Steve said: A Federal Judge in Wisconsin ruled this past Thursday that the government's recognition of the National Day of Prayer is unconstitutional!

Boris says: The Constitution is a document that has to be interpreted by the courts and the judge in this case made the correct interpretation. However a good way to settle disagreements among the rest of us about the Constitution is to study the words of the Founders themselves. Thomas Jefferson, one of the authors of the Constitution, opposed declarations of national days of prayer by the Federal government. He wrote "Fasting and prayer are religious exercises; the enjoining them an act of discipline. Every religious society has a right to determine for itself the time for these exercises, and the objects proper for them, according to their own particular tenets; and right can never be safer than in their hands, where the Constitution has deposited it." Evangelists often point out that President James Madison proclaimed a day of prayer. Christian historical revisionists always leave out the ending of the story though. Madison later said such proclamations are not appropriate and that, "They seem to imply and certainly nourish the erroneous idea of a national religion." So according to the men who actually wrote the Constitution, a National Day of Prayer is unconstitutional.

Steve said: “Our government had been acknowledging the importance of prayer since the Continental Congress in the 1700's!”

Boris says: Actually the opposite is true. At the Constitutional Convention of 1787, Benjamin Franklin strongly suggested on June 28 that the convention have prayers said there. Evangelists love to tell this story but here again they always leave out the ending. The convention did not accept the suggestion, and the convention went on without prayers. Franklin also related how the Christian clergy of the Revolutionary period tried again and again to have references to Christianity inserted directly into the U.S. Constitution, but they were refused every time by the Founders. The omission of prayers at the Constitutional Congress and of any mention of God, Jesus or Christianity is too obvious to have been anything but deliberate. According to one account when Alexander Hamilton was asked why there was no mention of God in the Constitution he said that the new nation was not in need of "foreign aid" and according to another, he simply said, "we forgot."

Steve said: The official Nat'l Day of Prayer was established in the 1950's and ever since then every state Governor, regardless of party affiliation or religious background, has issued an official proclamation.

Boris says: Not all of them. A few governors have refused citing the establishment clause most recently former Minnesota Governor Jesse Ventura, who is an atheist.

Steve said: If this Federal Judge's ruling holds...all of those acts would be deemed illegal.

Boris says: On the show Steve kept claiming that this ruling would be taking religion and morality out of the government. Neither one of those things has any business in a democratic government. The government has no business attempting to legislate morality or religion. Rather the government makes and enforces laws based on a system of rights. The government cannot force morality on people. Prohibition laws didn’t stop people from drinking, they just made alcohol harder to get and often unsafe to drink. State anti-abortion laws didn’t prevent abortions, they just made them harder to get and often unsafe. The Comstock Laws caused untold human suffering because they banned contraceptives and the distribution of information about them and about abortion for educational purposes. These particular laws were all invasive and infringed on the rights granted our citizens in the Constitution, which is why they don’t exist anymore. Needless to say a modern example would be marijuana laws, which have done absolutely nothing to stop people from smoking marijuana. Even once they’re in jail. Steve mentioned the Govenator spoke about his support for a day of prayer. His State California, the state I was born in, is also about to make marijuana legal for recreational use and the Govenator also supports that.

Steve said: Will President Obama and Attorney General Holder fight this ruling...or will they take part in another fundamental change to this great nation?

Boris says: First of all adding the National Day of Prayer, the words “In God We Trust” onto our currency and adding the phrase “under God” to our national pledge, all in the 1950’s were “fundamental” changes done for the insane purpose of trying to frighten the “atheist” Soviet Union during the Cold War into thinking we had God on our side. So they were never part of our heritage to begin with. Second the fact that something this trivial upsets Christians and no one else, while there are so many real problems in the world illustrates how skewed their priorities are. Somebody tell me why this issue is important to them.

On the show Steve kept implying that there is a connection between religion and morality. One of the things I really hate about religion is the hijacking of morality by religion and its spokespeople. The Jewish, Christian and Islamic scriptures contain many passages that teach noble ideas about proper human behavior. But without exception these principles developed in earlier cultures and history indicates that they were adopted by rather than learned from religion. For one example the claim that our laws in the U.S. are based on the Ten Commandments is ridiculous. The first four commandments have only to do with the proper worship of a particular desert deity. We have no laws requiring the worship of anything, making idols, keeping the Sabbath, about taking any God’s name in vain, or about honoring our parents or coveting. The Bible itself tells us that the other four commandments were already part of common law in Egypt. Long before the Ten Commandments were given to Moses, the Bible says Moses murdered an Egyptian and had to escape because the Egyptian authorities would certainly have punished him for murder. When the Israelites escaped into the desert the reason the Egyptian army chased them is because the Israelites had stolen property belonging to some of the Egyptian citizens. Obviously murder and stealing were forbidden in societies long before the Ten Commandments existed. Prior to that Joseph was falsely imprisoned in Egypt for the crimes of adultery and bearing false witness. So what laws originated from what God of what religion exactly? A considerable amount of scientific literature exists on the natural biological, cultural and evolutionary origins of morality. Darwin and Wallace saw the evolutionary advantage of cooperation and altruism. Modern scientists have elaborated on this by showing in detail how our moral sense arose naturally during the development of modern humanity. We see signs of primitive moral behavior in animals. Birds and bats share food. Apes and monkeys comfort members of their group who are upset and work together to get food. Even dogs have a rudimentary sense of justice. Dolphins push sick members of their group to the surface to get air. Whales will put themselves in harm's way to help a wounded member of their group. Elephants try their best to save injured members of their families. What’s my point? As Aldous Huxley said, “You never see animals going through the absurd and horrible fooleries of magic and religion…” In other words there’s no connection between morality and religion and prayer. Like everything else religion tries to take credit for there are much more plausible naturalistic explanations for morality and our system of laws than the Bible’s story about a burning bush, which as I pointed out is clearly refuted by the Bible itself anyway.

Steve repeated common Christian claim that our founders understood the [supposed] importance of religion. Some may have believed this but some clearly did not. “If we did a good act merely from love of God and a belief that it is pleasing to Him, whence arises the morality of the Atheist? ...Their virtue, then, must have had some other foundation than the love of God. - Thomas Jefferson, letter to Thomas Law, June 13, 1814. Steve also misrepresented Benjamin Franklin by implying he was a Christian. Like many of the Founders, Franklin was a Deist and also a Freemason. “Since it is impossible for me to have any positive, clear idea of that which is infinite and incomprehensible, I cannot conceive otherwise than that He… expects or requires no worship or praise from us.” – Benjamin Franklin. Those are hardly the words of a Bible believer.

1.The government recognizing a day of prayer for whoever wants to take part is NOT unconstitutional. Show us, Boris, how the proclamation establishes a religion. Obviously, it doesn't.

Boris says: The proclamation of a National Day of Prayer does not have to establish a religion to be unconstitutional. The "establishment of religion" clause of the First Amendment means that the government cannot pass laws that aid one religion, aid all religions, or prefer one religion or another. I haven’t read all of Judge Crabb's entire 66-page ruling yet. One argument I found particularly compelling was her legal opinion that a National Day of Prayer "serves no purpose but to encourage a religious exercise." So by aiding religion the proclamation of a day of prayer is clearly unconstitutional. The judge delayed enforcement of the ruling until there is an appeal. President Obama can ether uphold his oath to defend the Constitution or pander to the same ignorant people who have been calling him a baby-killer, “Obammy” and all the other sick names. In view of the other things he’s already done I doubt him refusing to go along with this day of delusion would hurt him politically.

2. Boris is not addressing my point. I said that the government has always acknowledged the importance of prayer...so Boris thinks that the government has said prayer is NOT important? They have never said that.

Boris says: No, I addressed your point and showed it to be false. Your words were “Our government had been acknowledging the importance of prayer since the Continental Congress in the 1700's!” I pointed out that there were no public prayers uttered during the Constitutional Convention. It doesn’t matter what the government thinks about the importance of prayer. Our government has no business offering opinions on such matters. I’ve read a lot of the scientific literature on the study of prayer and as far as we can tell prayer is an exercise in futility based on ancient superstitions. There’s no evidence that prayer is productive and plenty of evidence that it leads to escapist and life-avoidance problems among others. In other words, according to the data prayer is not only not important it’s often counter productive. I mean suppose people pray to Allah or Krishna or a rock. What good will come of that?

3. OK...I missed a few...a few out of 2,500 state proclamations an anti-God movement doesn't make. The overwhelming majority of Governor's have approved the day of prayer, but in all those cases they STILL haven't established a religion; imagine that!

Boris says: As I pointed out the government cannot establish a religious precedent.

4. May prominant Founding Fathers stated that our form of geovernment MUST rest on thye foundations of religion AND morality...they understood the depravity of man and that without some solid guidelines, rooted in religion for most, but just in morality for others, our representative form of government would ultimately fail.

Boris says: Evangelists constantly conflate and confuse the issues. Our Founders obviously believed that a moral citizenry was necessary for a democratic republic to succeed. That doesn’t mean any of them held to the Christian dogma that all men are depraved, fallen sinners and can’t think for themselves and so have to be told how to live by religious leaders or a religious holy book. Furthermore the men who supposedly believed that all men are created equal were slave owners. This is why morality can never be rooted in religion because religion is rooted in a past in which moral standards are simply unacceptable by today’s more highly evolved moral and ethical standards. There is no way to defend the Bible’s stance on slavery, which it not only condones, but also actually regulates. Nor can we defend our Founder’s acceptance of slavery except to say they simply didn’t know any better. If they could be so wrong about slavery what else might they have been wrong about? The importance of religion perhaps?

5. I guess the Declaration of Independence isn't a part of our heritage? Or the Federalist papers? Or the State Constitutions of all 50 states?

Boris says: What do these documents have to do with prayer exactly? The Declaration isn’t part of the law of the land but only an angry letter to a tyrant from wealthy land and slave owners who didn’t want to pay their fair share of taxes. The original state constitutions are a fine example of what kind of country we would have without the establishment clause. Many of the same men who signed the Constitution returned to their home states and drafted constitutions that excluded non-Christians from public office. Gary North, the noted Christian Reconstructionist, has written that the core leadership of the delegates to the (secret) Constitutional Convention was made up of Deists and Unitarians who sought to establish a secular state and end the theocratic tradition of the states' religious test oaths. So as soon as our Founders established separation of church and state Christians began violating this constitutional mandate. The courts have been fighting a constant battle ever since to keep religion out of government. Judge Crabb’s ruling is just another roadblock to the never-ending attacks from Christians on our Godless Constitution that have been going on since it was ratified.

Come on, Boris...you are not intellectually honest in your assessment of our nation's history. I din't think it was as "Fundy" as I am...but it certainly wasn't Godless like you are.

Boris says: The original colonies that existed prior to the Revolution and immediately afterward were probably even more “Fundy” than you are. They were intolerant and violent theocracies that required public officials to be Christians, usually members of the particular Christian sect that the majority of the population belonged to. Known dissenters were expelled from the colony and often hanged if they tried to sneak back in. Your modern brand of fundamentalism has been tempered by the rise of secular humanism. Sir Hermann Bondi put it this way: “Every one of us… has met the criticism that in ethics we humanists live on Christian capital, that our moral attitudes are derived from Christianity. I believe this to be utterly wrong and that, on the contrary, what goes for modern Christian ethics is in fact derived from humanist values. For most of its history Christianity was red in tooth and claw. It is only in the last couple of centuries that Christian attitudes have gradually become “civilized” and humane. Why? [Because of] the rise of humanism and skepticism. We have given Christianity its modern face, which often quotes the very nice things Jesus is reported to have said, and carefully omits the nasty sayings as ‘If a man abide not in me, he is cast forth as a branch, and is withered, and men gather them, and cast them into the fire, and they are burned.”

To Boris' last point - I did NOT imply that Franklin was a Christian...merely that he believed in the importance of prayer. To Boris' first paragraph...I don't believe a person has to be of any particular faith to be somewhat moral, but by what standard does Boris define what is moral? By his? By society?

Boris says: You believe in certain unchangeable moral imperatives. One of the many problems with your moral imperatives is that one of them says that some beliefs lie beyond the scope of criticism and that to question them is sinful or morally wrong. A much better standard to define what is moral is by Categorical Imperative. The Categorical Imperative is basically as follows: Whatever you do, consider the consequences if your actions were a universal law. It means asking what the world would be like if everyone acted exactly as you do in the same situation. If every time you pass someone collecting for a charity and you don’t give any money consider how it would affect things if everyone gave nothing or expected the next person to give instead. Humanism is another system of morality that is founded on the principle that the only ‘savior’ of humanity is humanity itself. So humanism relies on compassion and enlightened self-interest to foster a sense of altruism and community. However I don’t believe anyone has to adhere to these or any other moral systems to be a morally upstanding person. If all your morality rests upon is a gut feeling of what is right and wrong, it is every bit as valid as any of these, or any other systems.
Those things flutter about like the wind.

Boris says: No they don’t. An individual’s and a society’s, as well as our entire civilization’s morals slowly and grudgingly become more advanced and refined.

A person’s suppoded morality is just a glimpse of the fact that he was made in the image of God and bears some from from his God-given conscience.

Boris says: I already laid this argument to waste. Scientists have shown in detail how our human conscience arose naturally during the development of modern humanity. Before you make a claim to the contrary you must first show how and why scientific explanations for the human conscience and morality are not satisfactory. Otherwise any talk about a “God-given” conscience is just religious yammering.

Even an atheist can be moral…mostly. His problem, from the biblical point of view, is that he can’t be perfectly moral, which is why he needs saving.

Boris says: What is there to be saved from? This is why Christianity is so evil and immoral. It coerces belief through the use of fear rather than evidence. The world really needs to wake up from the long nightmare of religious belief.

Ellen Harlow,
Thanks for identifying yourself so I can separate you from all the anonymous posters. You may indeed have total belief that many people are headed to an after life with God and total bliss, while others are headed to an after life of separation from God and total damnation. The problem is that you also have an absolute total lack of evidence to support that religious fantasy. You’ve always believed that you would rather have been scared into Heaven than loved into Hell? How about being given actually reasons and evidence to believe in heaven and hell instead of being coerced into those beliefs through fear? Wouldn’t that make more sense? Whoever frightened you into these beliefs of yours had no evidence, which is why you had to be indoctrinated through the use of fear. Fear is not a good reason to believe anything. You ask people who don’t believe Jesus even existed why they don’t open their hearts and pray to him. A person cannot believe what is evidently false to them. Like your beliefs in heaven and hell you have no evidence that such a person as Jesus Christ even existed. That too, is a belief not based on evidence but coercion. Now you’re on this blog trying to coerce other people through the use of fear, the same fears that your beliefs are based on, into believing what you do. Why don’t you find some evidence to support your beliefs and then post it here on this blog and then we can discuss THAT? Because I’m just not frightened enough to believe what you do. In fact I’m not frightened at all. Again what is there to be saved from? You did a lot of talking but didn’t answer the question.

Then of course you top it all off with the usual Christian propaganda. Our Founders believed in Nature’s God, NOT the God of the Bible. Read what they wrote why don’t you? Washington, Franklin, Adams, Jefferson – all deists. These slave owning founders of ours probably would have been slaughtered in a slave – Native American uprising if there was any kind of just and fair God governing the universe. The fact they weren't when they should have been and that this imperialist troublesome nation exists at all is a pretty good indication that no such God exists. Yes most of us are lucky to live in this country. But our nation’s past has little to nothing for us to be proud of.