Something to Consider, Part 1

This will be my first blog in a series of discussions of politics and religion. My goal is to examine how Judeo-Christianity has interacted with government in the past, and how it should in the future with the US government.

First, my disclaimer: The views expressed in this blog are my own. They do not represent the views of any one faith, creed, church, denomination, sect, religion, etc. I hope to keep this blog as objective as possible, but with religion, I believe, for most people, it can be subjective. While I hold strong to my beliefs, I still try to remain objective in my blogs.

Current Events

In the last 6 months, President Barack Obama has stated he supports gay marriage. Washington and Maryland voted in favor of allowing same-sex couples to marry (being 2 of 8 states that now allow same-sex couples to marry), while Governor Christie vetoed a bill that sought to change the definition of marriage. And this month, a federal district court in Massachusetts ruled that the "Defense of Marriage Act" or DOMA is unconstitutional.

With the passing of the Affordable Health Care Act, President Obama asked all organizations to agree that birth control be available to any employee who requested it. This request stirred up controversy with traditional Roman Catholic churches as well as Protestants who believe birth control is contrary to God's law to "be fruitful and multiply" and that God alone is the decider of when a woman becomes pregnant. And yet, churches, vary in their beliefs when it comes to pregnancies caused by rape or incest.

And, with pregnancy comes the Roe vs Wade decision which literally split the nation and created the labels "pro-life" and "pro-choice". Interestingly, the two labels are not complements of one another. One would assume that "pro-choice" would counter "pro-chosen" or "pre-destined". Accordingly, with "pro-life", why isn't there "pro-death"? My opinion is that neither group would want to be an antonym of the other. Further, both those who are "pro-choice" and "pro-life" offer women choices (adoption, parenting, abortion); though pro-choice may lean a little more toward abortion given certain situations and pro-life would never consider abortion as a woman's choice.  Likewise, who would want to be considered pro–death? Perhaps the most radical pro-lifers would label their opponents as such, but consider the protections in place that limit abortions to before the third trimester in many states or if unborn baby dies as a result of another's assault or accident, that unborn's death is considered a homicide.

Something to Consider

So, with these three issues - gay marriage, birth control, and abortion - which the majority of Americans (in the United States) believe should be legislated by one's beliefs, who should we rely upon as the ultimate source of law- religion or utilitarianism?

There are two things to consider here: - first, of course is the first amendment which affords Americans with the right to worship as they see fit and second, our nation is currently made up of people of all nationalities and several faiths, both in religion and denomination.

So, let's first look at my second consideration in my next blog. I will address the first amendment in my last blog.