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We Surround Rochester
Aug 28, 2010, Washington DC
by rochester_veteran
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.
The above quote is the First Amendment of the US Constitution. One of the issues that I mentioned in my introductory post, Welcome to RochesterConservative.com!!! was the “cultural war between the left and right, liberal versus conservative, atheist versus Judeo/Christian”. Front and center in this issue is the controversy of the opening prayer that’s said before the Greece Town Board meeting. There’s a thirty year tradition of this prayer being said before the meeting. For the last nine years, local clergy have been invited to lead the opening prayer and all of the churches in Greece have been invited to have their clergyperson lead the opening prayer and this is done on a rotating basis.
There was never a problem with the opening prayer until a couple of leftist activists attended the Greece Town Board meeting, this past January. In attendence at that meeting were Nancy Braiman, a Brighton resident and the co-coordinator of the Rochester Civil Liberties Coalition, and Linda Stephens, a Greece resident and member of Americans United for Separation of Church and State. Leading the opening prayer that evening was the Rev. Bob Brado of the First Bible Baptist Church of Greece. Ms. Braiman and Ms. Stephens were “shocked and offended” when Rev. Brado had the audacity to invoke the name of Jesus Christ in his opening prayer! Imagine that, a Baptist minister invoking Jesus’ name… it’s like who else are *Christ*ians to pray to? Quite predictably, Ms. Braiman and Ms. Stephens reported the “contraband” prayer to the ACLU and they sent a letter to the Greece Town Board. I’m sure you read about this in the D&C.
Readers of RochesterConservative.com, what’s your take on this, does the First Amendment guarantee Freedom *of* Religion or Freedom *from* Religion? Do you think the Town of Greece should stick to their guns and defy the ACLU (I hope they do!)? If and when the ACLU files suit, will this go all the way to the Supreme Court?
This issue is starting to come to head. The ACLU hosted a meeting at the Greece Town Hall this past Thursday with the theme, “Role of Public Prayer” . The Greece Blogger, Petrena Hayes attended that meeting and invited Gary Pudup, executive director of the Genesee Valley Chapter of the ACLU, to the Greece Blog, Petrena’s Place, to discuss the issue with partcipating bloggers. Mr. Pudup accepted and is participating. You can read the posts at the link below:
You can join in and comment yourself. All you need is a blogger.com account and it won’t cost you anything. All I request of you is, even though this is a contentious issue, please be respectful to Mr. Pudup and the rest of those posting. This is a great opportunity to directly address a representative of the ACLU on the issue of their attempts to banish God from the public square.
All POW-MIA
3 responses so far ↓
1 phantomlord // Nov 18, 2007 at 1:58 pm
George Washington was sworn into office as our first President on a Masonic bible. Both houses of Congress have their own Chaplains whom have opened each session with a prayer since 1789. The Supreme Court has the Ten Commandments, held by Moses and written in Hebrew, as well as a depiction of Mohammad inscribed in it’s frieze.
Certainly nobody knows the intent of the First Amendment better than those who created it. If they had intended the government and the public square to be free FROM religion, don’t you think they would have ditched the chaplains and bibles?
2 Billzfan // Nov 18, 2007 at 10:50 pm
This topic created a major dispute on the D&C forums. The ACLU and atheists jumped all over it claiming that religion has to be forbidden from any public place. This goes against our own American history and definitely against the founders of our nation.
3 rochester_veteran // Nov 19, 2007 at 11:12 am
Billzfan,
Yeah, we both posted to that discussion on the Forum. It was one of the longest running discussions that I’ve seen on there.
As phantomlord stated in his comment, the relationship between religious faith, prayer and government are intertwined. The First Amendment guarantees freedom *of* religion. I don’t know about anyone else here, but I’m a whole person. My Christian-Catholic faith is a major part of me and my beliefs and I do not check my faith at the town hall door. I’m not suggesting that the US becomes a theocracy, however; to ban the expression of faith from the town square is “prohibiting the free exercise thereof” and a violation of the First Amenment.
I hope the Town of Greece fights this to the end! I have a feeling that their case, if it made it to the Supreme Court, would overturn years of anti-faith court rulings and redefine the role of faith, not only in government, but in daily life. We shouldn’t be ashamed of our faith nor should we be stifled from mentioning and honoring it in the town square!
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