World Affairs
Politics & OpinionsBy Jonathan
11 months ago
A dangerous attack on the American Bill of Rights has begun to show up on right wing blogs. Some posts go so far as to advocate denying First Amendment protection to the Muslim faith. Others go further and assert, "In America we must start by banning Islam and outlawing Muslim schools and the Quran. Then we must deport or imprison those who teach and/or practice Islam." These attitudes are intolerable.
No one has the right to decide whether another American's belief system is a religion. The words of the First Amendment, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion," precludes our government from discriminating against any religions. What could be a worse discrimination against a specific belief system than to legislate that it doesn't "qualify" as a religion at all.
We have a responsibility to judge individuals by their actions, not by the books they read. For example, when the United States decided to outlaw polygamy, Mormons were simply forbidden to follow the (then current) dictates of their book. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints |
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