Homework Question on Government Neutrality
- In your opinion is government neutrality toward religion a good idea or not? Why?
- In light of the film detailing the historical beginnings of America and the discussion of civil religion, do you think complete government neutrality is ever possible? Why or Why not?
- As we approach election time how have you seen the blending of religion and politics in campaign marketing, debates, speeches, etc.?
Homework Answer on Government Neutrality
Government neutrality toward religion is a good idea. This is because religion deals with spirituality matters that differ across religious groups, and even among people belonging to the same religion. Spirituality matters will never be well comprehended by governments, as they are usually temporal in nature as compared to religion that has existed for years. The ideology of successive governments in a nation varies considerably.
Therefore, letting each government to take a particular position toward religion would compromise the religious beliefs of its people. Such confusion can potentially contribute to the decline of the society as people would never be really sure of which ideology to embrace when a particular government ascends to power.Although government neutrality toward religion is a good idea, complete government neutrality is impossible to attain.
This can be explained by several reasons. Firstly, the government is run by people that are spiritual in nature. They will therefore tend to incline towards government policies that support their religious beliefs. For example, majority of the constitutions that govern how a country should be governed normally acknowledge God as the Supreme Being. This is an indication that the framers of the constitution, most of whom are top government officials, have religious beliefs that they tend to integrate into a country’s constitution.