I was utterly amazed to find the following on the AP Intl. Wire just now. In America the battle rages on over separation of church and state, even down to whether individual children are permitted to pray quietly by themselves in a reflective moment! Yet here is the International Big Brother FUNDING Iraqi Muslims trips to the hajj!!!

http://www.newsday.com/ap/rnmpin0d.htm

-- Elaine Seavey (Gods1sheep@aol.com), February 29, 2000

Answers

Your point is??? The United Nations is not the United States. Separation of church and state is a concept of THIS country and a few others. Belief in the greater wisdom of mankind's creator is more important to the MAJORITY of nations on this planet. There is no huge debate in England whether there should be prayer in school. Where in the UN Charter do you find separation of church and state? IT SOUNDS LIKE YOU"RE JEALOUS!!

-- Uriah Gardner (abumaryum@yahoo.com), February 29, 2000.

where in the constitution do you find separation of church and state, uriah?

-- (-@-.-), February 29, 2000.

Uriah, if the people of each nation who pay taxes support the UN, it should be under the same guiding principles as any of the nations who support it. I think that it is obvious what my annoyance is at this funding by the UN of a religious pilgrimage. It isn't jealousy to say that they should not be doing this for one religious group over all others: it is principle, Uriah.

Where did you come from so suddenly and start with such an attack?

-- Elaine Seavey (Gods1sheep@aol.com), February 29, 2000.

Well put, Elaine; it's a double-standard. If it's illegal for my tax money to help pay for my child's education because it takes place in a church-sponsored school, if it's illegal for tax money to support programs to help the needy that happen to be based in churches, then it should be illegal for my tax money to finance Iraqi Muslim religious pilgrimages.

-- Markus Archus (apxov@mail.com), February 29, 2000.

"if the people of each nation who pay taxes support the UN, it should be under the same guiding principles as any of the nations who support it".

Two rebuttles: 1) Since there are hundreds of separate nations participating at the UN there are likely to be numerous guiding principles that will differ between the various nations.

2) The USA has NOT been paying it's UN fees (what is it - an estimated billion $ in arrears?). I would think this should mean Americans have little right to complain how the money is spent...

-- Guido (Guido@debtcollector.com), February 29, 2000.

Markus:

We sent all five of our children to a Christian school and still paid our taxes in our community. All we got out of that was drivers' ed for three children. (The younger two decided they'd prefer private lessons.)

I could never understand why the leaders of the Christian Ed movement and we parents who were paying all those tax dollars never made a real big deal of the fact that we didn't want anyone else's money to go to our schools; we wanted OUR money to go to the schools of our choice.

Now that there are other, more secular reasons for school choice, I think it would be a good time to drive that idea home.

Separation of Church and State was adopted, I believe, after a Baptist minister, Roger Williams, encouraged its adoption; its intent was to protect the church from advocates of a state church, if I'm remembering my history correctly, not to protect the state from the church.

-- Connie (hive@gte.net), February 29, 2000.

Much Ado About Nothing. Exactly when did we catch up our UN dues?

All countries believe in a divine creator of some sort, or a higher power, so what is the problem? Even Jesus said something similar to this: Other sheep I have that are not of this fold.

-- gilda (jess@listbot.com), February 29, 2000.

"All we got out of that was drivers' ed for three children."

How did you drivers' ed? We never got that. All we've gotten for our tax dollars is bus transporation, if we want our kids to leave 90 minutes early for a school that's ten minutes away. And for that, public school parents call us "freeloaders," always demanding "freebies" from the school district.

-- Markus Archus (apxov@mail.com), February 29, 2000.

I all in favor of anyone sending their children to private school, Christian or secular, that chooses to do so. I'm also in favor of them paying for it.

Two of my neices send they kids to private secular schools and they pay plenty. Another neice sends hers to public school. I asked one of them if it bothered her to pay for schooling. She said, "No, you pay your money, you take your choice." No bitching about school taxes for public schools either.

-- gilda (jess@listbot.com), February 29, 2000.

ES,

Are you suggesting that the UN should follow all the laws of each member country? Before saying 'yes', think for just a moment about how difficult it is to follow the laws just in the USA.

BTW, I cannot for the life of me imagine how anyone can forbid individual children to 'pray quietly by themselves in a reflective moment.' Even if possible, it is not the position of any state or the federal government.

-- Bugeye (new@lurker.com), February 29, 2000.

Bugeye, and others who are asking the same question: I believe that the UN has ABSOLUTELY NO BUSINESS in funding the religious life/pilgrimages of ANY particular faith in the entire world. And if they do it for one, then by PRINCIPLE they should do it for all. Can you see them paying for us paycheck-to-paycheck American Christians to take a pilgrimage to the Holy Land? How about the devout Bhuddists who would love to meet the Dalai Lama? What about Jews who wish to visit their spiritual roots in Israel? What about people with roots in Africa who might wish to visit the shrines of their ancestor's worship? On and on I could go, until it became farcical.

What I am stating simply and clearly, and which I thought would require no further word from me after the original posting, since it would appear so obvious, is that the dues of ALL nations (even ours in arrears...we DO house the UN and give them rights to all our natural preserves, albeit the general population has not been asked if WE wish to give them that!) should NOT be being used by a quasi- international-political group to fund the religious activities of ANY religious group on the planet.

I am a deeply committed Christian, and I would not dream of asking this big NWO-precursor to sponsor/fund anything whatever of my spiritual life. It just is not what it is all about. It smacks of something under the rock. I cannot believe it is altruism.

If they wish to spend the money, why not on food to the starving masses around the world? Medicine? Et cetera. Yes, yes, I know they do that also. The point is: NO money should be diverted to making one religious group happy. That ought not to be the province of any such body.

-- Elaine Seavey (Gods1sheep@aol.com), February 29, 2000.

Gods First,

Your link does not lead to any article backing up your claims. I could find no story indicating the UN had payed for any trips. In fact, this link seems to imply the opposite of your contention:

http://www.newsday.com/ap/international/ap628.htm

Could you perhaps provide a good link?

Inquiringly,

-- Uhhmmm... (JFCP81A@aol.com), February 29, 2000.

Elaine, I hate to tell you this but when Shrubya dealt out those block grant funds to the religious groups to implement "reform", church and state separation was dead, at least in Texas.

Rest of y'all- heads up!

-- little wifey (littlewifey@home.com), February 29, 2000.

Seperation of Church and State is NOT in the Constitution!!!!!!

-- sniffles (sniffles@aol.com), February 29, 2000.

IMO, To the extent that the church is the path to power, the church will be led by those who love power. Do you think they will also be those who most love Christ?

It is good for individual Christians to influence their country, socially, politically, whatever. But it is good for churches to "not be paths to power."

I also agree that NO money should go to the UN for religious purposes, if that is what happened.

-- S. Kohl (kohl@hcpd.com), March 01, 2000.

From: Y2K, ` la Carte by Dancr (pic), near Monterey, California

I think perhaps the URL got broken there's no reference to UN or United Nations or "pilgr", there. So, the next comments are made having not read this article.

I agree. The UN should not be sponsoring roadtrips for the religious. The United States does a pretty good job of maintaining an arms length from the church, compared to the situation in many parts of the world. The best way to influence the United Nations to aspire to this same standard is to speak out against it, and act locally to reaffirm the principle in our daily lives. By serving as a shining example for freedom of thought, we may hope to attract other countries to follow in a similar direction.

Connie, I can see where you're coming from. You don't feel your family should be required to pay taxes to support government schools, when your own children don't go there. Think how I felt quite similarly more than a decade ago, when I not only didn't send my kids to public school, but I didn't even HAVE kids! Then, I convinced myself that it was in my own best interests if all of the children in my area would become well educated, and so I convinced myself that I should not complain about paying taxes to support schooling.

Since then, though, I've become convinced that not only are government schools a service that my family will probably not use, but also that compulsory attendance harms the people who pass through the system, on balance. I would much rather see that incredible mountain of public funding go toward structural improvments to parks, well equipped internet connected libraries, free books, science museums, chess houses, experimental rocket launching pads, crop gardens, and a wide variety of volunteer projects where practical skills can be learned in hands on work with involved professionals.

You said: ...[the] intent [of the concept of separation of church and state] was to protect the church from advocates of a state church...not to protect the state from the church. I believe the intent was to protect the people from a churchstate.

-- Dancr (addy.available@my.webpage), March 01, 2000.

Don't worry, guys. The One World Religion will be here soon, to go along with the global economy-in-process and the global government-in- the-works. Just snuggle up next to the shaman or the wiccan or the gaian and have a good ol' hootenanny time. Remember that Lennon song and just imagine there's no hell below you (you wouldn't go there even if there was, right?) and that there really was no such person as Jesus (not as if he mattered anyway) and god is whatever you want it to be. After all, YOU'RE in control.

Heck, you won't even have to be concerned with outdated notions like freedom, income, national soverignty, representative government, Constitutional rights and such tiresome old fashioned fuddy duddy notions as those. You're going to be MODERN now, it's the 21st Century after all. You too will be a happy serf in the new global feudalism, with the wealth provided you by the golbal economy and the glowing spiritual comfort that the Whore of Babylon will provide. Won't that be FUN? Boy, I can hardly WAIT.

Just remember the new motto: PRODUCE. CONSUME. OBEY. Simple, isn't it?

LPL ====================================================================

United Religions Initiative SM

http://www.united-religions.org

Toward June 2000

This June a truly global United Religions Initiative will be chartered to perpetuate the spirit and action of the 72 Hours. The URI welcomes people of all religions, spiritual expressions, and indigenous traditions to join in seeking a common ground of shared spiritual values and cooperative action for a better world.

Read news from around the world in the URI Update.

We invite you to inquire about how you or your organization might become part of URI and continue walking the path of peace-building as part of this growing global community. Read the Charter, especially the Preamble, Purpose and Principles. See if your values are expressed here. If you have questions or would like to find out more, send us a message.

URI History

To learn more about URI and how the initiative began, read Bishop Swing's book. To find out more go to our Resources section.

The Coming United Religions, by William E. Swing. Published December 1998 by CoNexus Press and the United Religions Initiative.

-- Lee (lplapinXOUT@hotmail.com), March 01, 2000.

Gilda:

My point was that pulic school advocates continually say that we want THEIR tax dollars, when in reality, we want OUR OWN tax dollars to go to OUR SCHOOLS.

Our tax dollars are paying for your childrens' and grandchildrens' educations. Then we DO make the choice to spend a lot more of our dollars so that our children will be spared the godless pap of the public schools.

Also, the reason we haven't paid our dues to the U.N. is because they want to use it to fund abortions around the world. The billion dollar gift that Ted Turner gave to the U.N. is to fund 'Family Planning' and abortions.

Now, I hear that Jane Fonda has become a Christian. (Praise God!) I wonder if, after she discovers what God has to say on the subject, whether she'll renounce the position she's held all these years.

Dancr:

I always agreed that the public schools were providing a service that was beneficial to the whole community and NEVER voted against a school tax issue. I never voted FOR one, either, though.

Now, however, I believe the public schools are actually evil and wouldn't care if they were shut down. When you can't discuss the true personality of God for six hours a day, you know the organization is not benign.

Some years ago, when a school bond issue was in the news, the local Catholic High School administrators stated very forcefully that if it didn't pass, they would close their 800 student high school, and 'dump' those students into the public system. It didn't and they did.

If you want to check on the facts of that, it was O'Rafferty High School in Lansing, MI, and it was sometime in the 80s, I believe. I was completely sympathetic to their position, even though our school would never have done that just for financial reasons.

Also, I happen to know a few of the details of the adopting of the Separation of Church and State, because my mother loved the concept, and taught us about it, because the Baptists (Roger Williams) were proponents of it. It was to protect the church from the state-church concept, from which the founding fathers had freed themselves, not too many years previously. Roger Williams was a Baptist minister, and a devout Christian.

It has come to be perceived as to protect unbelievers from believers, but that was not the original idea.

LPL:

I can see your point.

-- Connie (hive@gte. net), March 02, 2000.