Do Athiests have morals?

[SkepticThinker]

I don't know what he said was impossible or not but it is a terrible grounds for common morality.

Hitler literally thought he was acting on empathy when he decided to exterminate the weak to make the strong even stronger. He used nature as a pattern, he thought if he could remove those who burden mankind and restrict it's advancement then mankind as a whole would become stronger and advance faster.
Now my morality makes what he did inexcusable but it is impossible to show his actions if carried out in this context would not have produced what he claimed. It works in nature, why not for us?

Do you have some of his words to this affect?

 

[Saint Frankenstein]

So we should have 6 billon fiefdoms where each persons opinion or preference about what is empathic, and to who or what we should be empathic towards then. This kind of general theorizing works fine in thought experiments for an individual but it makes a poor foundation for a societies needs.

I have no idea how you got that from my post. The point is that humans naturally have a moral code, as we're a social species. We've evolved to live and function together in groups. So we need to have a basic morality in order for that to work.

 

[ArtieE]

Hitler ... used nature as a pattern, he thought if he could remove those who burden mankind and restrict it's advancement then mankind as a whole would become stronger and advance faster.

Doesn't that sound suspiciously like what your god did when he drowned the whole planet? Are you sure that nature was Hitler's inspiration and not your god?

 

[ArtieE]

So we should have 6 billon fiefdoms where each persons opinion or preference about what is empathic, and to who or what we should be empathic towards then. This kind of general theorizing works fine in thought experiments for an individual but it makes a poor foundation for a societies needs.

Individuals have a survival instinct. A society is a collection of individuals with a survival instinct. A stable safe prosperous society maximizes the chances of well being and survival for the individuals in it. The reason we make laws and regulations is because we want to keep the society stable, safe and prosperous because that enhances the well being and survival chances of the individuals in it.

 

[Koldo]

I don't know what he said was impossible or not but it is a terrible grounds for common morality.

Hitler literally thought he was acting on empathy when he decided to exterminate the weak to make the strong even stronger. He used nature as a pattern, he thought if he could remove those who burden mankind and restrict it's advancement then mankind as a whole would become stronger and advance faster.
Now my morality makes what he did inexcusable but it is impossible to show his actions if carried out in this context would not have produced what he claimed. It works in nature, why not for us?

What do you mean by 'works'?
Even if we take for granted that we would become stronger and advance faster doing that, it doesn't entail that we should go for it.

 

[1robin]

This is what you had said:

“The greatest, most benevolent, the most powerful, the most prosperous, and most advanced nation in human history was founded by a people 95% Christian. It is firmly rooted in Christianity, it has a bible in it's greatest monument's corner stone, scriptures carved into the marble of the capitol building, and it's greatest leaders have openly used Christian fundamentals to resolve the nations greatest difficulties and found it's greatest examples of exceptionalism. This is still largely true even after the secular revolution since the late 50's has begun it's corrosive inevitable effects.”

Snopes obviously isn’t replying directly to the comments 1Robin made. But the claim you had made that there are scriptures carved into the marble of the capitol building, was contained within in. I actually just posted it to help you out since you had said you couldn’t remember which scriptures you were talking about.

Since snopes is primarily used to debunk things I thought was your intended purpose. Regardless I managed to find the verses carved into the capitol and other Washington landmarks. It posted them in here somewhere.

Is “in god we trust” part of scripture?

It is certainly the conclusion of a thousand scriptures but that is not why I posted it. That was not an attempt to show what verses are carved into the government buildings, it was an attempt to show the primary point that I made about our founding heritage being dominated by Christianity.

Apparently those words were added to that podium in 1962. Long after the founding of your country.

That does not change anything. The evidence for our Christian founding has thousands of examples and was apparently so strong it was still having successes even during the secular revolution. I never said that statement was carved during the capitols construction. In fact I did not refer to it at all until you supplied that snopes stuff.

Won’t you also find depictions of Hammurabi, Solon, Gaius, Justinian I and various other historical lawmakers? So could you also conclude that American law is “firmly rooted in” ancient Babylonian history, for example?

I would agree that our legal theories include all manner of influences. However Christianity outstrips them all as our foundation in general. I think what your referring to is the supreme court building which naturally would put prominent law givers on display. I can see what your trying to do, exactly what I said you would. The evidence for our primary foundations being Christian is so over whelming you can't deny it so your attempting to dilute it.

Again, Snopes isn’t responding directly to 1Robin’s claims. It’s a more general discussion surrounding an email that had circulated about Christian symbolism in and around the capitol buildings. You have to pick through it to find your claim(s).

Well they do do that but they tell such a negligible fraction of the whole it alone is not much of a threat to my position, and it even contains evidence for my position, it just appears to be doing what you are and trying to dilute them.

Sounds to me like you’re the one reaching here.

Reaching? I am (even to my surprise) stumbling over evidence for our Christian heritage at every step.

There’s also a painting of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, Discovery of the Mississippi by De Soto, General George Washington Resigning His Commission, and Surrender of General Burgoyne. Seems to me like those are depictions of historical events in your history, not simply “Christian” historical events.

Well no kidding, the Christian painting are about our foundational principles and the rest are about our historical events. Exactly what I would expect.

Didn’t the Pilgrims come to America in search of religious freedom?

Not in the way you mean it. They came to get out from under the corporate state run take over and enforced uniformity of the English church. They wanted more than anything to retain their faith and built societies centered on it but they wanted to practice it in the way they thought best. That is where the law about congress not making laws mandating faith came in. They did not want the state to control the Church, they had Christianity in mind and the way it was universally systematized in England.

You already mentioned these above.

Were any of these things created at the time your country was founded?

Look your trying to kill an argument by a thousand paper cuts. I don't know why your demanding these things all have occurred at the very moment of foundation but I can find plenty that existed within the first let's say 15 presidential terms if you can explain why limiting it in this way is necessary. BTW our founding was long before Washington was constructed and so the form this evidence would come in is personal statement by the early founders and leaders themselves. I can supply them until we are both exhausted.

Everything I have posted is evidence of our core Christian heritage. You can't get rid of them by claiming:
1. They came to late.
2. They came to early.
3. They are not verbatim scripture (though there are some of these).
4. They can only by from this building or that document.
5. They include other scenes as well.
etc......

This just appears desperate. The total amount of evidence is over whelming and greater than any other influence by far.

And? It’s a depiction of important historical figures in US history.

Of course they are, but they contain many Christian specific scenes within them. Who's historical events did you think you would find?

How about the frieze in the Supreme Court building that depicts all kinds of different lawmakers throughout history which includes Mohammad, Draco, Confucius, Menes, Hammurabi, Charlemagne, etc. What do you make of that?

I already answered that, of course a building dedicated to law would include great lawmakers. You will notice I did not use Moses from this building as a religious figure but as a legal figure.

The Prayer Room was opened in 1955. There do appear to be some scriptures found within the room so you’re right about that, however, the Office of the Chaplain of the United States House of Representatives website claims that, “In the design and decoration of the room, it was important that no part of the furnishings and no symbol used would give offense to members of any church.” It also says that at the time the room was established, Members of the House said it was,

“…A lasting monument… to this government of ours which has ever been in the forefront of the fight for human liberties and particularly for the right to worship God in accordance with the dictates of one’s own conscience.

It is my hope that the establishment of the common room will serve not only to symbolize the diversity within unity that characterized the United Sates, but that it will serve also as an instrument for the advancement of understanding, of tolerance, and truth.”

Congressional Prayer Room, Office of the Chaplain

If the Christian heritage of the nation was still this strong after almost 200 years imagine how potent it was in 1780. A note here: If you see early references to diversity in worship it is a Christian intermural diversity, later on it became a more generalized diversity about religion sin general. Something you said reminded me of that so I threw it in here.

The Library of Congress page describes it this way:

“In the Great Hall of the Library of Congress, two monumental Bibles face each other as if in dialogue: one, the Giant Bible of Mainz, signifies the end of the handwritten book—and the other, the Gutenberg Bible, marks the beginning of the printed book and the explosion of knowledge and creativity it would engender. This exhibition explores the significance of the two Bibles, and, through an interactive presentation, the relationship between the Mainz Bible, the Gutenberg Bible, and sixteen selected Bibles from the Library’s collections.”

It goes on to say that the Bibles are surrounded by six murals which are collectively referred to as “The Evolution of the Book.”

Library of Congress Bible Collection | Exhibitions - Library of Congress

Exhibition Overview - Library of Congress Bible Collection | Exhibitions - Library of Congress


So it appears that its significance as far as it is contained within the Library of Congress, actually has to do with the history of the printed word and the transmission of information and knowledge. Makes sense.

Oh holy cow, they could have chosen any of tens of thousands of books. Actually the first book printed in the US was a book on the Psalms alone.

I can’t seem to find a primary source for the Andrew Jackson quote anywhere. Do you have one?

I don't know what you mean by primary but here are some sources.
In God We Trust: America's Historic Sites Reveal her Christian Foundations | Providence Foundation
Homeschoolers Of Wyoming
Sons of Liberty Joins the Global 24 Daily Lineup - Shortwave 9395 kHzShortwave 9395 kHz

This last one has a mountain of additional Christian heritage info in it.
http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=...U01f2sUGqnGqU64t0YuKnZw&bvm=bv.85464276,d.eXY

I assume since the government allowed his words to be carved into their structures they did their homework.

My CPU is bogged down, Continued below:

 

[1robin]

I don’t know what this is here for.

Because it was George Washington's farewell address.

There are apparently some Biblical quotations and references, but there are just as many secular references as well. Focusing on the former while ignoring or downplaying the latter seems to be the problem here.

Are you calling historical events secular?

Is that from scripture?

Part was, part was deduced from scripture.

You do understand that the scriptures carved into buildings was a small part of the primary point that the US had Christianity as it's foundational cornerstone.

This was constructed long after the founding of your country in dedication to a man who was clearly religious in his personal life.

This arbitrary date criteria only strengthen my point.

I don’t see that it’s “drenched in bias.”

I do. It was another attempt to say yeah Christianity is everywhere you look in founding documents, early writing by the founders, all over buildings, all over monuments to our greatest leaders, etc........... but we can water that down or subject it to the death of a thousand arbitrary qualification.

Why ignore all the secular references and depictions?

I have not denied one yet, that you mentioned anyway. But posting a secular event (if you call a historical event secular) is not a foundational issue, it is simply a historical one.

Not to mention that just because some people were religious in their personal lives, doesn’t mean they thought Christianity or any other religion should be forced onto the American people. And I think it’s kind of a shame you feel the way you do, because a lot of people like me, from other countries of the world look fondly upon your country as the only one in existence that was established on secular principles.

That's a straw man, you cannot force actual faith on anyone and no one suggested the US even try. Christians made sure you can think and act as secularly as you wish. You should say thanks, many faiths would have not allowed that.


Since any post which I must provide examples of our Christian heritage will be enormous and since your argument will only be to dilute the impact of that mountain of evidence can we dispense with the examples and just focus on the dilution or the secular examples you mention, for the sake of time. This post was so large I had to break it into, and one which I really start pouring on the examples would take a gig to store it. I think we can both agree that I can post examples of our Christian foundations for quite some time.

 

[1robin]

Because I read a lot. But if you think I'm wrong, please feel free to describe the types of "therapy" the ministries you have dealt with engage in.

Answer or not, it's your choice. But I'm sorry, I can't just let comments like this go without saying anything. That's just me.

I don't care how much you read, unless you have a masters in Christian homosexual ministries (and even if you did) you cannot know that all that is occurring is suppression of the desire in every single case. I know two who claim to no longer even have an attraction to the same sex anymore, and I am sure you could easily find many such statements online.

Since this concerned the ministry aspect I responded but I won't even do so for this issue after this point.

 

[1robin]

Day off from work.

That's funny, I only debate at work.

I can’t watch because it grosses me out. When it came time to dissect frogs in high school I let my partner do most of the work. I had to watch a live dissection of a cow eye in university once, which despite being disgusting was actually extremely interesting and informative.

I don't prefer to watch them but I have literally killed and gutted every things that walks, crawls, or fly's, in my part of the country. After I saw what bullet can do to dear, even though I was a soldier I never wanted to see it's effect on a human. However that seems to be what everyone wants to see these days. Maybe they ought to gut a deer first hand and they would lose the appetite.

But if you can handle it, like your 9 year old relative apparently can, then all the power to you. It’s extremely educational and I think it would do more people some good to learn about how the human body works.

I can't, she can. My point was that since virtually all immorality is actually on TV currently the only place left to sink to is LIVE dissections and XXX porn.

I don’t know how comical it is for a husband to threaten to beat his wife.

Oh come off it, you never joke with your spouse in a physical way? "One of these days pow right to the moon, Alice" is hardly an actual threat. BTW the irony of what a person who supports abortion objects to never ceases to amaze.

I have a feeling that people in the 1950s were just as outraged by movies and programming as some of us are today. It’s all a matter of perspective, I think. If you read up on that Jane Russell movie I mentioned, I think you’ll find that people were completely outraged at the prominent role her breasts played in the movie.

I am sure a few movies did offend back then. My point we have gone so far beyond over exposed mamarys (as Leonardo De crapio once called them) these days we are approaching a terminus. How much lower can TV go? It is never the case that Christian dominated societies are perfect, just that in the US at least they were far better.

I think if we did away with reality shows, we’d all be better off for it. What a waste of time those are.

I agree Housewives or the CIS's of anything should be canceled due to pure redundancy and stupidity.

 

[1robin]

Teen pregnancy rates appear to be much lower in the more secular countries of the world than they are in the US. What do you make of that, in connection with your argument about the immorality of secularism?

I am not familiar enough with those other nations to know.

 

[1robin]

Do you have some of his words to this affect?

Yes, I have given huge lists of them. If you want I can dig up a few again or you can search the forum for them.

 

[1robin]

I have no idea how you got that from my post. The point is that humans naturally have a moral code, as we're a social species. We've evolved to live and function together in groups. So we need to have a basic morality in order for that to work.

The point is that opinions and preferences concerning empathy for morality are fine for a person in theory but make lousy foundations for a society. IOW what works as a thought experiment many times utterly fails when applied.

 

[1robin]

Doesn't that sound suspiciously like what your god did when he drowned the whole planet? Are you sure that nature was Hitler's inspiration and not your god?

That is a huge subject but it has a easy explanation (just a long one). If you want me to explain it I will but your in for a lot of reading. BTW I am talking about the moral justifications for the flood.

 

[1robin]

Individuals have a survival instinct. A society is a collection of individuals with a survival instinct. A stable safe prosperous society maximizes the chances of well being and survival for the individuals in it. The reason we make laws and regulations is because we want to keep the society stable, safe and prosperous because that enhances the well being and survival chances of the individuals in it.

Me and you have beat this to death already.

 

[1robin]

What do you mean by 'works'?

Nature picks off the weak and thereby makes the heard stronger over time.

Even if we take for granted that we would become stronger and advance faster doing that, it doesn't entail that we should go for it.

MY point exactly. It would be empathetic towards mankind as a whole, but it should not be done. That is why empathy is a horrific foundation for law.

 

[Sunstone]

I don't know what he said was impossible or not but it is a terrible grounds for common morality.

Hitler literally thought he was acting on empathy when he decided to exterminate the weak to make the strong even stronger. He used nature as a pattern, he thought if he could remove those who burden mankind and restrict it's advancement then mankind as a whole would become stronger and advance faster.
Now my morality makes what he did inexcusable but it is impossible to show his actions if carried out in this context would not have produced what he claimed. It works in nature, why not for us?

Do you actually believe that Hitler's efforts to reduce and limit the human gene pool make sense in biological terms? If so, where do you get that notion? What biology, ecology, or other relevant science do you cite for it?

 

[Sunstone]

Nature picks off the weak and thereby makes the heard stronger over time.

^This is a prime example of why people should actually study evolution, rather than rely on bumper stickers for their education in the subject.

MY point exactly. It would be empathetic towards mankind as a whole, but it should not be done.

By your logic, the extermination of elephants for their ivory improves the herd and so is empathetic to elephants.

That is why empathy is a horrific foundation for law.

Are you seriously suggesting that the laws not have empathy as at least one of their foundational stones, so to speak?

 

[ArtieE]

That is a huge subject but it has a easy explanation (just a long one). If you want me to explain it I will but your in for a lot of reading. BTW I am talking about the moral justifications for the flood.

No need for any moral justifications for the flood. We all know the reason for the flood was to get rid of all the bad and evil people. God's "final solution" for everybody. Where did Hitler get the idea that genocide is a good solution to problems I wonder?

 

[SkepticThinker]

Since snopes is primarily used to debunk things I thought was your intended purpose. Regardless I managed to find the verses carved into the capitol and other Washington landmarks. It posted them in here somewhere.

It’s also used to verify things as well. If you look at the top of the page, it lists the claim being made, then the status of the claim. It usually says “true” or “false” but in this case it said “multiple.”

It is certainly the conclusion of a thousand scriptures but that is not why I posted it. That was not an attempt to show what verses are carved into the government buildings, it was an attempt to show the primary point that I made about our founding heritage being dominated by Christianity.

It’s not taken from scripture, and it was added during the big communist scare, not at the time of founding of the country. How can it be part of your “founding heritage” if it was added in the 1950’s or 1960’s?

That does not change anything. The evidence for our Christian founding has thousands of examples and was apparently so strong it was still having successes even during the secular revolution. I never said that statement was carved during the capitols construction. In fact I did not refer to it at all until you supplied that snopes stuff.

It changes things if you’re trying to tie it into your founding heritage.

Won’t you also find depictions of Hammurabi, Solon, Gaius, Justinian I and various other historical lawmakers? So could you also conclude that American law is “firmly rooted in” ancient Babylonian history, for example?

I would agree that our legal theories include all manner of influences. However Christianity outstrips them all as our foundation in general. I think what your referring to is the supreme court building which naturally would put prominent law givers on display. I can see what your trying to do, exactly what I said you would. The evidence for our primary foundations being Christian is so over whelming you can't deny it so your attempting to dilute it.

Why focus on what you view as the Christian components more so than the other components?

How is it evidence for the “primary foundations being Christian” when so far, we haven’t come across anything that was designed at the time of the founding of the US?

Well they do do that but they tell such a negligible fraction of the whole it alone is not much of a threat to my position, and it even contains evidence for my position, it just appears to be doing what you are and trying to dilute them.

I found that it was providing a more detailed explanation for the presence of what you consider Christian influence in the capitol buildings.

Reaching? I am (even to my surprise) stumbling over evidence for our Christian heritage at every step.

It looks to me like you’re searching for any connection to Christianity that you can find, no matter how tentative. I mean, the Landing of Columbus is obviously there because he’s the guy that discovered America. Kind of a big deal, right? The reaching I’m talking about comes in when you start attributing the presence of the painting in the rotunda to Columbus’ beliefs about god.

Well no kidding, the Christian painting are about our foundational principles and the rest are about our historical events. Exactly what I would expect.

According to you.

Not in the way you mean it. They came to get out from under the corporate state run take over and enforced uniformity of the English church. They wanted more than anything to retain their faith and built societies centered on it but they wanted to practice it in the way they thought best. That is where the law about congress not making laws mandating faith came in. They did not want the state to control the Church, they had Christianity in mind and the way it was universally systematized in England.

So they went to American to persecute others for their religious beliefs? That’s what they ended up doing, wasn’t it?

Good thing Madison and Jefferson disagreed with that line of thinking.

Look your trying to kill an argument by a thousand paper cuts. I don't know why your demanding these things all have occurred at the very moment of foundation but I can find plenty that existed within the first let's say 15 presidential terms if you can explain why limiting it in this way is necessary. BTW our founding was long before Washington was constructed and so the form this evidence would come in is personal statement by the early founders and leaders themselves. I can supply them until we are both exhausted.

Well, if you want to claim that your “foundational principles” are Christian in nature, dates kind of matter, don’t they?

So Jefferson, Madison, Adams, Franklin etc. are nobodies in this discussion?

I could supply quotations from the founding fathers talking about the importance of the separation of church and state, so where does that get us? What do you say about the bill Jefferson drafted as the governor of Virginia guaranteeing freedom of religion which was basically the precursor to the First Amendment?

Everything I have posted is evidence of our core Christian heritage. You can't get rid of them by claiming:
1. They came to late.
2. They came to early.
3. They are not verbatim scripture (though there are some of these).
4. They can only by from this building or that document.
5. They include other scenes as well.
etc......

This just appears desperate. The total amount of evidence is over whelming and greater than any other influence by far.

I think your cherry picking of only the Christian bits appears desperate.

Of course they are, but they contain many Christian specific scenes within them. Who's historical events did you think you would find?

They also contain many non-Christian specific scenes within them. Why focus only on the Christian specific scenes?

I already answered that, of course a building dedicated to law would include great lawmakers. You will notice I did not use Moses from this building as a religious figure but as a legal figure.

Ah, but you pointed out Moses specifically.

If it’s as you say, why are non-Christian lawmakers included at all? Why isn’t it just all Christian lawmakers?

If the Christian heritage of the nation was still this strong after almost 200 years imagine how potent it was in 1780. A note here: If you see early references to diversity in worship it is a Christian intermural diversity, later on it became a more generalized diversity about religion sin general. Something you said reminded me of that so I threw it in here.

It’s a non-denominational prayer room, as explained on the Office of the Chaplain website. You might have a point with the intramural diversity stuff if the prayer room was established in the 18th century, but it was created in 1954. We already know what was going on in the 1950s that precipitated the efforts to blend god with state.

Oh holy cow, they could have chosen any of tens of thousands of books. Actually the first book printed in the US was a book on the Psalms alone.

They could have if they didn’t want to include the actual first book ever printed, thereby defeating the purpose of the display.

I don't know what you mean by primary but here are some sources.
In God We Trust: America's Historic Sites Reveal her Christian Foundations | Providence Foundation
Homeschoolers Of Wyoming
Sons of Liberty Joins the Global 24 Daily Lineup - Shortwave 9395 kHzShortwave 9395 kHz

This last one has a mountain of additional Christian heritage info in it.
http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=...U01f2sUGqnGqU64t0YuKnZw&bvm=bv.85464276,d.eXY

What I mean by primary source, is the original document upon which the words were written; some original work from the author of the quotation.

The best I could come up with is this:

• Andrew Jackson, during his last illness, pointed a friend to the Bible, remarking, "That book, sir, is the rock upon which our republic rests."
  • Rev. Dr. Luther T. Townsend of Boston University, in an address at the "Anniversary of the Freedman's Aid Society" as recorded in the Third Annual Report of the Freedmen's Aid Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church (1868), p. 77; this is the earliest occurrence yet located of this anecdote; later reported in Halley’s Bible Handbook (1927, 1965), p. 18

Andrew Jackson - Wikiquote

He also, apparently said things like this:

“"I was brought up a rigid Presbeterian, to which I have always adhered. Our excellent constitution guarantees to every one freedom of religion, and charity tells us, and you know Charity is the reall basis of all true religion, and charity says judge the tree by its fruit. all who profess christianity, believe in a Saviour and that by and through him we must be saved. We ought therefor to consider all good christians, whose walk corresponds with their professions, be him Presbeterian, Episcopalian, Baptist, methodist or Roman catholic. let it be remembered by your Grandmother that no established religion can exist under our glorious constitution." -- letter to Ellen Hanson, 25 March 1835

"I could not do otherwise without transcending the limits prescribed by the Constitution for the President and without feeling that I might in some degree disturb the security which religion nowadays enjoys in this country in its complete separation from the political concerns of the General Government." -- letter to the Synod of the Reformed Church of North America, 12 June 1832, explaining his refusal of their request that he proclaim a "day of fasting, humiliation, and prayer."

I assume since the government allowed his words to be carved into their structures they did their homework.

What structure are they carved into?

 

[SkepticThinker]

Because it was George Washington's farewell address.

He was pretty clear on several occasions that the government should not establish a state religion.

Are you calling historical events secular?

I’m referring to the inclusion of many non-Christian figures in the capitol buildings.

Part was, part was deduced from scripture.

You do understand that the scriptures carved into buildings was a small part of the primary point that the US had Christianity as it's foundational cornerstone.

I realize this. The reason I posted the Snopes article in the first place was because someone had asked you what scriptures were etched into the capitol buildings.

This arbitrary date criteria only strengthen my point.

How so?

Honoring someone’s personal religious convictions in a monument to that person isn’t the same thing as declaring that the US was founded on Christian principles.

I do. It was another attempt to say yeah Christianity is everywhere you look in founding documents, early writing by the founders, all over buildings, all over monuments to our greatest leaders, etc........... but we can water that down or subject it to the death of a thousand arbitrary qualification.

As opposed to what you’re doing by downplaying the non-religious aspects found all over the capitol buildings.

Christianity is not at all mentioned in your Constitution, and arguably it is not mentioned in the Declaration of Independence either.

I have not denied one yet, that you mentioned anyway. But posting a secular event (if you call a historical event secular) is not a foundational issue, it is simply a historical one.

You do so when you focus only on what you think are the Christian components, instead of viewing the displays as a whole.

That's a straw man, you cannot force actual faith on anyone and no one suggested the US even try.

You’re saying the US was founded on Christianity because some of the founding fathers held religious convictions.

Christians made sure you can think and act as secularly as you wish. You should say thanks, many faiths would have not allowed that.

Humanists, atheists and secularists would have allowed it.

Since any post which I must provide examples of our Christian heritage will be enormous and since your argument will only be to dilute the impact of that mountain of evidence can we dispense with the examples and just focus on the dilution or the secular examples you mention, for the sake of time. This post was so large I had to break it into, and one which I really start pouring on the examples would take a gig to store it. I think we can both agree that I can post examples of our Christian foundations for quite some time.

That’s a shame. The rest of the world is going to be disappointed when they find out you aren’t actually a secular nation. That’s one of the things I admired about the US. Oh well.