UPDATE: Pastor Brown, You Are Not God [OPINION]

I got a little fired up and wordy yesterday and posted a blog about Pastor Tom Brown and his band of merry El Pasoans for Traditional Family Values minions.  You can read the very long original here.  I posted the link on Mike and Tricia's Facebook page, and Andrew Neblock said separation of Church and State being in the US Constitution was a popular myth.  So is it in there or not?

Well, yes and no.  There is no wording that says, "We want the Church and State to be separate".  The wording, according to usconstitution.net, reads, and I quote, " Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances." 

What does that mean?  Again, I turn to usconstitution.net which says, "the phrase is commonly thought to mean that the government should not establish, support, or otherwise involve itself in any religion." 

To me - and I am neither a legal nor a constitutional scholar - that means government and religion should not mix. 

As I said in my original blog post, I think Pastor Brown and his plethora of lawyers are leading us down a very steep and and very slippery slope.  If we let one church raise money and use their church to circulate petitions, then a precedent will be set, and the next thing you know, every church, every religion, every demonination will be gathering their people and money to affect every single politicial race.  That is a hop, skip, and jump away from one church having enough influence to take over the government.  Taliban in Afghanistan, anyone?

As I said, I am Catholic, but I do not want my Church to dictate secular law.  God's Law is God's Law, but my God or my religion may not jibe with yours, and vice versa.  It's best to keep our laws and our churches separate. 

Thanks Andrew for reading and listening! 

What do you think about this issue?