‘Under God’ in the Supreme Court

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Following up on the “…under God…” controversy from 2002 and last year, tomorrow the case will be heard by the U.S. Supreme Court — with Dr. Michael A. Newdow representing himself in the case.

Newdow convinced a divided three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in 2002 that the 50-year-old addition to the pledge amounts to government establishment of religion, which is prohibited by the First Amendment. But he will face overwhelming opposition at the Supreme Court.

After the appeals court ruling, the Senate voted 99-0 and the House of Representatives voted 416-3 to reaffirm their support for “under God.” Other high-power individuals and groups have lined up to oppose Newdow.

As I’ve said in the past, I think 9th Circuit Court was correct the first time, and that the constitutionally-mandated separation of Church and State should mandate the removal of “under God” from the Pledge of Allegiance. However, as our current administration seems to consistently disregard that very separation of Church and State, to the point of claiming religious inspiration for Bush’s actions, somehow I’m not terribly optimistic about the likely outcome of this trial.

If we’re lucky, the Supreme Court will use the custody dispute between Dr. Newdow and the mother of his daughter to allow them to dismiss the case out of hand, and the constitutionality of the Pledge will stay in its current somewhat nebulous state. I’d rather have that as an end result than face a Supreme Court ruling affirming the religious language in the Pledge.

It’s alive! Alive!

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I’ve been quite amused recently at a couple of older posts that have apparently taken on something of a life of their own over the past few months.

Last August, I put up a post which was little more than a pointer to an article elsewhere on the ‘net that I thought was interesting. The post itself, titled “Why I hate George W. Bush” after the article I was linking to, sat more or less unnoticed until January, when all of a sudden it started gathering comments. Since then, it’s turned into a running political debate that doesn’t look to be ending anytime soon. Some of the comments I’ve agreed with more than others, but it’s certainly been interesting to watch the debate bounce back and forth.

Also last August, I ran across an interesting article talking about schools installing security cameras in classrooms, and put up a post titled simply “Cameras in classrooms“. Apparently, sometime within the past two weeks, one of the classes at Tequesta Trace Middle School in Florida has been assigned a report on this subject, and my post has suddenly become something of a graffiti-ridden ‘tag board’ for students who come across my page while doing research for their project. It’s been mildly entertaining to see the rather incoherent comments pop up on a daily basis.

Weird, the things that suddenly gain a life of their own.

Kevin Smith on ‘The Passion’

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CURTIS You made a controversial movie about Catholicism, “Dogma.” What did you think about “The Passion of the Christ”?

SMITH I haven’t seen it yet. I think it’s funny, though, that people bring it up and ask me, “What do you think of the controversy?” I’m like, “What controversy?” The dude made a movie about Jesus in a country that’s largely Christian — a very traditional movie — and it’s made over \$200 million in two weeks. There ain’t no controversy, people. That’s a hit. They took one or two Jewish leaders in the beginning and said, “This may be construed as anti-Semitic,” and then spun it into a must-see movie for hard-core Christians. You’ve got to go see it if you love Jesus. I wish to God I had thought to do that when I was making “Dogma.”

From a recent New York Times article promoting Jersey Girl.

Marriage by the Book, part 2

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Something I pointed out last August seems to be making the rounds again, and now I’m a bit curious as to the original source. It’s a collection of proposed laws for governing marriage, based on Biblical quotations (in response to the many people basing their anti-gay-marriage stance on select Biblical verses, instead of just admitting to homophobia and bigotry).

Here’s what I know of this piece of writing, working backwards.

Today — March 21st, 2004 — Boing Boing posted about it, linking to The Common Good Network, who posted their version on February 4th, 2004.

The Common Good Network gave attribution to The Boston Phoenix, who published a more Massacheussets-specific version of the text between Nov. 28th and Dec. 4th, 2003 under the byline of Mary-Ann Greanier.

However, searching through my archives, I linked to and quoted nearly the identical text on August 26th, 2003, after discovering it through the Ex-Gay Watch via a link from Anil Dash, and linked to the original version (to my knowledge) on Public Nuisance from August 18th, 2003.

While I’m sure that Alex Frantz of Public Nuisance is flattered that his creation is still making the rounds, shouldn’t credit be given where credit is due?

Congratulations Rev. Dammann!

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In a quick update to a story from two posts back…Rev. Dammann has been acquitted!

A lesbian Methodist pastor will be allowed to continue her ministry after she was acquitted Saturday in a church trial over her sexual orientation.

A jury of 13 pastors ruled in favor of the Rev. Karen Dammann, 47, who disclosed three years ago that she was in a homosexual relationship.

Rock on.

Rev. Karen Dammann

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I just found out about this from a headline yesterday, and hadn’t had a chance to look up any of the information until just now, but Bothell, WA has become the centerpoint of what could be a precedent-setting event within the Methodist church, as Rev. Karen Damman is in the midst of a church trial that could end up stripping her of her ordination — because she is a practicing homosexual.

The two reports I’ve found in the Seattle PI are more optimistic than I initially expected, though. While, of course, there’s no guarantee that she won’t be stripped of her ministry, some good points have been raised in the course of the trial.

From Methodists begin trial of gay minister:

In the Old Testament, the four places where homosexuality is addressed must be considered in the context of ancient Israeli civilization, said Kah-Jin Jeffrey Kuan, an ordained elder in the United Methodist Church and associate professor at the Pacific School of Religion in Berkeley, Calif.

The story of Sodom and Gomorrah in the book of Genesis is about the condemnation of violence and wickedness, not homosexuality, he said. Other instances call homosexuality an “abomination,” a term Kuan said does not carry the weight many attach to it now.

“An abomination is ultimately a practice that is religiously, socially and culturally unacceptable in Israelite society,” he said.

Under cross-examination, Kuan conceded that other scholars interpret the same material differently.

The New Testament scholar said of four instances where the issue of homosexuality appears, all written by the Apostle Paul or his direct followers, only one merits consideration. The others lack a scholarly basis for examination, said Mary Tolbert, who also teaches at the Pacific School of Religion.

Condemnations of things such as divorce are much stronger and are made by both Jesus and Paul, she said. The Methodist Church allows its ministers to divorce.

“It seems to me if you’re going to say one verse in Romans is enough to remove a person, and their calling and all this other stuff is overlooked, then with all due respect, it seems to me you’re acting hypocritically,” said Tolbert, who later asked jurors not to replicate the crucifixion of Jesus by finding Dammann guilty.

And from Scholar challenges church case against gay minister:

A leading scholar on United Methodist law challenged the central point of that church’s entire case against a lesbian minister on trial here yesterday.

“In my considered opinion and judgment, the United Methodist Church has never declared the practice of homosexuality to be incompatible with Christian teaching,” said Jack Tuell, a retired bishop viewed by many as a top authority on the church’s rulebook, the Book of Discipline.

Tuell made the explosive charge during the second day of testimony in the church trial of the Rev. Karen Dammann, a United Methodist minister who has publicly acknowledged that she is in a relationship with another woman.

The trial could end today and, if found guilty, Dammann may be stripped of her ordination.

Counsel for the church said the statement was a powerful challenge to their case, but called the testimony just “one man’s opinion.”

“His opinion is not law. He’s not God. The General Council (the church’s legislative body) has not interpreted any of this the way Jack Tuell interpreted it today,” said the Rev. James Finkbeiner in an interview. He is arguing the case for the church.

I’ll be keeping an eye out to see where this one ends up.

iTunes: “Crablouse, The (It’s There to Stay)” by Lords of Acid from the album Crablouse, The (1994, 5:08).

Just curious

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I sometimes wonder how people would react to a Biblical film cast entirely with actors from that area of the world. I’d love to see the reaction…or, rather, the reactions across different areas of the globe. No matter how good the film was, I’m quite curious as to how (speaking very generically here) middle America and the Bible Belt would react to a Jesus that was swarthy, with dark, short, curly hair — who looked like Jesus probably really looked like, in other words.

In other words, like the people that our government is doing its best to make sure we’re scared to death of.

iTunes: “Natural” by Arrested Development from the album 3 Years, 5 Months and 2 Days in the Life of… (1992, 4:30).

WüdiVisions

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Since all the recent babbling about cameras (and the lack thereof) has had photography back on my brain recently (not to mention rebuilding my iPhoto library), I’ve spent the night resurrecting my WüdiVisions photoblog. It’s still a bit sparse at the moment — all of eight photos posted so far — but one has to start somewhere, right? It’ll grow over the coming days, weeks, and months, I’m sure. In the meantime, enjoy what little is there!

Design-wise, as that’s not one of my stronger points, I just went for slightly altering my current design for Eclecticism a bit to fit the format of a photoblog. I’m not sure I’m entirely happy with it, but it’ll do for the moment, and I wanted to get something up before another PROJECT fell into my lap.

I’m most proud of the archive pages — though if someone who can interpret CSS better than I can is able to figure out why the thumbnail icons on the category pages have underlines while the icons on the main archive page do not (which is how I’d prefer it), I’d really appreciate it. As far as I can tell, they should be displaying identically, but that doesn’t seem to be the case….

iTunes: “Brandenburg Concerto for Violin in G Major, No.4, BWV1049, III. Presto” by Rees, Jonathan/Scottish Ensemble from the album Bach: Brandenburg Concertos, Violin Concertos (1998, 5:03).