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Please cite your historical proof to back up the claim that a bargain was struck with churches upon the founding of the country where they would no longer have a voice in government in compensation for being relieved of a tax burden. I'm pretty well-versed in American History, and this is the first I've heard, although that doesn't mean you're not right. (I, unlike some, feel obligated to be understood by those in an open forum into which I've stepped with combative assertions.)
As I understand it, there was little if any history of church taxation (for the "established", read: "accepted" ones) even before the War of Independence. Upstart belief systems have always had a rough go of it in the face of competing fantasies; hucksters HATE having others mess with their hustle, and call them "cults" or worse. A religion, after all, is simply a cult that "made it".
As for your lack of obligation to make any logical sense whatsoever to me, a simple answer to the following points should be a responsibility for anyone who swaggers into an open forum copping an dismissive attitude to the peons who don't swallow his/her disconnected historical facts that are paraded as irrefutable causality.
Is it just ME or some so-and-so like me who doesn't deserve an explanation for incoherence? Am I a special version of no-account who's not worthy of justification for fantastical paranoia, or are we all beneath contempt and subject to edicts of self-evidence that come with no support? Fatuous pronouncements are the heart and soul of religion, and arrogant demands to be above reproach are the aristocratic mien of spiritual superiority.
Is persecution for one's beliefs tantamount to letters of Marque and Reprisal to do as one damn well pleases with no justification?
Is a set of beliefs, some of which are admirable, enough to make one immune to the obligation of justification that the rest of us have to endure? If so, then step to the back of the bus, because members of the Society of Friends haven't suffered anywhere near as much or as dearly on the whole as non-believers have. Playing the pity card to non-believers is laughable.
Where do you get this distorted historical set of "facts"?
As for the religions being the governments, that's just plain silly in most cases. Yes, the Massachusetts Bay Colony was a Puritan enclave, and the church had an inordinate say in governance, but it was NOT the government. There were Governors and councils. Maryland was a Catholic operation. Pennsylvania was Quaker. Still, there was a separate, if well-influenced to the point of being ALMOST affiliated, government in all of these colonies. Your supposition that religions WERE the governments is outrageously incorrect, and designed to claim some kind of magnanimity for surrendering authority.
In the spectrum of suckitude that is religion, the Quakers come off quite well. My quarrel isn't with this sect as much as it is with Religion Incorporated: the big Protestant Sects, the Mormons, the Roman Catholic Syndicate, The Nation of Islam and others that shall remain nameless here.
What on earth allows you to flail around with absurd leaps of logic and sneer at having to explain yourself? If you want to make your point in what is a fairly hostile (to your belief system) thread, that's not going to work. That's aversion therapy, and those of us who have chosen to chart a course of non-belief in this society tend to be rather immune to hectoring, badgering and fulminating dismissal.
There is a assumption held by many believers that belief is inherently "good", and that the rest of us simply must share this prejudice. I don't. MANY of us don't. MANY of us are offended at the demand that we are to see believers as inherently "good"; the fundamental, single function of the Christian is to square him/herself with the big, vindictive Sky Chief and secure his/her future safety. That's pure selfishness, and it shows throughout the belief system. Sure, there are many good things in the belief system, but the very core of the duty of the individual is to save his/her own ass, and that's a cringing, childish mentality, and sheer selfishness. Don't get me wrong; Islam's MUCH worse on this account: it's complete subservience.
I see religion as a mixed bag, and on the whole, a personal failing that promotes and exacerbates mental illness and justifies social abuse, while demanding exemption from logic, justification and transparency and denigrating that which is greatest about us as a species: curiosity and the ability to function amid uncertainty and evolving understanding. Religions seek to kill thinking. They are inherently conservative by this very definition: faith is certainty and unwillingness to explore alternatives or step down from the altar of superiority to admit such faults.
That your particular sect is "good" on the balance is probably very true, but that doesn't justify the concept of subsidizing dangerous entities.
First, though, a bit of history to justify your wildly proclaimed "facts". Even if I am beneath deserving an explanation, you're in a communal setting here, and there are others who presumably DO rise above my obvious calumny or insignificance, and they DO deserve an explanation. Otherwise, your posts are just the action of a bomb-throwing popinjay who expects aristocratic immunity from reproach because of the moral beauty of his/her superior beliefs.
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