Contextually Speaking

Dear Editor:

In your December 3 edition, you published a letter from Maggie Seligman under the title “Freedom from Religion”. In it she argues that quotations from Edmund Burke, Alexis de Tocqueville and Abraham Lincoln were inappropriately taken out of their historical and textual context (her words not mine!). The criticism is followed by the rather remarkable charge that the Courier was using “religion as a weapon to prey upon those who do not have the education or realm of knowledge to understand more than the surface of the editorial’s argument.”

Now, at the risk of taking Ms. Seligman’s argument out of context, she seems to be saying that only those with a little less mental voltage than a flashlight bulb believe that religion ought to play an important part of the life of a nation and its citizens. In short, religion is for dummies! If this is correct, then let this dummy make the following points.

First, it is not sufficient for Ms. Seligman to argue historical and textual context and let it go at that. That is what celebrities and politicians do when they are trying to dodge questions about yet another mess that they have managed to get themselves in. Precisely how has the Courier distorted the meaning of the thinkers it cited? What did the Courier say they meant and what did they really mean? The argument about context is too important to be fudged over.

Second, many, many great thinkers, educated or otherwise, have believed in God and religion. Among the reasons given is that religion best deals with the momentous issues of life, death and the flawed nature of human behavior in much more soul satisfying ways than are within the grasp of our limited powers of reason.

Third, it should be pointed out that Ms. Seligman is clearly too well informed not to have known that the concept of “separation of church and state” is a mid-twentieth century judicial add-on. Further the phrase “established church” is a technical one and referrs to an official state church, financially supported by all, members and non-members alike. Further the established church carried special legal privileges reserved for its members exclusively.

But enough! This is the Christmas season! We Christians are celebrating the birth of Jesus, Son of God. It is a wonderful time for us! So, Ms Seligman, let me; 1) invite you to join us at church to celebrate the birth of Jesus or; 2) if you can’t make it, well . . . Merry Christmas anyway.
Ed Lundberg
CARMEL