BE:
-Are  you  suggesting  here  that  the  American  constitution  has
-nothing  to  say  here?
>No.
>
>In  the  courts such an action against a well established religion
>will fail simply because the judge/jury would view it  as  a  free
>choice.  Not that difficult to do if that judge/jury are primarily
>theists.
>
>Perhaps  if he had an atheist judge/jury the court would then rule
>in favor of him based on some other clause in the constitution.
Well, to make this argument  at  least  credible,  you'd  have  to
suggest  one.   If  you're  saying that the courts just make it up
as they  go,  you're  implying  the  Constitution  doesn't  really
matter, contrary to your "No" response above.
>Y'see, in the court system it is all a matter of  what  judge/jury
>you get and what lawyer you have.  The constitution fights itself,
>and  in  a  case  such  as  this  it  all  falls  down to what the
>judge/jury decides
In  a  case  like  Rigor's  the jury would be involved only at the
trial level, and he would almost certainly have to open  his  case
in  a  state  court, since a federal district court would probably
rule that it did not have original jurisdiction to handle  a  suit
about   torts.    Remember  Rigor's  suit  seeks  damages  against
churches for circulating  the  idea  of  perfection.   This  is  a
tort case.
But all the significant action on his suit would have  nothing  to
do  with  the jury, since it would be at the appellate level.  The
arguments would be solely about the Constitution.
>- and take a  wild  guess  what  that  decision
>would  be  if  the  judge and jury are primarily theists who would
>likely feel that their faith is being tested or is  in  danger  in
>some  way.   Still  not convinced?  What would a theist believe is
>more important, faith in "God" or faith in the constitution?
You're  still  confining  your  argument  to the trial level.  But
okay, even at the trial level there would be jury selection.   And
counsel  for  the  respondent Church would almost certainly strike
out any candidate who  was  an  atheist,  while  counsel  for  the
applicant would eliminate all the candidates who were theists.
The  only  jurors  would  would  survive  jury  selection would be
agnostics or positivists.
BE:
-Your  notion  that  religions  are  "too
-powerful" suggests that the result  would  be  different  if  they
-were  not  so  powerful--say, if all the judges were atheists, and
-religions  existed  only  in  the  backwoods.
>WOW!  Nice loading of the deck here!   But,  yes
>it does suggest that.
BE:
-I really doubt that the  unwinnable  nature  of  Rigor's  proposed
-lawsuit  has  anything  to  do  with  the  power  distribution  of
-religious and non-religious groups.
>Explain why you doubt this.  I have explained why I do not doubt it.
See below
BE:
-Although it is true  that  the  Free  Exercise  and  Establishment
-clauses of the Constitution were originally put there by Baptists,
-Methodists  and  American Protestant Episcopalians, I really doubt
-that, all other things being equal, those clauses would have  read
-any  differently  if  they  had  been put into the Constitution by
-atheists and agnostics.
>Explain why.
Suppose all Americans in 1787-1789 were atheists  (in  the  narrow
dictionary sense: an atheist is a person who believes that gods do
not exist, or who denies the existence of gods).
Based on psychologically credible  assumptions,  what  would  they
prefer  on  the  subject  of religion in the Constitution?  First,
they would not want any reference to religion in the main body  of
the  Constitution.   In fact, there is no actual such reference in
it, so there is no difference there.
Second,  they  would  be  opposed  to  any  government  effort  to
establish religion.   Therefore,  they  would  advocate  a  clause
denying   to   government   power   to  make  laws  respecting  an
establishment of religion.  Such a clause already  exists  in  the
Constitution.  No difference there, either.
Continued ...
--- PCBoard (R) v15.3 (OS/2) 5
---------------