PaganCentric

By the Rev. Dr. Thomas Summers,
 Rabbi Sanford Marcus and the Rev. Dr. Neal Jones.

It’s a simple question: Should our state government favor one religion over others?

The obvious answer is, “No!”

South Carolina, just like the rest of the United States, is made up of a wide array of Christians, Jews, Muslims, Unitarians, Hindus, Buddhists, Native Americans and other religious groups. There are also people who follow no spiritual path at all.

But when our state’s legislators vote unanimously in favor of a “Christian” license plate, while not giving any other faith group similar treatment, what they are doing is, in fact, favoring one religious tradition over others. This goes against the clear mandate of the U.S. Constitution, not to mention the basic principle of fairness.

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The U.S. Central Intelligence Agency estimates that 50,000 people are trafficked into or transited through the U.S.A.  annually as sex slaves, domestics, garment, and agricultural slaves.

The United States (U.S.) is a destination country for thousands of men, women, and children trafficked largely from East Asia, Mexico, and Central America for the purposes of sexual and labor exploitation. A majority of foreign victims identified during the year were victims of trafficking for forced labor. Some men and women, responding to fraudulent offers of employment in the United States, migrate willingly – legally and illegally – but are subsequently subjected to conditions of involuntary servitude or debt bondage at work sites or in the commercial sex trade. An unknown number of American citizens and legal residents are trafficked within the country primarily for sexual servitude and, to a lesser extent, forced labor.

The U.S. Government (USG) in 2007 continued to advance the goal of eradicating human trafficking in the United States. This coordinated effort includes several federal agencies and approximately $23 million in Fiscal Year (FY) 2007 for domestic programs to boost anti-trafficking law enforcement efforts, identify and protect victims of trafficking, and raise awareness of trafficking as a means of preventing new incidents.

– Adapted from U.S. State Dept Trafficking in Persons Report, June, 2008

Stumbled across an interesting passage from The Bible regarding Christmas trees, from Jeremiah 10:2-5.

10:2 Thus says the Lord, Learn not the way of the heathen, and be not dismayed at the signs of heaven; for the heathen are dismayed at them.

10:3 For the customs of the people are vain: for one cuts a tree out of the forest, the work of the hands of the workman, with the axe.

10:4 They deck it with silver and with gold; they fasten it with nails and with hammers, that it move not.

10:5 They are upright as the palm tree, but speak not: they must needs be borne, because they cannot go. Be not afraid of them; for they cannot do evil, neither also is it in them to do good.”

Wonder why that’s in there if Christmas trees are such a part of the Christian tradition? Not that I care. It’s no big deal to me. But the yearly give and take about Christian traditions being based upon Pagan holy days and customs is raging already. It all makes me wonder, if ancient Pagan holy days have nothing whatsoever to do with our modern observations, what exactly does a Christmas tree have to do with the birth of Jesus Christ? Kind of like wondering what the Easter Bunny has to do with the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

Why can no one explain this to me? And why do people get so uptight when you ask these questions?