What does "Christian Nation" mean?

Al, the word "man" is neutral. When you read in the Bible that a man should not lie with another man, it is not specific to a male.

BH, I'm sorry if I have forgotten your main question, please forgive me.

What we are discussing, the "Christian Nation", has really become theoretical as natural law has been covered by statutory law, and that has changed the landscape to the point where the original intent of the Founding Fathers has been pretty much lost. Examples of this are the Supreme Court rule against private ownership of property as well as the case of the little old lady growing and using pot in her own home for the sake of pain easement. However, realize that, while the nation was intended to be a Christian nation and that the rights of man were not to be restrained by the government because it was the Creator who gave the rights, not the government, it was not intended to be a theocracy. That is to say, while Packistan's Federal Sharia court has made it clear that, "The penalty for contempt of the Holy Prophet is death and nothing else." this government has never had any law that restrained one's freedom of conscience. It is simply that our morals, our ethics and principles are based upon the Christian faith. It doesn't get any simpler than that.

So, it sounds like you're saying that it really means not much of anything.

The FF were Christians and our laws are based on Christian values. Nothing more. Nothing implied, no need for laws regulating morals (any further than murder and theft).

"Christian Nation" is just a statement about our history with no implications for the present or future.

It means that the nation was built on Christianity, our laws were based on that belief, that NAtural Law, which is God's Law, is Constitutional Law, but with that being coated with statutory law and "civil" rights (created by congress, therefore removable by congress), we are so far removed from that nation it means nothing.

There is so little left that is Christian, if Christianity was a crime, we, as a nation, could not be found guilty in a court of law.

But hey, BH, we've been discussing history, and history is important as a nation needs to know where it is from to figure out if it is on the right course to where it should go.

I don't even know if it's worth making this reply but, I think the preponderence of evidence makes it quite clear that the Founding Fathers were not Christian in any significant percentage - some were; some weren't. They all (all, I think?) believed in God - the Creator, Supreme Being, etc. but they did not all - maybe not even a majority - believe in Jesus as the Messianic Son of God.

The laws, constitution, system of government, etc. were based largely on other systems and those were based on previous systems and so on and so on but, somewhere in there is reflected a lot of Judaic law that was later adopted by Christians.

I mean, I doubt I'll convince anybody who wishes to revise history to make Christianity seem to have more influence than it has ever really had in this world and this nation. I agree it's important to study history - absolutely! It's also important to realize that history did not begin with the USA or even with the birth of Jesus or even with story of Noah's flood. Mankind has been around a long time and has spent most of that period trying to figure out how to live with the other people around them.

If you believe in Adam and Eve, you'd have to say that along with Eve came the first human heirarchy and, therefore, the beginnings of society along with man's invention of governance...while you may not believe in Darwinian Evolution, nobody can deny societal evolution.

There were thousands of governments before the USA and there will almost certainly be thousands after it is gone. Let us not forget that our country is still in its infancy compared to others throughout history - 230 years is really nothing compared to world history.

Oh, one more thing - I do believe that when the bible says "man" in reference to laws, it really means an adult male human. I contend that nothing in the bible condemns lesbians. In fact, the Talmud says of lesbianism, to loosely paraphrase, "you shouldn't leave women alone together because they will have sex" - it doesn't say that it's wrong...it says it's inevitable!

Originally posted by Al Davison
I don't even know if it's worth making this reply but, I think the preponderence of evidence makes it quite clear that the Founding Fathers were not Christian in any significant percentage - some were; some weren't. They all (all, I think?) believed in God - the Creator, Supreme Being, etc. but they did not all - maybe not even a majority - believe in Jesus as the Messianic Son of God.

That's interesting, because from what I've found I would believe this viewpoint to be the revisionist history version. I've read and heard plenty that the founding fathers were not Christians but gnostics (always seems to come from gnostics, interestingly enough...). Could you provide some of this evidence?

A plethora of 'evidence' has already been provided on both sides of this argument. The thing is it doesn't matter. So what? They were or weren't Christians. So what?

If they were, so what?

If they weren't, so what?

It doesn't matter!

Originally posted by Benevolent Heretic
A plethora of 'evidence' has already been provided on both sides of this argument. The thing is it doesn't matter. So what? They were or weren't Christians. So what?

If they were, so what?

If they weren't, so what?

It doesn't matter!

In truth it doesn't matter, except for the fact that some seem to think that this argument, for some reason, should give their views more weight in congress when it comes to congress. It seems to me, that at least for some issues, they haven't found a valid argument to support their positions, and this is the ace they have up their sleeves.

As far as our civil right laws interferring with the "natural laws"..

okay, the "natural laws" kind of establishes that the strong rule over the weak, that only the fittest survive. If you go back, way back, to the time when the spirit that was behind those civil rights movements began to advance, well, there was a king, a preist, a few noblemen and the aristrocrats, and then there were all the little slave, surfs, ect....who struggled to survive in this MANMADE hierarchy! Are the laws that we have on the books against slavery not good, because they aren't part of this "natural law"? What about the ones that guarentee that we all have an equal opportunity? Or heck, even the right to be able to sit down and read your OWN Bible in your OWN language, instead of having to take a preist or the pope's word for what it says? I don't care what some people think of our society today, it is a heck of alot better than what we had a few centuries years ago when men and women could legally be owned, women were being auctioned off in new orleans as wives, and straps and whips could often times be found hanging off a nail on the bedroom door--just in case little wifey got a little too headstrong! And oh yes, since there was no way for the women to control the number of babies that she brings in the world, well, she can have 9 or ten of them and they can be all put to work for pennies on the dollar and maybe, just maybe, the family will have what they need to make it through the winter!!