Thank you ACLU for Maintaining the Division Between Church and State

I recently had the opportunity to respond to an e-mail that suggested that it was appropriate to bombard the American Civil Liberties Union with Christmas cards to clog up their operation. It was a mean spirited suggestion by those to clearly do not understand what is the mission of the ACLU. My responses are as follows:

Nice - clearly someone does NOT understand the ACLU. You can send all the religious cards you want - that is precisely the point about a country in which the government does not endorse any particular religion. That is also what the ACLU is trying to protect. Do you want a country (much like Spain under Franco) that a specific religion, in fact a specific branch, sect or denomination dictates policy and personal expression of religious belief? If you want to have prayer in the school then send your children to a school run by the religion of your choice - that is your choice. And no one, not the ACLU or anyone else will keep you educating your children or practicing your religion as you see fit.

However, when it an arena, that is sanctioned by the government (and paid for by all our tax dollars) that is different matter. The religion must keep out of the government and government must keep out of the religion. Therefore, no religion in publicly funded schools.

Why is it so important to keep the division? Our founding fathers had been ruled under a system where there was no separation of church and state. Recall that the King of England was also the titular head of the Church of England. Our founders felt strongly that both the state and religious organizations would benefit from the separation. The church would be free from the corruption of politics (Jefferson's words) and the state would not become a tool for religious intolerance and repression. Madison felt so strongly about the separation that as a senator he voted against the creation of a Senate Chaplaincy. Trust me, it was no accident that one of the first acts of Adolph Hitler assume power was to enact a law creating a state religion (note that there was none under the Wiemar Republic).

Yes, go ahead and send the ACLU a Christmas card if you send with the holiday spirit of goodwill. They are not a government agency and the Christians there will appreciate that you thought about them. Better yet, include a donation. Myself, I will send them a card as well with the renewal of our membership to thank them their service for keeping our Constitution strong and protecting the Bill of Rights.