Churches

While it is necessary for there to be a separation of church and state in some areas, it does not necessarily follow that there must be separation of church and state in all areas. Churches are a part of our communities. Good citizens practice their religion.

That being said, there is a definite need for church participation in our recovery process. Churches can and should provide their communities with more social activities. Everybody is looking for cheap entertainment and churches need to be on the map. Churches would be the perfect place to move teenage social activities associated with high school to if we ever separate the boys from the girls. Teenagers behave so much better at church than they do at school and teachers won't have to chaperone.

If you are not at this moment a member of a particular church, you may not have known that religious affiliation is connected to good citizenship.

It is the philosophy of this blog not to promote any particular religion, but rather encourage its followers to investigate any religion they so choose. It is always wise to make an informed decision. You don't have to join any church to be a good citizen, but you do have to practice what you profess to be. Not all spiritual traditions include going to church.

Yes, the Bill of Rights does guarantee, "freedom of religion," which is not the same thing as freedom from religion. You are free to practice any religion you so choose, but you have to make a choice in order to be a good citizen. Good citizens do not let people die for rights they are not going to use.

Churches should be the second place we learn about self-respect. They should take more responsibility for sex education in their communities. It is getting too expensive for the schools to keep doing it. Beyond the teaching of Biology, schools shouldn't have to deal with the dispersing of condoms. An all girls school certainly wouldn't. Churches need to actively help people connect the dots from self-respect to sexual activity and the importance of self-respect. There are not enough hours in the current school day for teachers to teach both self-respect and citizenship. Our current society is what you end up with when you have schools that teach the mechanics of sex without the morals and churches that teach the morals without the mechanics. Somebody needs to start teaching the two subjects together. Oh right, that's the parents job. Except, parents cannot teach their children what they do not know!

Churches and schools need to work together in their communities. They should not be enemies nor should they be completely separated. Schools cannot promote any particular religion or church, which does not mean schools cannot promote social activites of all religions and churches. If churches want to provide flyers to send home with school children or place in a school office or waiting area that should be do-able. Parents can't take their kids to family days or movie nights if they don't know they're available. It is not out of the question to believe that more church sponsored community entertainment might lead to more church membership.

A country's government can only be as good as the quality of its citizens.


Copyright © 2009 Annette Fortunato

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