Thread: Britain adopts Islamic law...

Originally Posted by graves

Why? Because as much as you like to toot the horn of "Separation of Church and State", quite frankly, it doesn't exist.

Separation of Church and State is kind of a clusterfuck. The original intention, though not clearly defined in the constitution, was to keep the church and the government institutionally separate. The feds don't regulate belief, and the ministers don't make laws. In England the two were one in the same, and several millions of people were tortured/killed/exiled as a direct result. America decided to go the other way on that one. All relevant documents were penned in a time and place where about 100% of citizens were deeply religions or faking it very well, with the vast majority belonging to some form of Judeo-Christian church. Judges were still supposed to view the accused through a glass of christian morals, which range from the common sense (don't steal shit, don't kill people) to the old-school (no working on the sabbath, no gay marriage) to the somewhat confusing (don't cook a goat in its mother's milk, all that stuff about the unleavened bread.) In 1800, this was a perfectly good way to regulate American society, and by "perfectly good" I mean "practically speaking, it worked out well enough." In 2008, that shit don't fly because not everybody goes to the same place on Sundays, or for that matter even on Sundays or at all. For this reason, the phrasing "Separation of Church and State" has been interpreted very literally, meaning if I go to court over my neighbor doing TPS reports on Sunday, the judge isn't going to call him a heathen and let me walk. Modern-day American Christians are rather more liberal than their ancestors even one generation previous, so this works out fine.

To put it a different way, America's population has mellowed out on punishing people for indiscretions that are only valid in a given religion. There are places where this is not true, and separation of church and state is not something you hear in those places. It is therefore surprising that England (whose people, in modern times, are pretty much like Americans in this context) has the aforementioned sharia court, but according to the article it wasn't created by the government, it was allowed for due to phrasing in their legal code.

Originally Posted by ebaconjr

Yah, like that Pentacostal background Palin. Are Pentacostals the ones that are judged by rattlesnakes?

Judge: Uh, you got caught shoplifting a Snickers bar. Now the Snickers bar is in a box with a rattlesnake. Reach into the box and manifest the Snickers bar into your life again so that ye may be judged! AMEN Brothuh! LOL.

heyheyhey...be careful, I was raised a non-UPC Pentecostal...
UPC = United Pentecostal Church....they're the weirdos who can't wear jewelry, makeup, and only wear very modest clothing...

Pentecostals really aren't TOO weird...they can live in American society just fine. They don't care what other people do, and only like to worry about how they live their own lives.....the strictest of them won't watch TV or anything.

They also do some weird stuff like speaking in tongues....the whole "being overtaken by the Holy Spirit" type stuff...I personally never did any of that, lol.

Speaking in tongues? Sorry. Let me try again.

Judge: Uh, bloom huag nytre mum poop ujlpo awer wadfer gok! LOL.

I see how that provides a notice function. Just messing around.

Pentecost sprang from the evangelical movement of the 1800's....VERY VERY spirited services and yeah, fire and brimstone preaching :-P

I personally don't support the UPC stuff...and don't like the whole speaking in tongues thing, it's a bit much for me....