(Opinion) Rick Santorm promotes fundamental extremist views that are dangerous to individual Freedom, a insult to Liberty and Unconstitutional.
During a town hall meeting in Iowa, Rick Santorum said Americans should suffer more, “Suffering, if you’re a Christian, suffering is a part of life. And it’s not a bad thing, it is an essential thing in life … There are all different ways to suffer. One way to suffer is through lack of food and shelter and there’s another way to suffer which is lack of dignity and hope and there’s all sorts of ways that people suffer and it’s not just tangible, it’s also intangible and we have to consider both.” Check it.
Christianity is based on compassion, which is “suffering with”, to have empathy and help others to alleviate suffering. To seek and endorse suffering is just insane. These are not conservative views, these are extremist views of a fanatic and they should not be labeled as Social Conservative.
The Constitution forbids State Religion.
The First Amendment of the United States Consitution Reads:
“Amendment I
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”
The No Religious Test Clause of the United States Constitution found in Article VI, states that:
“The Senators and Representatives before mentioned, and the Members of the several State Legislatures, and all executive and judicial Officers, both of the United States and of the several States, shall be bound by Oath or Affirmation, to support this Constitution; but no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States.”
A Secular Nation.
Thomas Paine was a deist. As was Benjamin Franklin. Thomas Jefferson made his own version of the Bible, cutting and pasting from English, French, Latin and Greek, his favored translations, and removing the supernatural events of the New Testament.
In 1802 Thomas Jefferson wrote, “Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between Man & his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legitimate powers of government reach actions only, & not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should “make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof”, thus building a wall of separation between Church & State. Adhering to this expression of the supreme will of the nation in behalf of the rights of conscience, I shall see with sincere satisfaction the progress of those sentiments which tend to restore to man all his natural rights, convinced he has no natural right in opposition to his social duties.”
Thomas Paine said on religion, “I believe in the equality of man; and I believe that religious duties consist in doing justice, loving mercy, and endeavoring to make our fellow-creatures happy. But, lest it should be supposed that I believe in many other things in addition to these, I shall, in the progress of this work, declare the things I do not believe, and my reasons for not believing them. I do not believe in the creed professed by the Jewish church, by the Roman church, by the Greek church, by the Turkish church, by the Protestant church, nor by any church that I know of. My own mind is my own church. All national institutions of churches, whether Jewish, Christian or Turkish, appear to me no other than human inventions, set up to terrify and enslave mankind, and monopolize power and profit.”
The Constitution forbids State Religion recognizing the danger of fanatic zealots yearning to impose their perverted views by rule of law.
Rebelling from the Theocracy of the Divine Right of Kings, the United States was built on a foundation Separating Church and State.
Check it. Santorum Defends ‘Phony Theology’ Remarks, Doubles Down On Religious Critique Of Obama.
“Rick Santorum doubled down on several controversial, and religiously laden, remarks”
Check it. 9 controversial Rick Santorum quotes.
Check it. Jefferson’s Letter to the Danbury Baptists.