User:KaylaAndrew

Separation of Church and State
Thomas Jefferson once said that there is “a wall of separation between church and state.” This quote has been a popular and controversial topic of discussion with regard to the meaning. We think that it means that the government shouldn’t force a religion onto the people. We believe that the word “church” in the quote refers to religion in general and that the word “state” refers to government. So that means to us, that Thomas Jefferson was saying that the affairs of the church should not be affiliated with the government at all. Even though the government has tried to have a distinct separation between church and state, there have still been some instances where it has seemed that the government has endorsed a certain religion. For example, when the words “under God” were entered into the Pledge of Allegiance, it seemed as though the government was supportive of Christianity, but not any other religion. As another example, during George W. Bush’s term as the governor of Texas, he decided to use tax dollars to help fund churches because he thought that they could do social services better then the state. But that seemed like Mr. Bush was giving funding to Christianity based organizations rather than other religious organizations or organizations that were not religious based. This would suggest that the state government was favoring Christianity over any other religion, and also that they were willing to hand some power over to the church, which is not acceptable according to the Constitution (Establishment Clause of the First Amendment). But even we these small instances, we are still very lucky to have the type of separation that we do. Other governments do support a certain type of religion and sometimes even force it on their people.

The Pakistani constitution establishes Islam as the official religion of the state. It also give the responsibility of protecting this religion to the government. The constitution creates many laws to help the government protect Islam. Article 295-C forbids defaming the prophet Muhammad. Article 295C also states the the punishment for this crime is death. In Pakistan you can be sentenced to jail or even death for believing in something. This is why we believe in separation of church and state, the government has no right to control the beliefs of the people. The government is made by the people for the people, not for any one belief.

We believe that separation of church and state is needed for there to be a free country. When a country begins to endorse a certain religion, the people become pressured to practice it, therefore, the country is no longer free because it forces someone to practice a religion they may not believe in.

'Please feel free to comment about your views on this topic!!'