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comment by user-inactivated

    But personally my favorite argument against trying to enforce an interpretation of Christianity via law is "Render unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's; and unto God the things that are God's." Talking about the separation of church and state as described by America's founders is futile.

In my opinion, Romans 13 would probably be more appropriate as the whole interpretation of "Render unto Ceaser" could really go either way. Whereas Romans 13 is more specific, cut, and dry.

Though, I guess she could point to the second half of Romans 13 and say "See? They're in the wrong." Which goes to show how hard it can be to use the Bible as a guiding source. Still though, the first part does put obedience to authority in plain, simple English. According to that passage, it is a must.

Edit: Unless you're using the passage as a way of saying Church and State are two separate things? I dunno. I'm tired and full of dumb at the moment.





o11c  ·  3131 days ago  ·  link  ·  

Seeing how disparate the interpretations were was certainly enlightening. But then:

    I think we'd be hard pressed to find any religious concept that isn't disputed by someone.

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Romans 13 might be more applicable for the specific case of obedience, but the underlying problem is that these people can't acknowledge a government that is separated from the church.

Besides, giving someone a whole chapter as reference means TL;DR. The Caesar quote stands alone. Regardless of how much people can argue about where the separation needs to be set, it must be there somewhere.

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As for using the Bible as a guiding source ... someone asked Jesus that and his answer seems pretty clear.