26
This is a Canada-specific answer, but one that is likely applicable to the US as well.
Anti-discrimination laws (or more generally in Canada, human rights laws, although are some other examples of laws prohibiting discrimination in areas such as health and safety) prohibit discrimination on a range of specific protected characteristics.
In Manitoba, for ...
26
This is a rather principialist question, and politics is a much more pragmatic field.
Philosophically, yes, a State should not acknowledge a god, there are religions without gods, agnosticism and atheism. As the State should not endorse any particular group, the god question should be absent from the State sphere.
Pragmatically, four out of five Americans ...
24
Evidently, they do. There are a lot of Muslim countries who combat terrorism. I think Muslim governments are even more concerned with terrorism than anybody else and take very hard-line measures.
Islamist terrorists routinely get imprisoned and executed. Moreover, the most of the "grassroots" popular revolutions in the majority-Muslim countries (Iraq, ...
24
I'm not familiar with Germany but there's a similar law in France, and I guess in a few other countries. The law is amended from time to time and there are quite a lot of exemptions, but the general case is still that most businesses must close every Sunday, and in particular that employees cannot be asked to work on a Sunday.
In France at least the debate ...
24
Well, Wikipedia has a pretty detailed explanation on this:
Alsace-Moselle maintains its own local legislation, applying specific customs and laws on certain issues in spite of its being an integral part of France. These laws are principally in areas that France addressed by changing its own law in the period 1871–1919, when Alsace-Moselle was a part of ...
Only top voted, non community-wiki answers of a minimum length are eligible
