She isn't going to treat me differently either way, so why does it matter. Of course she wishes I was a Muslim. She thinks her religion is right.
It's a great video that explains it better than I ever could, so give it a look when you get home (I'm in the same boat as you), but basically atheism is the lack of a belief. Not a belief of lacking.
Actually you're taking his comments two, maybe three steps farther than you should. If I were you, I'd re-read, with a focus on comprehension and limiting your assumptions.
Maybe what he might have said before or after the quotes? The Sherrod screwjob is the perfect example of why we shouldn't be so quick to draw conclusions from quotes without knowing what might have been said immediately before or after the quotes. In other words, context. I mean, we already have people in this thread assuming he's going to try and convert the entire state to Christianity. LOL.
Do you have an example? I mean Sherrod's was cut and dried: "I was a racist...but...." as the subsequent videotape showed, and as she described. Here we don't really have anything that suggests he preceded it with "I love all religions equally and won't religiously govern blah blah" (or if that would have actually made a difference) - by all accounts it was the opposite type of speech, rather than some sort of inter-faith ecumenical thing.
If my friend said "I wish you were Muslim, because we're not sisters right now but could be if you converted," it would actually make me pretty uncomfortable. Kind of rude, honestly...just something most tactful people keep to themselves. Like I said, I understand what he meant (coming from a Christian background), but I think he chose his words without any thought involved.
Oh, nothing. Except for that little nugget in the Constitution about separation of church and state, or not showing a clear bias toward a sector of the community, or just looking like a bigot generally.
I see what you are saying, but at some level you know they think or have thought that before so... I agree he obviously didn't put any thought into it because this reaction is not hard to predict.
I'm confused, in the section labeled "Separation of Church and State" in the Constitution, what does it say about elected officials holding and espousing religious views without legislating based on them? Also, please point me to the articles regarding this man's "clear bias" being displayed in governance. Or his bigotry. Thanks in advance. I went ahead and pulled the "little nugget" so you could point me to the text that seems to say this man did something wrong:
You don't believe your Christian friends wish you were Christian? You either don't have Christian friends or you think lowly enough of them to consider them hypocrites.
No, I hope they don't look at me and think "non-Christian" or think we are somehow not equal or different because of something immaterial like religious faith.
Does everyone have to be his spiritual brother and sister? Do you wish to be his spiritual brother? I prefer keeping the relationship as it stands.
Nothing illegal about any of that.......he can be whatever he wants and the public can vote him in or out based upon their own criteria. DD
If he said "people who are not of European descent are not my brothers but I wish they were" would that be ok? He isn't overtly excluding them or oppressing them he is just letting them know (as he takes the highest public office of the state) that he does not consider them to be his brothers. Brothers, by the way is often used as a term to describe an equal or to express camaraderie. Again, he is free to say what he wants but this was a move that wreaks of several forms of ignorance.
Well, he was speaking in a church, not the steps of the State Capital. I mean really, from that entire speech, we have 2 sentences to judge. Wouldn't it be easier to assess what he meant by reading a transcript of the entire speech? But no, Yahoo decided to take those 2 sentences and roll with the headline NEW ALABAMA GOV: JUST CHRISTIANS ARE HIS FAMILY. And of course, everyone is running with it. Agree 100%. But it doesn't automatically mean he's going to start implementing a Christians-only agenda as some in here seem to conclude based on those 2 sentences.
