Despite the Rain, Hundreds Showed up for Rock Beyond Belief

I think the ‘but’ was grammatically part of the compare & contrast  with the earlier Christian gathering, not a negation of the wholesomeness of the children’s activities.

I agree. The article seems to be saying, “This event was very like an earlier Christian gathering, but for these elements.” I don’t think they’re trying to imply anything wrong about calling out creationism.

 They don’t get any easier, do they?

This was not a nonreligious event it was an antichristian event.  I was very disappointed to see and hear this.  For this I am pleased the rain came and possibly kept many from attending.  Is this what was intended? 

If Christianity is self-centerness, then what does that make an atheist?? Freedom of Religion is actually constitutional but if we use your logic then your event would also be un-Constitutional.  This nonsense that the military or the men and women in the military cannot express their religious belief is completely contrary to our First Amendment Rights.  The last time I checked Congress has not established any religion that I must conform to.

Bambam, you are trying to twist my words in order to make a point, but you’re not very good at it, so you’re not fooling anybody, except perhaps yourself.

For instance:

I did not say that “Christianity is self-centeredness.” I was talking about the self-centeredness of Christians who assume that Rock Beyond Belief was strictly about being against Christianity.

I made it clear why Rock the Fort was unconstitutional. It’s because it used taxpayer money to promote a religious event.  Rock Beyond belief used only privately funded money.

There is nothing in my words, nor in any effort by those sponsoring Rock Beyond Belief that opposes individuals in the military expressing their religious beliefs. but when the military as an institution uses its authority, credibility, or clout to promote or endorse a specific religion, or to coerce soldiers into practicing a particular religion, that is when it is violating the Constitution.

These distinctions are not difficult. Your straw man arguments are tediously typical of Christians who deliberately and knowingly pretend to misunderstand the First Amendment’s prohibition against establishment of any state religion, and against limiting the  practice of any individual’s religion. The easiest way to understand it is to say that government, at any level, through any of its agencies, stays out of religion, and religion stays out of all those agencies. There is nothing in there that prevents a kid in a public school from praying on the playground, or a soldier from praying in his barracks, or a preacher from standing on a street corner yelling his head off. All this has been clarified again and again by several Supreme Courts, yet the military, many public schools, and many local governments continue to pretend they don’t know, or to blatantly flout the law in defiance. The law that prohibits a mixing of state and church is protecting EVERYBODY’S religious freedom, including yours and mine. We all have to obey it, or we all will lose our freedom.

This is Pascal’s Wager, and it’s based on the underlying assumption that the Christian god is the correct one. What if Allah is the one true God? What if Zeus and the Greek pantheon are the real ones? What if the Norse or the Bantu or the Zoroastrians or the Babylonians or the Inuits or the Hopi or the Aztecs were correct? 

By picking the Christian god, you’re screwing your chances of achieving eternal paradise of any religion that thinks non-followers won’t end up there. By rejecting all those other religions, you’re picking sides. What will be your excuse if there is a god… but he’s not yours?