Ten Commandments on a Classroom Wall Are for Certain Christians Only

When a state government cares so little about its people that it ranks 46th in healthcare, 47th in education, 49th in economy, 49th in infrastructure, 50th in crime, and 2nd from the bottom in pollution, finding something to distract public attention from reality is of utmost importance.

So Louisiana’s Governor has signed legislation making the state first to require that the ten commandments be posted in classrooms.

Do you see that? Louisiana is #1! Praise Jesus!

The Bayou State’s new law, by the way, requires a Protestant translation of the Ten Commandments be posted in all classrooms within schools requiring public funding, including colleges and universities. Jews, Muslims, and Catholics are expected to accept this Christian Nationalist idea.

Just ask the law's sponsor, Rep. Dodie Horton: “I'm not concerned with an atheist. I'm not concerned with a Muslim. I’m concerned with our children looking and seeing what God’s law is,” she said, explaining why she proposed the bill.

Other states, including Texas, South Carolina and Utah tried to mandate the Ten Commandments, but none got their bills across the legislative finish line with the same requirement as Louisiana's.

Mandating placement of this particular foundational religious document has been a cause for religious conservatives for a half century. In deep Red states voting against this sort of legislation is a litmus test for legislators lest they be lumped in with the atheist communists seeking secularization of our society.

Now, before all you liberals go on about separation of church and state, realize that there has always been tension between these two powers. The American experiment IS complicated.

The framers of the Constitution (not Jesus) had ancestors who were likely persecuted by dominant religious groups, including the Puritans and the Church of England. Furthermore, the religion of the day favored by much of the educated class, was deism, which accepted the existence of a creator on the basis of reason but rejected belief in a supernatural deity who interacts with humankind. 

Got it? God’s okay and out there somewhere, but our laws come from rational experiences.

I found the following point of view about secularism vs religion in the U.S. as expressed by Wilfred McClay, SunTrust Bank Chair of Excellence in Humanities, University of Tennessee at Chattanooga at the 2007 Pew Forum’s biannual conference on religion, politics and public life:

• So let me begin with two propositions. The first one is that in the American experience, the separation of church and state, which by and large we acknowledge as a rough-and-ready principle, does not necessarily mean the separation of religion from public life. Another way of saying this is that America has a strong commitment to secularism, but it is secularism of a particular kind, understood in a particular way.

• Second, that the United States has achieved in practice what seemed impossible in theory: a reconciliation of religion with modernity, in contrast, as I say, to the Western European pattern. In the United States religious belief has proven amazingly persistent even as the culture has been more and more willing to embrace enthusiastically all or most of the scientific and technological agenda of modernity. Sometimes the two reinforce one another. Sometimes they clash with one another, but the American culture has found room for both to be present. I won’t prophesy this will always be the case, but it’s a very solid relationship of long standing.

In analyzing politics and history it’s always important to look at the economics involved. When the US was founded the nation had an abundant supply of land (to be stolen), but faced ongoing labor shortages. 

In order for the country to grow, immigration was a necessity. In the South (where it’s becoming forbidden to teach this) the solution was slavery. Elsewhere, people coming for opportunities not possible in (mostly) Europe were what was needed. As a nation it didn’t make sense to pick only one religious affiliation for immigrants. Skin color, of course, was another matter altogether.

Which brings me to modern-day Christian Nationalism, an outgrowth of the evangelical movement at the core of the MAGA cult. There are different flavors of this ideology, but the end goal is the same.

What they seek is the integration of their religious tenets in the manner of governance in the United States. God has told them this should be done, along with reframing our history to emphasize the country’s Christian roots and identity.

Within (or alongside of) Christian Nationalism is Seven Mountains Dominionism, a relatively recent (1975) set of beliefs holding that believers are obligated to invade the "seven spheres" of society identified as family, religion, education, media, entertainment, business, and government. Followers believe that by fulfilling this mandate, they can bring about the end times

Following this trail of theology leads one down into a rabbit hole of prophecy, including the rapture, where true believers will be drawn to heaven and the rest will live in hell. A chaotic world, the state of Israel, and the anti-Christ are all players in this process.

Part of the process of interweaving these beliefs into society involves a deference for authoritarian rule, in keeping with their belief in a patriarchal order. Donald Trump is appealing to this movement, not because he’s a Godly man, but because he is the chosen vessel of the Lord Almighty.

Politico came upon documents from The Center for Renewing America, led by Russell Vought (who served as Trump’s  director of the Office of Management and Budget) including a list of top priorities for a second Trump term. 

“Christian nationalism” is one of the bullet points, along with invoking the Insurrection Act on Day One to quash protests and refusing to spend authorized congressional funds on unwanted projects.

• The documents obtained by POLITICO do not outline specific Christian nationalist policies. But Vought has promoted a restrictionist immigration agenda, saying a person’s background doesn’t define who can enter the U.S., but rather, citing Biblical teachings, whether that person “accept[ed] Israel’s God, laws and understanding of history.”

• Vought has a close affiliation with Christian nationalist William Wolfe, a former Trump administration official who has advocated for overturning same-sex marriage, ending abortion and reducing access to contraceptives.

• Vought, who declined to comment, is advising Project 2025, a governing agenda that would usher in one of the most conservative executive branches in modern American history. The effort is made up of a constellation of conservative groups run by Trump allies who’ve constructed a detailed plan to dismantle or overhaul key agencies in a second term. Among other principles, the project’s “Mandate for Leadership” states that “freedom is defined by God, not man.”

Getting back to the Ten Commandments legislation, Gov. Landry expects to be sued over the constitutionality of this law.. 

• "I'm going home to sign a bill that places the Ten Commandments in public classrooms," he said earlier this week in a keynote address a Republican fundraiser in Nashville. "And I can't wait to be sued."

This is a situation like the undoing of Roe v Wade, where a seeming loosening of interpretations by the Supreme Court encourages actions designed to get religion once again up for judicial review.

These efforts were prompted by Supreme Court rulings in cases like Kennedy v. Bremerton School District indicated a looser interpretation of the Constitution's Establishment Clause, which prevents state-sponsored religion.

Opponents of the Louisiana law include the American Civil Liberties Union, the ACLU of Louisiana, Americans United for Separation of Church and State, and the Freedom from Religion Foundation. In a joint statement, the organizations called the new law "blatantly unconstitutional."

I can only hope that once people begin to understand that being a “Christian nation” involves undermining democracy, they’ll understand this sort of legislation isn’t a joke.

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Thursday’s Noteworthy News Links

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California lawmakers fast-track restaurant exemption to hidden fees law by Dan Walters at CalMatters

• Restaurant industry lobbyists and union officials contend that SB 478 would, in effect, eliminate negotiated service fees and therefore deprive employees of income. It is, however, a specious argument. There’s nothing in the new law to prohibit restaurants from folding fees into their quoted prices and using the income for whatever purpose it is being used now.

• The real reason the industry dislikes the new law is a fear that disclosing complete prices of meals would discourage customers from dining out. In other words, they want to continue their bait-and-switch tactics with the Legislature’s blessing.

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Outbreeding the liberals by Lyz at Men Yell At Me

• Eugenics is making an ideological comeback, not that it ever really left us. This month, Elon Musk, who has decided the world needs more of his genes and has thus far fathered 11 children, tweeted that it should be considered a national emergency to have children¹. Far-right activist Chaiya Raichik replied that she believed conservatives should “outbreed the left.” 

• And it isn’t just shitposters talking like this. The ideology is evident in the posts of trad wives — women who, at least in their minds, eschew the trappings of modern womanhood and dedicate their lives to being wives and mothers, and posting about it nonstop on social media. Books and articles encouraging people to just get married and have kids and fetishistic profiles of atheist couples who are vowing to breed smart children seem to be everywhere. The religion-free rebrand, dubbed “pronatalism,” is really just eugenics dressed up with hipster glasses. 

• At the same time, reproductive choice is increasingly criminalized, gender is being policed, the United States has the highest maternal mortality rate of any developed nation, childcare is unaffordable and parents are losing their jobs because of childcare shortages.

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More Than 171,000 People Crossed State Lines to Get an Abortion in 2023 via truthout

• “Traveling for abortion care requires individuals to overcome huge financial and logistical barriers,” said Isaac Maddow-Zimet, a data scientist at Guttmacher and project lead of the study, “and our findings show just how far people will travel to obtain the care they want and deserve.

• The 171,300 individuals who traveled from their home state to another is double the number seen in 2020. In states without total abortion bans, more than 1 million abortions were performed — the highest rate in over a decade.

• States like Illinois and Florida, which border stricter states with short gestational limits or outright bans on abortion in 2023, saw huge influxes of travelers seeking abortion services, according to Guttmacher’s research. But Florida became one of those stricter states earlier this year, as its six-week abortion ban — one of the harshest bans in the country — went into effect this past spring.