[Vision2020] Daniel C. Dennett On Separation of Church And State

[Chasuk]

I owe no particular allegiance to the past, so the reconstructed
intentions of our founders aren't keenly relevant to me.  The nation
they conceived and which was born of their disparate intentions has
fortunately evolved, so that being a white male property owner is no
longer a requirement to enjoy the full benefits of citizenship.

As a complete secularist, I don't include God or the supernatural in
any equation that governs my life.  Further, as I have indicated
above, that some of our founders did -- arguably the majority -- is of
only historical interest.  "Rights" are something that humans invented
that they sometimes wax poetic about.  For rights to exist in any form
other than the uselessly ephemeral, they must be enforced and
maintained.  Deities don't do the enforcing, people do.  In this
modern era, governments are the primary instruments of enforcement.
Theoretically, this isn't a bad thing, as governments are supposed to
derive their power from the will of the people.

I don't want to live in a white Christian hegemony, even if that's
what this nation was in times of yore (yesterday, relatively
speaking), even if that was the intention of our founders.  Humanity
has  evolved beyond that.  "Rights" are now extended to blacks and
women and to nearly everyone who was previously dispossessed due to
the superstitions and prejudices that were acceptable -- or the norm
-- in bygone eras.  Too many religious institutions dogmatically
preserve all that was bad about our past.

More people understand this than not, even if only intuitively.  That
enshrines it, for me, as a worthy democratic principle.

Democracy before faith?  That gets my vote, especially when the
alternative is a return to a medieval brand of Christianity on the
shores of a country that I love, however critical I may be of it.