Poll: Does Hate Crimes Bill Threaten Religious Liberties?

October 23, 2009 RSS Feed Print

By Dan Gilgoff, God & Country

Religious conservatives allege that Congress's expansion of hate crimes protections to include gays threatens the religious liberties of those who publicly condemn homosexuality. Legal experts tend to disagree.

What do you think? Take a moment to explain your vote in comments.

Do you think expanding federal hate crimes protections to gays, as the Senate did this week, threatens the religious liberties of those who condemn homosexuality?

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aura only has hearsay concerning Christians and homosexuals. She offers no evidences or sources that Christians have tried to murder homosexuals. She also misrepresents Christian beliefs that the Law of the Old Testament has been made void, so her arguments that believers want homosexuals dead are misleading.

No other ruling made by the Supreme Court has over turned the one made in 1961. No law has been created to exclude secular humanism. Secular humanists, and other atheists, still have been unable to clearly prove there is no God.

aura also lumps all religions and Christians together, as though as if they are the world's source of evil. I'm sorry, but atheists like Stalin, Mal Pot, Mao Zedong, and others killed more than the Crusaders. Yes, Christianity has had its nut cases, but none of them really taught true Christianity. Instead, they created cults and drew people away from the truth. Secular humanism will either become Nihilism or postmodernism. Neither one has a good hold on reality.

Dryfire of IL 11:41AM October 25, 2009

Manson, as I recall, was not convicted of personally murdering anyone, but of being the person who incited the religion-stupified waifs to do it for him. I have no record of how many homosexuals who were crippled or killed by neurotic Christians after reading & re-reading Leviticus & hearing it preached. Leviticus says homosexuals commit abominable sin & deserve to be killed. BanAbortion preachers have incited neurotic Christians to cripple or kill people who have anything to do with abortion. CONSEQUENCES following the inciting language are to be considered when deciding punishment for the inciters. I hope they're very heavily fined & spend at least five years in jail, working there to help feed themselves. Until now, some preachers have been able to do what amounts to standing hidden, while ordering killer dogs to attack a victim.

aura dawn veirs of CA 12:11AM October 25, 2009

Until 1973, the Supreme Court said it was constitutional for the civil government to enforce church law that bans abortion. In l973, the Court put a stop to that with Roe v Wade. Court members vary, but for a long time the US Supreme Court has been "conservative," meaning it favors religion & capitalism. Member of the l961 Court were wrong about the phrase "secular humanism" by saying it's a religion. Secular is the exact opposite of religion. Humanism means humanists who strongly deny there are any gods anywhere, anytime. Members of the l961 court demonstrated their ignorance of definitions & their linguistic shortcomings. Dryf suggests their mistakes should be accepted & preserved. My explanation of the Establishment Clause is accurate. Some day, the unconstitutional harassment of atheists will diminish as more Americans attain higher education. Voters will put atheists in office. We'll repeal all the undemocratic, un-American laws that give privileges to faith-based corporations. People founded establishments of religion but they're are too cheap to support the preachers they say are so vital to their lives.

aura dawn veirs of CA 11:55PM October 24, 2009

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Dan Gilgoff covers religion for U.S. News & World Report. He is the author of The Jesus Machine: How James Dobson, Focus on the Family, and Evangelical America are Winning the Culture War, and is a former politics editor at beliefnet. E-mail Dan at godandcountry@usnews.com.

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