Religion in Politics: President JFK versus Kim Davis County Clerk

[Procrustes Stretched]

Transcript: JFK's Speech on His Religion

I believe in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute, where no Catholic prelate would tell the president (should he be Catholic) how to act, and no Protestant minister would tell his parishioners for whom to vote; where no church or church school is granted any public funds or political preference; and where no man is denied public office merely because his religion differs from the president who might appoint him or the people who might elect him.

I believe in an America that is officially neither Catholic, Protestant nor Jewish; where no public official either requests or accepts instructions on public policy from the Pope, the National Council of Churches or any other ecclesiastical source; where no religious body seeks to impose its will directly or indirectly upon the general populace or the public acts of its officials; and where religious liberty is so indivisible that an act against one church is treated as an act against all.​

 

[Procrustes Stretched]

Finally, I believe in an America where religious intolerance will someday end; where all men and all churches are treated as equal; where every man has the same right to attend or not attend the church of his choice; where there is no Catholic vote, no anti-Catholic vote, no bloc voting of any kind; and where Catholics, Protestants and Jews, at both the lay and pastoral level, will refrain from those attitudes of disdain and division which have so often marred their works in the past, and promote instead the American ideal of brotherhood.

That is the kind of America in which I believe. And it represents the kind of presidency in which I believe — a great office that must neither be humbled by making it the instrument of any one religious group, nor tarnished by arbitrarily withholding its occupancy from the members of any one religious group. I believe in a president whose religious views are his own private affair, neither imposed by him upon the nation, or imposed by the nation upon him as a condition to holding that office.​

Transcript: JFK's Speech on His Religion
Transcript: JFK's Speech on His Religion

 

[Bfgrn]

I want a chief executive whose public acts are responsible to all groups and obligated to none; who can attend any ceremony, service or dinner his office may appropriately require of him; and whose fulfillment of his presidential oath is not limited or conditioned by any religious oath, ritual or obligation.

This is the kind of America I believe in, and this is the kind I fought for in the South Pacific, and the kind my brother died for in Europe. No one suggested then that we may have a "divided loyalty," that we did "not believe in liberty," or that we belonged to a disloyal group that threatened the "freedoms for which our forefathers died."

And in fact ,this is the kind of America for which our forefathers died, when they fled here to escape religious test oaths that denied office to members of less favored churches; when they fought for the Constitution, the Bill of Rights and the Virginia Statute of Religious Freedom; and when they fought at the shrine I visited today, the Alamo. For side by side with Bowie and Crockett died McCafferty and Bailey and Carey. But no one knows whether they were Catholic or not, for there was no religious test at the Alamo.

 

[Procrustes Stretched]

yep, thought so

D

 

[hazlnut]

Transcript: JFK's Speech on His Religion

I believe in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute, where no Catholic prelate would tell the president (should he be Catholic) how to act, and no Protestant minister would tell his parishioners for whom to vote; where no church or church school is granted any public funds or political preference; and where no man is denied public office merely because his religion differs from the president who might appoint him or the people who might elect him.

I believe in an America that is officially neither Catholic, Protestant nor Jewish; where no public official either requests or accepts instructions on public policy from the Pope, the National Council of Churches or any other ecclesiastical source; where no religious body seeks to impose its will directly or indirectly upon the general populace or the public acts of its officials; and where religious liberty is so indivisible that an act against one church is treated as an act against all.​

Reading that makes me think -- where did we go wrong.

I'm think Reagan. It was unintentional on his part, I mean, Nancy can't stand these people, but it was Ronny who invited them in... their money in.

 

[Procrustes Stretched]

hazelnut

Transcript: JFK's Speech on His Religion

I believe in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute, where no Catholic prelate would tell the president (should he be Catholic) how to act, and no Protestant minister would tell his parishioners for whom to vote; where no church or church school is granted any public funds or political preference; and where no man is denied public office merely because his religion differs from the president who might appoint him or the people who might elect him.

I believe in an America that is officially neither Catholic, Protestant nor Jewish; where no public official either requests or accepts instructions on public policy from the Pope, the National Council of Churches or any other ecclesiastical source; where no religious body seeks to impose its will directly or indirectly upon the general populace or the public acts of its officials; and where religious liberty is so indivisible that an act against one church is treated as an act against all.​

Reading that makes me think -- where did we go wrong.

I'm think Reagan. It was unintentional on his part, I mean, Nancy can't stand these people, but it was Ronny who invited them in... their money in.

I agree in part...

Jimmy Carter was first

his Evangelical ties and family predate the Moral Majority

 

[Procrustes Stretched]

I have been told JFK was no true Roman Catholic.

I guess by the standards of today's conservative reactionaries withing Mother Church, he wasn't


how pathetic is that?

 

[CrusaderFrank]

Can we write in Pope Francis?

 

[Procrustes Stretched]

Can we write in Pope Francis?

Guys a creep.

HE'll bring in more of the hypocrites back into mother church. Like converts they will "get religion' in ways that will frighten most sane christians

 

[tyroneweaver]

kennedy certainly knew where the votes were in Utah when he catered to LDS Mormon leaders
Kennedy had a lot of friends in the LDS office building in downtown SLC