FFRF Loses Challenge to Stop Arizona Day of Prayer

“For centuries, millions of Americans of every race, creed and color have come together in voluntary prayer to seek strength and wisdom.”

I don’t think the African slaves were allowed to keep their ancestral beliefs, and even after forced (i.e. not voluntary) christianisation they were still segregated and continued to be enslaved. The Native Americans had their ancestral beliefs suppressed and suffered racial genocide. There was no acceptance or “togetherness” for those outside Christianity over the centuries, and even different races and cultures were discriminated againsted and segregated. Even Catholicism up until the past century was an “outside faction”.

There are so many disparate factions in the religious community my mind boggles at how the word “togetherness” can even be spoken. This person suffers from the worst cognitive dissonance.

Sad.

FFRF, American Atheists and similar groups should lay off this legal harassment over trivial issues. I declined to renew my membership in these organizations because I didn’t want them to waste my money in that way. And I have somehow mysteriously stopped every political “day of prayer” from affecting me simply by not participating, without having to threaten to sue anyone. 

Atheists in the U.S. have really cheapened the meaning of “persecution” when we live under conditions which look like an atheist utopia to atheists in backwards countries who face imprisonment, family disruption, confiscations of wealth and even capital punishment for their expressions of nonbelief. Atheists like the ones leading FFRF who engage in legal attention-whoring don’t deserve as much respect as they think they do, and I think their ill-advised attempts at do-goodism don’t help atheists’ reputations in the U.S.

For getting paid to make decisions, judges sure do use standing an awful lot to avoid making tough decisions.  Oh well, as they say, the law is an ass.

” In these troubled times, it is more important than ever that we have
opportunities such as this to freely and voluntarily come together in
seeking courage and guidance from a higher power.”

WTF?  Like you don’t have the opportunity every single day?  Do you really need the government to set aside a specific day? 

“I applaud the Arizona Superior Court for rejecting this
lawsuit, which was little more than another sad attempt to stifle an
American tradition.”Just a wild guess…. 1950s?

It really bothers me when politicians refer to “these troubled times”, as if this is a specific time when we really need to pray.  Regardless of what little snapshot of our country’s history you choose to look at, there will always be people who are in troubled times, and people who are most certainly not.  In the photo above, Governor Brewer does not give off the appearance that she is in the middle of any troubled times: she appears as all the other politicians do- well groomed, well fed, and if I had to venture a guess, has more than adequate health care available to her. 

The “troubled times” phrase is a gimmick that politicians hope will open the door for them to do whatever they damn well please.  In this case, it’s being used as rationale to pray.

you can never force people to change their beliefs…, they might say they have changed them, but only to avoid torture.

But then their children, no longer being forced to avoid torture, were willingly brought up genuinely believing and thus, a country bursting at the seams with Christians.

From a political party that holds the Constitution to be akin to another book of the Bible, they sure don’t mind wiping their butts with it when “the law” doesn’t agree with their belief of the moment.

“…another sad attempt to stifle an American tradition.”

Could they have said that about slavery at one time? What’s the point of a 
constitution if it’s not followed?

Gosh, why would anyone EVER think that vocal Christians are often hypocritical liars with an example like yours?

Bear more false witness because you think it’s okay when you don’t like the person, whiner.

 Of course politicians prefer them. People who pray are typically easier to control, because A) they are trained to defer to anyone who claims to have authority, B) they can be made to go along with any idea, no matter how horrendous, on the premise that it is some superior being’s will (nothing is better for getting a decent person to commit evil than to convince him that he isn’t the one responsible for it), and C) they are trained to have a knee-jerk martyr reaction that makes it easy to rile them on false grounds.

The constitution calls for freedom to express one’s religion, and it also outlines the right of states to proclaim things like a day of prayer. They’re actually following the constitution. They’re not selecting one religion over the other, this is for “every creed.”

 It is a bit too faint tho. If you have a day of prayer, officiated and sanctioned by the government, and the word prayer in this case does specifically reference a christian prayer, and not any other type of prayer, then the government is indorsing that specific religion, and that type of prayer, to the exclusion of all other religions and types of prayer. I wouldn’t even dare to mention nonbelievers here. The slippery slope in this situation is obvious and very dangerous. The next you may see, is the closure of all restaurants and fast food outlets during lent, because good Christians as supposed to be fasting then. Islamic countries do that, and you would risk arrest and corporal punishment for public eating during Ramadan. But then again, these countries are theocracies, and they use and consider religion as the bases for government. So i suggest those atheists who withdraw support for these organizations that actively object to government sanctioned prayer and other religious symbols, please support them, lest you find yourself forced into a prayer or other religious activity. Slippery slope type activities, while seemingly harmless in the beginning, have the awful tendency to spiral downwards with great acceleration and are very hard to stop once they gain momentum. So too bad the FFRF lost this battle, but i am sure they will continue, as the should, their work is vital, and i can’t be thankful enough for it. 

Thank you!!! It is a constant battle, and one where we have to remain vigilant. Christians know that they are losing ground and will do everything in their power to, not only keep what they have, but also, get back what they have lost.

The constitution calls for freedom to express one’s religion…

Yes.

…and it also outlines the right of states to proclaim things like a day of prayer.

No. Please be so kind as to point out where you think the Constitution “outlines the right of states” to proclaim a day of prayer.

Many slaves were actually Muslims and they certainly weren’t allowed to hold on to their religion.

Correct decision by the Arizona court.  Same result here in Texas.  I applaud them.

“Another brick from the wall of separation has been taken down” 

Not exactly.  I rock thrown at constitutionally recognized religious liberty has been cast aside as it should have been.

 It is not a Christian standard at all.  It is the jurisdictional requirement of standing that exists for all parties going to federal court. 

You seriously missed the point of Stev84’s complaint: the standard is being applied unequally. As Martin Luther King correctly pointed out, a law that is just on its face can be unjust in its application.

Maybe I did. If ther are cases that he is referring to maybe we could investigate it and find out if in fact the standard is being applied in a different fashion for Christian groups.

Out of curiosity, on what principle of jurisprudence do you determine that this is “constitutionally recognize religious liberty”? By what logic is this not government speech but merely the private speech of a government official?

‘Out of curiosity, on what principle of jurisprudence do you determine that this is “constitutionally recognized religious liberty”?’

Just a wild-assed guess here: “Because Christianity.”

“In these troubled times, it is more important than ever that we have
opportunities such as this to freely and voluntarily come together in
seeking courage and guidance from a higher power.”

If prayer was so effective we wouldn’t be in troubled times.  But let’s keep doing useless stuff, and even have our elected officials declare special holidays for it in violation of the Constitution, because it’s “tradition”, you know. Let’s bring back slavery and child labor while we’re at it because apparently it was wrong of those meddling bullies to take away those American “traditions”. 

The Constitution does not give states religious liberty. It says, in plain English, that the government cannot make any religious laws or declarations. 

All this is is more christian privilege stepping on the rights of others. It’s pathetic that you laud this as the “right” decision. 

There is a longstanding historical precedent for owning slaves. It goes back to the time of the founding fathers.

Actually 26 years practicing and very successful thank you.

That’s, uh, playing a little loose with the language of the Constitution, too. Much as I agree with the thrust of your argument, the actual text of the Constitution only says that:

1.  Congress may not *establish* a religion as the nation’s official religion, establishment being a clear term of art for that state of affairs in many European nations at the time, such as the Church of England in England, or the Norges Folkekirke of Norway

2. Congress may not impede the free exercise of religion (fairly self-explanatory)

3. The Federal Government may not in any way use a religious test to sort for suitability of holding any position in the government (also pretty self-explanatory)

The 14th Amendment then applied these to the states through incorporation.

Now, the text doesn’t say exactly how Congress should go about guaranteeing freedom of religious exercise, and the courts have interpreted that clause together with the Establishment clause over the past seventy years or so to point to erecting a strict wall of separation (following the advice of Jefferson ad Madison) as the safest, least complicated way to ensure maximum freedom from government entanglement in religious affairs. The doctrine of separation does not exist in plain text in the Constitution, but is a perfectly reasonable way to enforce the existing textual passages regarding the subject of religion. 

So what magically makes this endorsement of religion constitutional (assuming that you were saying that this is an endorsement but is still constitutional)? I’m asking for the underlying principle, not merely “We’ve done it for a while already.”

Don’t get too caught up in “just world” thinking; there are plenty of ignorant lawyers out there. Just ask Andy Schlafly.

Governor Brewer continues to be a deplorable human being. No surprise here.

On what evidence do you suggest that “establishment” only referred to a state religion? I do understand that there were some official state churches, but I chalk that up to the same thing as Jefferson’s profession of human equality and his owning of slaves: an inability to live consistently by one’s own principles.

At any rate, I don’t think we’re arguing over the originalist reading of the Establishment Clause; I just don’t see how a plain reading leads one to insist that the Establishment Clause only applies to a state religion.

 That’s why we atheists in Arizona call her the “Wicked Witch of the West”. I just wish someone would drop a house on her already!

It didn’t have any other meaning in American jurisprudence until 1947, with Everson, when it was changed to mean the more expansive meaning with which you are familiar and applied to the states for the first time. Not for nothing, but the wiki article I redirected you to had a ton of cites, so while I appreciate the “don’t want to take wiki’s word for it” you really don’t have to. If you can find a reference to establishment meaning anything other than state establishment of a religion through direct endorsement, anywhere, prior to 1947, I’d be honestly shocked. 

For what it’s worth, the original proposed and submitted text by Madison of what would become the beginning of the 1st amendment is:

The civil rights of none shall be abridged on account of religious belief  or worship, nor shall any national religion be established, nor shall the full and equal rights of conscience be in any manner, or on any pretext, infringed. (1 Annals of Congress 452.)

I never understand why “it is illegal” is not considered enough. 

 If prayer is a such strong American tradition, why does the government need to promote it?

 So George Washington pushed congress do declare a national day of prayer?  How informative:)

 Also remember that little word there “respecting,” it’s important, and the founders used that word on purpose to make sure that the reading and interpretation would be broad so people wouldn’t make the mistake of thinking that it was only about establishing a state religion.

So George Washington pushed the Arizona state congress to declare a national day of prayer? 

What is the *it* your talking about and how long has it been practised?