The Pendragon's Hall

There might be a silver lining to the whole separation of church and state scheme liberals keep pushing...if they were completely consistent anyway, which they never are. If the church is not allowed to have some kind of say in public policy, then the state has no right to dictate to the church what its own internal policies shall be. If the church refuses to marry gays, the state cannot force them to do so without violating the imaginary separation. If the church does not want to ordain women, the state cannot force them to do so. It might almost be worth giving up the Ten Commandments in courtrooms and the possibility of an objective teaching of evolution in public schools if liberals would agree to leave Christians alone in the way they run their own affairs. Unfortunately, this won't happen and that is because the whole idea of an absolute "separation of church and state" is an impossibility without one destroying the other. If they must be absolutely separated, then they can, at no time, come in contact with one another. The moment the church speaks out on public policy, the principle is violated; the moment the state forces the church to comply against her will with some element of the state "religion" (which is really all liberalism is in the long run), the principle is violated. We hear a lot about not forcing religious beliefs into secular arenas. Maybe conservatives should respond, instead of getting huffy, with the following deal: We will take down the crosses and sand blast off the Ten Commandments, but in return we demand complete and total autonomy to live our lives according to our beliefs. Such an agreement of course will never happen; Christians are rightly reluctant to give up our rights to share our faith and liberals will never agree to a world where people live in complete personal freedom. But it is a charming idea.