Matthew McGill

6 Honors English 10

Gardener

3 May 2017

A Government for All

The uses of Religion in Governments

In the United States 46.5% of adults ages 18 or above describe themselves as Christian

and because of this our government runs on mainly Christian traditions even though less than

half of the population follows this religion. In our pledge, while swearing in the president and

even in our own homes on our dollar bills you can see the effects of religion on this

government. Our country was built on Christianity, but why cant that change? In our

changing times when the majority of people arent Christian shouldnt we change our ways to

create a government all people can be happy with? Religion should be banished from all

forms of government in order to create a government all people of all religions can agree with,

but Christianity still continues to remain in our government causing hate and disagreement in

a country where everyone is supposed to be accepted without the fear of favoritism.

Some people might deny this idea and say that our country was built on religion,

shouldnt we respect our country and our founding fathers by continuing this idea? Justice

John Paul Stevens argues The Court has unambiguously concluded that the individual

freedom of conscience protected by the First Amendment embraces the right to select any

religious faith or none at all.. People on the other side of this argument argue that there are no

religions used or favored in the government and that the first amendment protects us from
things like this or that it if it is the overpowering religion so we should continue using it since

so many people are catholic.

Almost everywhere in the world people want to follow what religions they believe in.

But because of many countries choosing to follow a certain religion the people who follow

something else are usually bullied or hurt for their beliefs. Many cases of this happen in high

schools around the United States, such as a boy named Damon Fowler. In public schools

prayer is illegal, so during Damons graduation when his school decided it was appropriate to

recite a prayer, Damon asked for them to not do so. Because of this simple request to stop

something illegal, Damon was bullied and ostracized by his community and even kicked out

of his home by his parents. This has happened to many other teens such as Jessica Ahlquist

who was bullied, ostracized, called an "evil little thing" by her state representative, and

targeted with multiple threats of brutal violence, rape, and death. Cases like these are

extremely common and they will continue to happen around the country unless the

government can create stronger laws that require more enforcement around schools like these.

Students shouldnt be afraid to go to school just because they have a fear of being judged for

their religious belief This is also shown in small businesses where people are refused service

just because their sexuallity contridicts with the businesses belief. An example of this

happened in Washington when a cake shop refused to make a cake for a gay couples wedding

because those ideas contradicted with their religion. If we were able to remove religion from

government the religions would no longer feel as powerful causing cases like this to disappear

since all religions appear equal. With a decrease in christianity of almost fifteen percent in the

past ten years according to Christian Science Monitor more and more people are changing

which means more and more people may get hurt.

 Would you vote for an atheist president? When asked this question 42% of adults

stated no according to Washington Post. This is an issue since the beginning of our country

causing every president to be a christian. This is confirmed when a president swears into

office he must put his hand on the bible. Some people may question why the president must

do this. According to an Iowa City Press Citizen this is because many people often see this as

a sign or a promise. This bias on religion has also been continued recently when Trump

banned Muslims from entering our country since they are believed to live in dangerous places

where terrorist often breed. Because of this unfair assumption, many Muslims that currently

live in the United States are often judged unfairly and fired from jobs for the fear that theyre

dangerous and could cause harm to us. Just last year according to CNN nearly 150 muslims

were fired from a job in Colorado mainly because of the fear that they might act poorly or

cause some harm to somebody. Judging someone by their religion is similar to judging

someone by their skin tone, there might be people similar to them who have done bad things

but just because they have one small similarity doesnt mean they will act the same at all.

This issue also takes place in other countries. According to Wall Street Journal many

countries have one main religion that people are forced to follow and if they dont they will be

killed. For example in countries such as Afghanistan where Islam is the main religion many

people of Christian religion are killed even though in other countries Christianity is the

strongest religion. It gets worse when people get into fights and there are wars between

countries just because they have contradicting idea. This has happened many times in recent

history such as the fight between Palestine and Israel where there was a disagreement over
what a plot of land should have as its main religion. A similar instance happened between

Pakistan and India when Hindu members decided Muslim people didnt have the same rights

as them. These wars could have easily been avoided if there was no official religion in

countries. It is crucial that we try and fix this in America but if we truly want to cause change

we must also encourage other countries around the world to follow suit otherwise instantences

like this will most likely continue to happen.

It is highly unlikely we will be able to convince every other country to stop choosing a

particular religion in the near future, but as time goes on and atheism percentages continue to

increase religion is expected to phase out and atheism is expected to take over by the year

2038 according to Huffpost. But, in the near future we all must still work to block out

Christianity from the United States government. If we are able to succeed we will be able to

create an equal government everyone can be proud to call their own. If this does not happen

more hate will continue to occur in a time when we must remain strong and unified.
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