“True Equality Means All Or None.”

My students know that I am not an atheist - there is no way to scientifically prove a negative.  Of course there is no scientific proof that there is a super-humanoid god, either.  So, I remain very skeptical.

Thomas Jefferson, Deist
from www.biography.com

The founding fathers (mostly deists who believed in a god but not as presented by established religions) were very much opposed to the mixing of government and religion.  They had first-hand examples of what happened when religions rule, all over Europe.  So do we:  just think of how nasty things were when the Taliban ruled Afghanistan, or the Muslim Brotherhood was in charge of Egypt.

Unfortunately in this country there are many who feel that their religion can be promoted above others.  This includes the placing of biblical symbols on government property.  

Will Dickey/Florida Times-Union, via Associated Press

Last week a group called American Atheists  put up its own monument,  a 1,500-pound gray granite bench engraved with quotations extolling the separation of church and state, outside a county courthouse in Florida after failing to force Bradford County to remove the six-ton statue of the Ten Commandments that a Christian group had put up nearby.

Building monuments to atheism across the country is not the American Atheists' goal. They figure that once atheists join the fray, every other group  will demand the same privilege — including some that Christians might find objectionable, like pagans and Satanists. In the end, the atheists hope, local governments and school boards will decide that it is simpler to say no to everyone.

“True equality means all or none,” said Ken Loukinen, a retired firefighter in Florida who volunteers as director of state and regional operations for American Atheists. 

More information is here, at the Washington Post.