Romney made his big "Kennedy" speech yesterday. It was supposed to convince voters that it doesn't matter that he's a Mormon. I doubt that he succeeded, but I really don't care about his Mormonism. One christian cult is the same as another to me.
What bothered me was something else he threw in the speech to appeal to the right-wing religious nuts. I'm sure it sounded good to the very religious, but it made absolutely no sense to me. Here is what he said:
"Freedom requires religion, just as religion requires freedom. Freedom opens the windows of the soul so that man can discover his most profound beliefs and commune with God. Freedom and religion endure together, or perish alone."
I can understand the "religion requires freedom" part, especially if you have a religion different from the majority. History is rife with instances of the majority trying to force everyone to worship as they do. Without freedom, a minor religion may not even be allowed to exist.
But the "freedom requires religion" part is just so much happy horse crap. Does he truly believe you cannot have a free society without believing in some religious myth? Does he really believe that atheists and agnostics cannot believe in and practice the ideals of a free society?
A truly free society must allow the belief in religious myths, but it must also allow others to not believe in those myths. Those who believe in a god or gods are no more capable of embracing the principles of freedom than those who don't. In fact, the ability to reason is far more important to freedom than faith in a religion.
I know he probably just said it to appeal to the religious majority, but it's still a ridiculous and nonsensical statement.
My guess is that Romney's speech writers must have thought that there was a certain literary symmetry in the phrase, "Freedom requires religion, just as religion requires freedom." The words "religion" and "freedom" were probably poll-tested, too.
ReplyDeleteThat's what you get for your money when you spend $7 million to win Iowa (as opposed to Huckabee's $300,000). And Romney's the one that's supposed to be this savvy businessman. Ever heard of Return on Investment, Mitt?
I even have my doubts about the phrase that "religion requires freedom." I guess it's true if you mean religion qua organized religion with all its trappings (big buildings; ostentatious ceremonies; large, well-paid staffs; etc.).
But if you mean religion qua deep-seeded faith, look at the Israelites in Egypt under the Pharoah, the early Christians in the Roman Empire, and more recently the Underground Church behind the Iron Curtain and the Tibetan Buddhists under the Chinese Communists. Compare these examples to our country, where religious observance is broader, but at the same time a lot shallower among many of the faithful.
Don't get me wrong; I'm not advocating the repeal of the Free Exercise clause of the First Amendment. My point is that religion often thrives more in the crucible of oppression than in the cocoon of freedom.
I was speaking of organized religion, but you do have a valid point.
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