Pagan rights
This message was posted in my UU congregation's listserv today. The Chronicle of Higher Education published a short article in its news blog yesterday, [Pagan Students Find a Haven at Marshall U. I find the responses quite interesting, as one writer called the author on the carpet for sarcasm and others attempted to educate one another.
The comments were indeed interesting.
It's great that the Pagan faiths are finally being acknowledged as religions, and freedom of religion is being extended to them. The Army accepts Wicca as a valid religion, and at long last the VA recently did too, albeit not without a fight.
Poor fundamentalists ... they just don't get it that freedom of religion means ALL religions. All the same religious rights they want as Christians must be extended to everyone, regardless of whether the fundies consider someone's beliefs a valid religion or not. (Personally, I don't consider Sc**nt*l*gy1 a religion at all, let alone a valid one, but they claim it is, and as much as it pains me, they have a right to freedom of religion too.)
It's only fairly recently that schools began closing for the Jewish high holy days, and they probably still don't in many areas. Why can't Christians understand that if they want recognition for their holidays, symbols, and so on, then everybody else needs to have the same rights?2 The Christian extremists' ludicrous claim that saying "Happy holidays" is an attack on Christmas tramples on my freedom of religion. If store clerks are expected to wish Christians "Merry Christmas," they should be required to give each customer the appropriate greeting -- which is why I call the fundies' outrage ludicrous.
Every action like Marshall University's is a nail in the coffin of Christian hegemony. I didn't start this post to be a diatribe, I intended it as a celebration. But the fundies are going to be aghast at this, so I'm going to leave that in here.
1Name munged because they troll the web aggressively for mentions of it, and their written doctrine states that critics are "Fair game. May be deprived of property or injured by any means by any Sc**nt*l*g*st without any discipline of the Sc**nt*l*g*st. May be tricked, sued or lied to or destroyed." Frankly, yes, I am afraid of them.
2That's a rhetorical question. I already know the answer.
The comments were indeed interesting.
It's great that the Pagan faiths are finally being acknowledged as religions, and freedom of religion is being extended to them. The Army accepts Wicca as a valid religion, and at long last the VA recently did too, albeit not without a fight.
Poor fundamentalists ... they just don't get it that freedom of religion means ALL religions. All the same religious rights they want as Christians must be extended to everyone, regardless of whether the fundies consider someone's beliefs a valid religion or not. (Personally, I don't consider Sc**nt*l*gy1 a religion at all, let alone a valid one, but they claim it is, and as much as it pains me, they have a right to freedom of religion too.)
It's only fairly recently that schools began closing for the Jewish high holy days, and they probably still don't in many areas. Why can't Christians understand that if they want recognition for their holidays, symbols, and so on, then everybody else needs to have the same rights?2 The Christian extremists' ludicrous claim that saying "Happy holidays" is an attack on Christmas tramples on my freedom of religion. If store clerks are expected to wish Christians "Merry Christmas," they should be required to give each customer the appropriate greeting -- which is why I call the fundies' outrage ludicrous.
Every action like Marshall University's is a nail in the coffin of Christian hegemony. I didn't start this post to be a diatribe, I intended it as a celebration. But the fundies are going to be aghast at this, so I'm going to leave that in here.
1Name munged because they troll the web aggressively for mentions of it, and their written doctrine states that critics are "Fair game. May be deprived of property or injured by any means by any Sc**nt*l*g*st without any discipline of the Sc**nt*l*g*st. May be tricked, sued or lied to or destroyed." Frankly, yes, I am afraid of them.
2That's a rhetorical question. I already know the answer.