Obama and "we are not a Christian nation"

What he said:

"And I've said before that one of the great strengths of the United States is -- although as I mentioned, we have a very large Christian population, we do not consider ourselves a Christian nation or a Jewish nation or a Muslim nation; we consider ourselves a nation of citizens who are bound by ideals and a set of values."

Conservatives managed to take a positive statement and make some offense out of it. I mean only hateful overly-sensitive people who are looking for problems can find offense to this statement. It doesn't help that people like Hannity, did the usual cut and paste technique on the quote, meaning they butchered the quote by only focusing on one single part of it and not the whole quote as a whole. You can tell their brain shut off after the words "We do not consider ourselves a Christian nation".

The truth is that the quote is saying we are not just a Christian nation, Jewish nation, or Muslim nation. What Obama is trying to do is bring the whole nation together rather than leave people out by separating them because of their religion.

If he said America was a Christian nation, he would be forgetting so many people. Its not his job to just pander to Christians, especially when conservative Christians will never like him.

Conservatives were trying to use the founding father bit, but they have seemed to forget that the founding fathers wanted a separation of church and state. They could have easily made this country an official Christian nation, where only Christianity is allowed, if they wanted to, I mean most were Protestants anyways. But they didn't. Because they knew exactly what happened in England a few hundred years earlier...you get persecuted if you dare have a different belief.

And besides realistically, there are different denominations in Christianity, who is right? How do you decide?

I have always preferred the liberal idea to religion, and would prefer to be a liberal Christian anyday than ever become a conservative one. The liberal idea is that one should not let their religious beliefs over power the good of a country. They believe that what one believes is personal and should not be forced upon other. Conservative christians are okay with forcing their religion on others because majority in america are christians. But how would you feel if the majority became Muslim, would you want to be forced to convert? If not, then why would you want to do that someone else? Your religio is not more right than anyone else's.

We may be a predominately Christian nation, that sadly attacks people for not having Christian beliefs, but we are not an official Christian nation. If people that don't know America want to say we are then fine, but legally and officially we are not.

I personally don't care to hear any whining about how Christians are victims. Its like the south and the civil war, both are complaining that they are victims when they are only victims of their own actions.

I find that about 90% of those who call themselves Christians honestly are not. Otherwise why cry over the more trivial things rather than focus on your religion. From what I know its not the stuff that makes the religion, its your relationship with the Lord, which shouldn't be based on material objects.

In another topic that relates to religion, some ask what turns more people away from Christianity? Honestly its not just a matter of lower morals, in fact that comes as a result of less people being Christian.

Many people at some point in their life will question if God exists, some are in this stage for ever, some only for a little bit. But if anything its a good thing to question, because it can bring you even closer to the Lord...or it can push you away. Ultimately strongly knowing what you believe, whether you are theist or atheist, is good because you know what you want and etc.

But what pushes people away is that some, like myself see the truth about many Christians. Growing up in that conservative Christian family I was able to see all the hypocrisy these so called Christians had. They were too busy hating on people for different beliefs and condemning people and being hypocrites to actually care about Christianity itself.

So I walked away, I was already questioning and going to church actually made things worse.

I once noted that sometimes born-again Christians are more christianly (though they have their own faults) than those who have never had their Christianity die within them. Why? because the Born again Christian, has been to the other side and seen it for themselves. When they return they often live more by the Bible because they are unsure how a Christian is supposed to be. But Christians that have never left often forget what they are truly supposed to be believing because the label of Christian has become too much a part of them.

I haven't closed the doors of maybe one day returning to Christianity, but I personally don't care to ever join a denomination again. I just do not like the hypocrisy of many Christians today.

Its that kind of behavior that makes someone get pushed away from a religion. When someone intensly questioning, they start to see what is easily missed.