There’s an interesting story at CNN.com where US Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia proclaims there is too much separation of church and stat in the US today.

I’m not religious. I’ve never particularily liked organized religion. I can understand the comfort people take in religion, but I’m a strong supporter of separation of church and state. This aside, I think Justice Scalia has some interesting points. Most notably this one:

The Constitution says the government cannot “establish” or promote religion, but Scalia said the framers did not intend for God to be stripped from public life.

I agree that our founders didn’t want to abolish religion, rather they want to make sure the government didn’t have any part in religion.

Where I differ from Justice Scalia is in him saying that “one nation, under God” should not have been stripped from the Pledge of Allegance. There are two things to note here: 1.) the “under God” part was only recently added to the Pledge this century and 2.) the Constitution plainly states “cannot promote”, which “under God” is doing in the Pledge.

Many may not agree with my analysis, which is fine, but you have to agree that putting “In God We Trust” on every coin minted in the US is some sort of promotion. The thing that makes me so angry about the religious right is their inability to recognize the founders want to allow everyone to practice their own religion of choice. What if I wanted to pray to the almighty god of “Joe” before basketball games? Why isn’t “In Allah We Trust” on a coin? I’m willing to bet these actions would be met with widespread outcry. Hypocrisy anyone?