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Old 05-02-2011, 10:31 AM   #244 (permalink)
MoonlitSunshine
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Join Date: Jul 2006
Location: Ireland
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The Godbothering was in relation to the "One Nation under God" statement at the end of his speech, I'm not sure how those arguing the religious neutrality of his speech keep missing this as it's been said at least three times by different people. As I know I have said and probably others too, we have no problem with him asking for God's blessing of the country, but we do have a problem with him declaring the entire United States as a nation "under God", a nation defined by Christianity, a nation still being driven by a religious force. That's what the Godbothering is in relation to.

It's insulting because it implies that every success of the people is as a result of God's blessing, though I'd ignore that one personally. It's dangerous from a religious perspective as it alienates those who do not believe in the Christian God (being known as "God" - One nation under God implies that those who do not believe in God are either his unwitting subjects or not part of the Nation), and it has political ramifications because it implies that the actions made by the country were done by the will of God, as a nation under Him, thus making it an action of religious importance.

While the above might be slight exaggerations, and that you would have to be either unlucky or a bit touchy in order to see it that way, I hope you can understand the offence taken by the definite implication by that statement that the USA is a Christian nation.

P.S: I know some of you are going to do this, but I'm going to try anyway: Please don't ignore the point of this post, and focus on one of the potential ramifications that I gave. I was just giving examples of how it might be seen by people who already have a problem with the US, who are numerous indeed, and not necessarily already enemies. The point in terms of the people taking offence in this thread is a lot less severe, so picking on one of those points and saying "that's ridiculous" is not a rebuttal...
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