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Politics : View from the Center and Left -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: JohnM who wrote (37813)	5/24/2007 2:27:48 PM
From: epicure	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 542131

If secular life is perceived as an "attack" on religion it can strengthen it, in that perverse way "attacks" (or perceived attacks) strengthen something- giving people a nucleus of anger to band together around. I think it is that reaction which relates to your US example. I think secularism by definition weakens the kind of religiosity that wishes to impose itself in the public square, for everyone other than the people who rise up in anger trying to inflict their religion on everyone else- and those people are actually strengthened- this is a religiosity that some Christians, Jews and Muslims experience and they obviously feel they "deserve" a world based on their beliefs- because they feel it is the "correct" way to live (for them and everyone else). For people who believe that the absence of the state in religious matters, or failure of the state to be godminded, is anti-god, then for those people, by definition, secularism "appears" to weaken their religion, the world, their lives- etc- even though it may actually strengthen their movements because the idea energizes their group think. There's a duality there- I hope I expressed it in a way that is understandable. It makes sense to me, but if it seems muddled to anyone reading it, my apologies.