Dreadsox said:
Her complete response including the quote out of context is about the fact that for the longest time, evangelical Christians in this countries history have shunned politics and involvement in them. Her quote about the founding fathers has to do with getting rid of this belief that separation of church and state meant people of faith cannot get involved.
I can't agree with your second sentence there--it seems pretty clear to me that the context does
not modify the meaning of what she meant about "founding fathers." What is it that the founding fathers and God allegedly didn't intend? That "we're going to have a nation of secular laws." I don't understand why you would read the "That's not what..." immediately following that clause as referring to anything else. Yes, she is portraying this allegedly unintended outcome as a
consequence of evangelicals misinterpreting "separation" to mean No active involvement in politics. But I don't see why this matters with regard to the negative reactions to her statement, because so far as I can tell, the negative reactions are to the idea that the "founding fathers and God" intended a nation of
non-secular laws, not the idea that it's OK for evangelicals to be actively involved in politics.
Did you read Harris' clarification in the article anitram linked to?
Asked if the U.S. should be a secular country, Harris said: "I think that our laws, I mean, I look at how the law originated, even from Moses, the 10 Commandments. And I don't believe, that uh . . . That's how all of our laws originated in the United States, period. I think that's the basis of our rule of law."
I'm also skeptical, though less so, about your first sentence, as she really was very vague there about what precisely "avoiding politics" entails. Is she talking about evangelicals who refuse to vote? Is she talking about evangelicals who
only vote, but otherwise reject all forms of political participation? Is she talking about evangelicals that prefer to vote for career politicans who also happen to be Christians, like GWB, rather than those with more explicitly religious platforms, like Pat Robertson (who also stresses the importance of "electing godly men"), because they fear the latter might muddy the message, "settling for a lesser king and lesser kingdom" as Cal Thomas once put it? Or is she simply alluding to what she explicitly states at the end of that paragraph--i.e., that just because churches are 5013C organizations (and/or because of "separation of church and state") doesn't mean that it's problematic for politicians to speak in them? IMO, it's simply not very clear which, if any, of the above she's suggesting. And the first two aren't that common anyhow, and haven't been since the 70s, so far as I know--at least not among Southern Baptists, which is the denomination this paper serves.
As far as the "legislating sin" quote, I was not all that bothered by it either; however, even in context, I can certainly see why some religious minorities, as well as some Christians, took offense to it, since it appears to suggest that A) non-Christians who also hold a concept of sin (Jews, Muslims, etc.) are incapable of determining what non-sinful legislation looks like; and that B) if you
are a "tried and true" Christian, then it's a foregone conclusion that you'd be opposed to the legality of gay marriage and/or abortion.
I do appreciate your insistence on taking the context into account however.