"As Legal as..." 

"Faith-Based Organization on Weekdays Allocated for non-Secular Observances"

by Bryan Zepp Jamieson

1/29/01

The old phrase, of course, was "As legal as church on Sunday". However, the times, they is a-changin’.

The religious right, long suffering under the unendurable burden of being legal and unmolested by government and society, has decided to cast aside the shackles of equality and become the dominant force in society. Now that the GOP has stolen the election, they figure it’s time for a religious coup. Under the befuddled but benign gaze of Dubious George, and the less confused but totally unbenign gazes of the dishonest right-wing crackpots infesting the Supine Court, two proposals from the Bush White House have been made that should end, forever and once and for all, the notion that the United States was ever a free and secular nation. Why should the non-Christians who make up a quarter of population be spared subsidizing the church? After all, in other countries like Ireland, and Iran, and Afghanistan, not being a member of the state-sanctioned superstition doesn’t take you off the hook!

So Dubious George has taken a two-pronged religious attack on what’s left of the Constitution, first with school vouchers, a charming scheme whereby non-believers are forced to pay for church schools, and a second scheme to give federal tax dollars to churches, allegedly to perform social services with.

But there’s one little problem with all this. Not the Supine Court–it’s in Republican pockets these days. Certainly not Congress, ready to sell us out with a loud roar of approval.

No, the problem with that is that most people, Christian and non-Christian alike, remember a little phrase Jefferson coined called "separation of church and state." Anyone who took high-school civics remembers that. Government isn’t supposed to get involved with church matters, and the churches aren’t supposed to get involved in government matters. As Dubious his very own self said, ""I am convinced our plan is constitutional because we will not fund a church or synagogue or mosque or any religion. Instead, we'll be funding programs that affect people in a positive way."

Well, that’s good to know. We won’t be subsidizing churches, or synagogues, or mosques, or anything like that. Separation of Church and State is intact.

Of course, in that case, it won’t hurt to have a few guidelines in place to assure compliance with this. After all, "faith-based organizations" include the Nation of Islam, the Jehovah’s Witnesses, the various million or so charismatic sects, and even the Branch Davidians and the Church of Satan. Some of them can be . . . well, pushy. In their enthusiasm, they might start proselytizing while accepting taxpayer money, or sacrificing virgins, or any number of odd things that I’m pretty sure would violate Jefferson’s promise to the Danbury Baptists. So these guidelines should serve to remind all these religious outfits that while taking federal dole, they can’t be . . .um, religious. Wouldn’t be right.

After long and careful thought, I’ve come up with nomenclature that should help to make the involvement of these groups in the public sector a bit less sectarian. Here’s a few examples:

"God" aka Allah, Jehovah, Jawa, Thor, Buddha, Set, and several thousand other names, will henceforth be referred to as "Deistic Unit". This removes any sectarian leanings from the entity and provides a referent that should appeal to all believers equally.

"Church" aka synagogue, mosque, etc. "Faith-based socio-political structure." May also be used to describe any edifice devoted to the discussion of the Deistic Unit by members of the faith-based socio-political structure.

"Holy Communion" – Transmogrific Ingestion.

"Sabbath" – Weekday Allocated for non-Secular Observance

"Ramadan" – A new government program: "Diet by Day, Nosh by Night"

"Speaking in Tongues" – Proto-chordate eructations

"Baptism" – Non-secular immersions

"State of Grace" – Clean rap sheet

"Ten Commandments" – four policies affiliated with faith-based organizational deistic units, and some other social suggestions of note

"Five Pillars" – Ten Commandments divided by two.

Revival, church meeting, service – peer group interactions

Christmas, Chanukah, Solstice – end of annular cycle celebratory event.

Crucifixion – death penalty

Romans – Republicans

Proselytization – Training course for indigent clientele and trainees.

All faith based organizations will be happy to make these changes in order to bring themselves in line with constitutional requirements, and the added bonus is that with the standardization of nomenclature, they won’t have anything to fight about any more.

Our Deistic Unit, who are in budget surplus, may your name engender good poll results, your policies reach fruition, your will be done in New Hampshire as in California, give us this day our allocations, and deliver us from adverse media coverage, for yours is the country, the quorum and the ratings, for several extended periods of time. Message Ends.