“Nation” vs “government”

I see Vox Day is up to his usual form. Writing for WorldNetDaily, he tries to dilute the impact of the Treaty of Tripoli by a bit of heavy-handed framing.

[T]he argument that America was never a Christian nation relies upon a common atheist trick, in this case, the substitution of the word “nation” for “government.” What is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion? Is it “the United States of America”? Is it “the American people”? No, it is “the Government of the United States of America.”

Notice it’s the atheists who are trying to “trick” you into confusing the American nation with the American government. No Christian (like David Barton, for instance) would ever try to conflate “nation” and “government” in such a way as to make it sound like our laws and government institutions (e.g. public schools) had a right and/or obligation to give preference to Christianity.

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OZ: Date change prompts accusations of ‘Christian cleansing’

The Christian Post reports that Australian education officials are planning to edit the dates in textbooks by replacing the initials BC (Before Christ) and AD (Anno Domini, “in the year of our Lord”) with the secular alternatives BCE (Before Common Era) and CE (Common Era). Stop me if you’ve heard this one: local Christians are taking this move as a deliberate attempt to eradicate Christianity from Australia.

Fred Nile, a minister in New South Wales, told The Daily Telegraph that the announcement was a “final insult” to Christians in Australia and “an absolute disgrace.”

Nile said he feels the move is an attempt to remove any traces of Christianity from the country.

“The direction of the national curriculum is towards almost a Christian cleansing to remove from our history any references to the role Christianity had in the formation of Australia and still has today,” he told The Telegraph.

Personally, I don’t much care whether you say BC or BCE, any more than I care that Wednesday is a tribute to the Norse god Woden. Its mythological significance is too trivial to fuss over. But “Christian cleansing”? For a typographical substitution? That’s a bit over the top in my book. Save the “ethnic cleansing” insinuations for actual human rights violations please.

“Missing the Point” Department

TV Station WJHG reports that “several hundred” fans and football players staged an ostensibly defiant recitation of the Lord’s Prayer just before a high school football game.

Marianna- Just before Friday night’s football game at Marianna High School, students, parents, and even the players went through with reciting the Lord’s Prayer…

One student said it should send a strong message about prayer in public schools.

“It just shows that with God anything’s possible, nothing can stop us,” said Marianna High School student Trenton Nobles.

It also shows that prayer is not being repressed in the United States. What’s illegal is for the state (e.g. school teachers, coaches, principals, etc) to dictate to students when and how they must pray. But students themselves are free to pray whenever they like. As the TV station kindly noted in their online report, the ACLU confirmed the fact that public, student-led prayer cannot legally be discouraged by school officials.

The American Civil Liberties Union was not involved in the Jackson County School Board’s decision about pre-game prayers, but it said it’s against the law for school administrators and teachers to either encourage or discourage them.

Yep, those dad-gummed atheist liberals are standing up for believers’ civil rights again. Care to guess how many believers are going to thank them for it?