Love’s all that matters

We equal m c squared

Einstein drank his wine in pairs

We equal m c squared

Beyond mathematics there is love in the air

~~ “Relativity” by Grafton Primary

We had a really fun weekend! Ken got a new lawnmower (that’s a big deal ‘round these parts!), we had brunch with Shane and Matt at Brew Werks and then saw the stage production of “Dirty Dancing” (fabulous!), but the highlight was the wedding of our friends Tom and Roger on Saturday.

It’s hard to explain why, but there was just so much joy in the air. The wedding was at a historic building in the area and everything was beautiful. We knew quite a few people there, I got to meet Tom’s godson in person (after doing Tom’s podcast with him), and we got to meet new people, including the guy who conducted the ceremony. The dinner was wonderful, we got to take some fun and goofy pictures, and we got to dance a little bit. Everyone was feeling great and everyone was so happy for Tom and Roger! There was just an air of festivity and celebration and it makes me smile just to think back on it!

As I watched the ceremony (which included lyrics from Prince and “The Princess Bride”), as we all congratulated the happy couple, as friends and family toasted them, as we all broke bread, drank champagne, danced, and talked, one thought stayed prominent in my mind:

Who would ever take away this happiness?

Who, because of whatever religious tropes they are clinging to, or because of whatever personal issues they have, would deny this happiness to these two people who were so obviously in love?

Who would do that?

Apparently, there were one or two people who had some issues with this marriage. I won’t name any names. But we all know people like them, don’t we?  They just can’t accept anything outside their own narrow purview.

From my perspective, all I saw was a dear friend and his beau declaring their love for and commitment to each other.

I will fight for their right to do that forever.

I’ve seen the usual arguments about how marriage is about having children. Stupid argument. Millions of people get married and choose not to have children. [raising hand] That doesn’t make a marriage invalid. Besides, ADOPTION. Duh. Or there is “the Bible says” argument. It really doesn’t, but even if it did, who gives a flying fuck? Despite what some might say, we do not base our laws on the Bible. We base our laws on the Constitution of the Goddamn United States of America. In your face!

I suppose there are other arguments, but yeah, they’re all stupid. You know what isn’t stupid? Love. Love isn’t stupid.

And when people love each other, when two consenting adults want to enter into a committed, legal relationship, they have that right under the Constitution.

It was my great pleasure and honor to see the Constitution in action Saturday night and to see love win. Tom and Roger’s program included this paragraph from Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy, writing the majority opinion in the Obergefell v Hodges case, which guaranteed the right of marriage to all citizens, and it is worth quoting it here:

No union is more profound than marriage, for it embodies the highest ideals of love, fidelity, devotion, sacrifice, and family. In forming a marital union, two people become something greater than once they were. As some of the petitioners in these cases demonstrate, marriage embodies a love that may endure even past death. It would misunderstand these men and women to say they disrespect the idea of marriage. Their plea is that they do respect it, respect it so deeply that they seek to find its fulfillment for themselves. Their hope is not to be condemned to live in loneliness, excluded from one of civilization’s oldest institutions. They ask for equal dignity in the eyes of the law. The Constitution grants them that right.

It damn well does and if you try to take that away, you are going to have a fight on your hands. I guarantee.

Exceptionally exceptional exceptionalism

You hear a lot these days from the teabaggers about what a remarkable place America is.

I don't dispute that; it is a remarkable place, in ways both good and bad. The same country that produced Thomas Jefferson also embraced slavery for several decades; the country that enacted ground-breaking civil rights laws a few decades ago still discriminates against a significant portion of its citizenry; it is a country of breathtaking beauty and one of urban decay; ours is one of the most prosperous countries in the world, and we still have people starving and going without medical care; the same country that gave us Barack Obama (and if you still think he's not an American citizen, please just go away...you bore me) also gave us Sarah Palin.

Yeah, it's a mixed bag all right.

I love my country. I am proud of our accomplishments, but realize that there is still much to be done. I don't believe we're perfect, and we have made mistakes. I believe it is important to take responsibility for that, and to apologize to those we have wronged. We are a young nation, and we are a work in progress.

So I resent the hell out of it when people like the aforementioned Sarah Palin say that I'm not patriotic because I find fault with some of the things that we've done, or dare to declare that perhaps we are fighting a war we shouldn't be. I may love my country, but that doesn't mean that I'm willing to goosestep in agreement with everything we do, or adopt that ultra-nationalistic jingoism of "my country right or wrong." What I find amusing is that what is truly most exceptional about America is what teabaggin' idiots like Palin, O'Donnell, and others would do away with first.

When Jefferson, Adams, and other framers of the Constitution began working on it, they were still witnessing the effects of religion upon governments. They had recently won independence from a country that had established a state religion. It was called the Church of England, for pete's sake. In a remarkable act of courage, rebellion, innovation, and vision, they broke from centuries of tradition and expressly forbade that our government would ever be capable of promoting any religion above another, forcing people to believe a certain way, or taking away their freedom to worship--or not worship--as they chose.

What an amazing and precious thing they gave us in their foresight to prohibit such a thing. All one has to do is look around the world at countries that operate as theocracies and see what is happening in their countries. Stonings for adultery; hangings for homosexuality; prison for those dissidents who would question the status quo and go against the state-sanctioned religion. Every time someone like Palin talks about how our Constitution and our laws are based on the ten commandments, or a Paladino talks about children being brainwashed into thinking that homosexuality is a valid option, or Christine O'Donnell shows her unbelievable ignorance of this most basic tenet of our freedoms, they disrespect the framers of our Constitution and show their ignorance of just how amazing that document is.

We've seen some pretty astounding things in the past few months, but I think O'Donnell's ignorance of the First Amendment takes the cake. Naturally, her campaign is trying to spin it that she was saying expressly that the phrase "separation of church and state" is not in the First Amendment. I wish Chris Coons, her opponent (and the front runner, thank science), had been more forceful in saying that no, it is not, but the sentiment is there, it has been proven over and over again in the writings of Jefferson and others, and it has been upheld and strengthened throughout repeated court rulings. Her complete lack of comprehension of the deepest meaning of the First Amendment and its importance to our freedoms as individuals is absolutely mind-boggling to me. Anyone who wants us to get back to our "Christian roots" is also ignorant of the framers' intent and beliefs. I would remind them that if they get their wish and Christianity is declared a state-sanctioned religion, kids are led in prayer in school, Bible study classes are on the curriculum at every school in the country, and their religion is the law of the land...it can just as easily be taken away and replaced with a different religion at some point. Perhaps one day we'll have our first Jewish President, and he or she will declare that Judaism is the primary religion in the country, and it must be taught in our schools. I wonder how much they would like that? Or maybe one day, we'll have a Muslim President. (Let me state again that if you still think Obama is a Muslim, just go away. Seriously.)

For all their talk of protecting our freedoms and our liberty and the Constitution, they are certainly quick to subvert that document, and they seem eager to take away one of our most fundamental freedoms of all: that of religion. Apparently as long as it is done in the name of their own personal religion, they think it is just dandy. Jefferson and others did their best to protect us and our country from such demagogues. We need to make sure that we carry on their vision and not let our country or our freedoms be usurped by these people.

For Palin, O'Donnell, and all the others that just can't seem to wrap their simple little brains around the concept of it all, I have the same questions that they ask of anyone who wonders about our motives and our actions when we question things in our country: Why do you hate our founding fathers? Why do you hate America? YOU do not get to decide who is a patriot and who isn't. YOU do not get to tell me that I hate my country, or hate our troops. YOU do not get to dictate morality based on your religious beliefs. Your actions and ignorance show what I think is a deep-seated disrespect for the fundamental rights laid out centuries ago by those men who were the sort of deep thinkers and philosophers that you seem to ridicule as elitists today.

This is MY America, too. And you can't have it.

My paper, I wrote it a letter

(You can probably guess what song that is meant to be sung to!)

In today's paper, I saw this letter to the editor:

How many Americans will give serious thought to what the Fourth of July and the Declaration of Independence are all about? If you really study this document, one cannot help but notice that there is a lot of talk about God in it.

He is named four times in the document. As a lawgiver, the author of “the laws of nature” and nature’s God. As a maker, the “Creator” who endowed us with our unalienable rights. As a judge, “the Supreme Judge of the world.” And as a protector, “Divine Providence” to whom we look for protection.

This document looks up at God and acknowledges his supremacy. The authors appeal to his authority for the basis of their actions. They seek his protection. They acknowledge that their rights are a gift from him.

In the Declaration, we accused King George of violating “the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God.” It meant King George was violating the will of God and the laws of the Bible that was our foundation.

The Founding Fathers’ actions hinged on the fact that law came from God, and not from man. It is upon this concept, a purely biblical one, that our government was founded.

Ken B*****, Shipshewana

I suppose that most days, I'd just let that go by and move along about my daily business. Not today, for some reason. I've written about this topic in the past, and felt the need to respond to this. Maybe it was his smug assertion that no one really thinks about these things. My paper asks for letters of no more than 200 words, and this is about five times beyond that, but I asked them to consider it for an opinion piece. I won't get my hopes up, considering the conservative nature of my area, but my local newspaper is generally a little on the liberal side. So we'll see what happens! Even if they don't publish it, I enjoyed writing it, and I hope some of you will enjoy reading it. Here you go!

~~~~~

In response to Ken B*****’s letter of June 26 stating that the American government was founded upon Biblical laws, I would like to address this continued fallacy that America is a Christian nation and that is the way the framers of our government intended it.

Language from the Declaration of Independence is quoted, including the terms “Creator,” “nature’s God,” and “Divine Providence.” The Declaration of Independence is not a legal document for our country; it does not set out to establish our laws, and has no legal authority over our legislators, or our citizens. Its primary purpose was to delineate the reasons for ending the ties between our country and Great Britain. As such, it is a powerful document, but it in no way prescribes the actual governance of the United States.

The language used in the Declaration is also in keeping with its primary author’s Deism. Thomas Jefferson and other framers of our government were not theists. Their belief system consisted mainly of a deity who set things in motion and then established a hands-off attitude. While they believed in a “Divine Providence” and a god of nature, those terms are not the equivalent of the Christian God. Most of our founding fathers subscribed to this deist philosophy, and had no use for the usual trappings of religious dogma. George Washington refused to participate in communion at his church, and when chastised by the minister for his lack of reverence, he simply stopped attending church. To continue to maintain that these men were highly religious in terms of a Christian god is simply not historically accurate.

In fact, Jefferson and other authors of our Constitution (which is the true legal document when it comes to our country’s governance) went out of their way to ensure that we were not and would never become a Christian—or any other religion—nation. The First Amendment states that "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." This is usually interpreted to mean that the Congress is prohibited from the establishment of a national religion or the preference of one religion over another or the support of a "religious idea with no identifiable secular purpose." If you recall, the Puritans left England because they no longer wanted to be told by the Church of England how to believe. The last thing they would ever want was to have a national religion established in their new land.

In Jefferson’s Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom, he wrote:

“That no man shall be compelled to frequent or support any religious worship, place, or ministry whatsoever, nor shall be enforced, restrained, molested, or burdened in his body or goods, nor shall otherwise suffer on account of his religious opinions or belief; but that all men shall be free to profess, and by argument to maintain, their opinion in matters of religion, and that the same shall in no wise diminish enlarge, or affect their civil capacities.”

In his letter to the Danbury Baptist Association, he wrote:

“Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between Man & his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legitimate powers of the government reach actions only, & not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should ‘make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,’ thus building a wall of separation between Church & State. Adhering to this expression of the supreme will of the nation in behalf of the rights of conscience, I shall see with sincere satisfaction the progress of those sentiments which tend to restore to man all his natural rights, convinced he has no natural right in opposition to his social duties.”

Beyond his coining of the phrase “wall of separation between church and state,” note his usage of “the supreme will of the nation in behalf of the rights of conscience.” As with the wording in the Constitution of “we the people,” he means clearly to establish that our laws are based on humankind’s laws, “of the nation,” not on God’s laws. They are written by the people and the legislators who represent them, not by any deity or any book ascribed to a deity.

Jefferson is recognized by many as one of the most visionary men in history; regardless of his own feelings about religion or how he practiced it, he realized that true freedom could come only when a government does not have the power to coerce any citizen into a certain type of belief system, or into any type of belief system.

He wasn’t the only founding father to feel this way. The Treaty of Tripoli, signed by President John Adams in 1797, states in Article 11:

“As the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion [italics mine]; as it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion, or tranquility, of Mussulmen; and, as the said States never entered into any war, or act of hostility against any Mahometan nation, it is declared by the parties, that no pretext arising from religious opinions, shall ever produce an interruption of the harmony existing between the two countries.”

That treaty was unanimously ratified by the Senate; no one objected to anything in the wording, indicating that the prevailing attitude at the time was consistent with that set out by the framers of our Constitution.

We are not a Christian nation, and our laws are not based on the Ten Commandments or on any religion; as hard as it may be for people to accept that, it is the historical truth. We are a nation of many faiths, including those who have no faith at all. It doesn't mean that anyone of a different faith or lack thereof is less of an American or a "bad" American. They're still American, and have the Constitutional right to believe or not believe in the manner which they choose. That is the way our founding fathers intended it to be, and anyone who reveres and respects the Constitution would do well to remember that. We were never intended to be a theocracy, and as we watch the abuses perpetrated in the name of state-run religions around the globe, we should applaud these men who established our government for having the foresight to attempt to ensure that such behavior never happens here.

At least it won’t happen as long as “we the people” do not allow it to happen.