they just as guilty of proselytizing as any other organized religion or that religion rick when rove joins me now to discuss this issue is the virginia state director of near american atheists a recall from the program thank you thanks for joining us first of all i want to say very much share your goal of separation of church and state i think that the this is an important one but it seems to me that what you have done is created another church you know and for example when did you come to your. being saved by the religion of atheism. well model not loaded words in that question i'm a lifelong atheist and so i lost any tendency to believe in deities when i found out santa claus wasn't real so seven years old maybe younger. what makes you so sure of your belief system. well. i read science or read things other than the bible and it seems obvious to me that the bronze age deities are obvious mythology but this was bad guesswork people who did not have science available to him were the body of work but beside which brought would not disagree with that and yet they still find solace in t

religion is the people's religion. and so when that changes in america and then becomes the first amendment's -- and i'm obviously simplifying -- it is so revolutionary that i think it is one of the justifications for why the supreme court justices so rapidly turn to history when we are talking about religious freedom. >> thank you very much. i would like to thank our speakers today. [applause] [applause] >> interested in american history? watch american history television on c-span three every weekend 48 hours a people and events that help document the american story. visit c-span.org / history for more information. >> i am of very unrepentant idealist, and i have understand -- come to understand hopeful lesson that realism and strength as blessings. this book, as much as anything is a gesture of gratitude to some of the people who have given me those gifts of hopefulness and idealism, the teachers who give me a reason to believe in a brighter future, the family and strangers to give me a reason to believe in the powe

that isn't trying every every religion in the world and even people who scribed no religion would be the very first to say this is the first rule of humanity is to not kill. then why why what possible reason would we as a society want to kill because you're overlooking the fact it's a little bit like asking here human nagasaki without pearl harbor it is a response to express the moral of the moral reprehensible what the of what was done in the first instance it's not the government doesn't go on pick people off the street and execute them it's because and i certainly believe you've got to have a trial gotta have due process you have to have clear who you must you know or includes me you're putting this war no i'm just saying that it's wrong to just look at the hand we've had here and isolate and from what caused the sentence to be administered but if if a life sentence in prison is actually more painful if if our goal is retribution and if there is a possibility of rehabilitation if rehabilitation is our goal. i just. i don't see any possible rationalization for a society that calls

religion. so there's not a whole lot of things. john mccain in the 2008 election said the constitution definitely establishes america as a christian nation. well, you know, that's -- you're hard-pressed to make that argument based on the text. now, however, if you look at 1 of the 13 state -- 12 of the 13 state constitutions, and virginia is the big exception to this because they're the ones, as john just pointed out, established religious freedom, separation of church and state and so forth. if you look at these state constitutions, though, and, you know, i don't have a political axe to grind on this question, but it does fascinate me that almost all of them have very, very specific religious, christian if not protestant qualifications for holding office. so you have pennsylvania, for example. the most radical, democratic constitution of them all. in order to serve the government in pennsylvania, you have to uphold the divine inspiration of the old and new testaments. you know, you have to bel

there's many forms, old religions, new religions of nationalism and so on. we're seeing plenty of that. if you think long term whole world, that's going on. everything we know so far about ourselves and people as a whole is there's so much we don't know, so much mystery, so much ample that another breakthrough in science means another breakthrough in arts and religion too. >> one brief follow-up, there's a book -- >> i think we're -- >> religion without revolution, religion without revolution. >> that's one of the ones i quoted. >> yeah. we've come to the end of our time. i thank you for your attention. one idea that is quoted is the idea from another author on the subject. as expressed the ideas are not disturbing, but dangerous. we saw some of that in our discussion today, and the impact of dangerous ideas on culture and society has always been an important one. i tharng dr. marty for writing this biography to remind us of those ideas in the work of dietrich bonhoeffer. thank you for coming today. you'll be able to meet dr. marty and he'll autograph books

a religion cannot be about violence there's this this is a totally phony argument. who have to do it because gary in ohio was threatened to be killed by her father in the name of sure write a lot muslims advocate shariah law and guess who there has been a half a dozen abortion doctors in the united states killed in the name of jesus corden does that mean that we should say that you can't have a church no that means i denounce the k.k.k. i denounce violence in an evil proportion but this man mohammed this not denounce violence in tech she advocates violence he had to. go into the iran not serves chapter nine and verse five he says most limbs can and should kill christians slay the idolater wherever you find them and take them captive the shoah botanists church says the pope is the anti-christ should we ban her church before one of the tries to torch the local catholic church or do you think i pose the as i christ to this religious opinion written by. not necessarily by michele bachmann but i'm saying that while you know i got my very simple question for you gordon do

islam is the world's second largest religion. it is the world's fastest growing religion. in the year ahead we will explore its diversity and many voices. there are 1.5 billion muslims. they live in 57 different countries. they speak many different languages and belong to many different cultures. we will examine the debate about whether islam is compatible with liberal democracy. we will ask questions about political islam, its controversies and future. these issuesre increasingly the focus of the world's attention. our series began cairo egypt. i was there in the final moments of the 18 day revolution that brought down the regime of hosni mubarak. in that time, egyptians spoke to me about breaking down barriers of fear and sectianism. >> it wajust this moment ere you i realized that basicay clearly the barrier of fear that has been there for so long was broken. and i think this is one of the most significa outcomes of what we've seen happen so far regardls of, you know, how the political situation develops. this is one thing. the second moment was when mubarak made his fi

the religion and politics. i think that islam like all other religions have having interesting toay about politics, about community, and wehould listen to that message. >> but it has been to think about islam or political islam as monolithic group. gee logically, politically whereas it is a great diversity within the islamic movement, within the political parties. so therefore,my work is to see what are the possibilities for incorporating political islam in the political process to become part of the political system while at the same time, talking frankly about some of the issues that are problematic of islam. one of them is gender this is an important one that has to be addressed. >> tell me what hopes you have. what you would like to see happen in the understanding of islam. what are your deepest and most profound hopes? >> i would hope thatslam could return to being just a relinl on. >> wl said. >> and you? >> i think i would like to see the muslim community flourish, spiritually and individually, to -- als

around the world religion's never had it so good. religions are booming. in bonhoeffer's part of the world and ours there are 3,000 fewer christians every 24 hours. in sub-saharan africa there are 18 million more every 24 hours. oceans of ink -- 18,000 more every 24 hours. we're more religious, and we're more secular. a great student of this, david martin, once said i can name this series in one phrase. is this religious or secular i'm talking about? texas baptist millionaire. [laughter] he doesn't want his preacher to talk about allowances and is so on. and the other -- but that led him to that whole new mark, if you will. he wasn't looking for a market, he was ready to die. but then he talked about religionless christianity, and that's what confused people. he used the word to show how you develop a piety so god can't get at you, and he wanted you to get rid of all those things. he didn't stop worshiping, he led worship for the fellow prisoners, but he did believe that the show we put on very often stands in the way of it. and then the question is, what

all religions that i am awre othink tha marriage should be a holy institute. is a strong alignment of values, yes. >> the material used in government-funded marriage education programs mostly deals with communication problems and conflict management between spouses, like this scenario in a video produced by a federally funded group in alabama. >> robert! you didn't even start dinner. i asked you two things and you promised two things, clothes and dinner. all you had to do was turn on the oven! i left you a note right on the refrigerator and i know you saw it because see what's in yr ha. hey! >> ew! you can see where this conversation is headed. robert and tanya are both tired and stressed. he made some promises he didn't keep, and she is coming on pretty strong -- >> fighting poverty is primarily why the federal government is funding marriage education, the argument being that couples that stay together, especially in low-income minority communities, are more stable and less likely to seek government assistance. although few question the benefits of marriage,

plus russia rules scientology literature as extremist but what exactly is scientology a cult or religion. good afternoon it's friday july eighth four pm here in washington d.c. i'm lauren lyster and your watching our team well as the conversation in washington continues to focus on national debt and the u.s. government deficits a new jobs report is out and highlights what many argue is the real issue that's not being discussed seriously enough unemployment the numbers are way worse than analysts were expecting take a look at them unemployment ticked up to nine point two percent it was nine point one percent last month only eighteen thousand jobs were added employers hired actually the fewest number of workers and nine months and to give you some context analysts were expecting ninety thousand jobs to be created and just to remind you the economy would need to add one hundred twenty five thousand jobs a month just to keep up with population growth and two hundred fifty thousand to bring down unemployment so you can see eight hundred thousand jobs really just a drop in the bucket and obama

that's not discriminating based upon religion against their particular religion. >> jon: i'm pretty sure that's the definition of discriminating based upon religion. let me see if i can illustrate that by replacing the word mosque in that sentence in the, yes, they can ban the mosque sentence, with the word church. or synagogue or church-synagogue or scientology celebrity center. unless you're suggesting islam is other than an religion. >> islam is both a religion and a set of laws, sharia law. that's the difference between any one of our other traditional religions whenwhere it's just about religious purposes. >> jon: yes, yes, yes. [laughter] it's very different. it's very different. i read about the strangeness of their combination of religion and laws in my people's holy book, the torah, which translated into english literally means "the law." i don't think the predators are even going to bother with this one. [laughter] that's adorable. of course, there's one candidate who seems to be gaining strength by the day, michele bachmann, but can her $4.2 million fun

we are going to fit religion diplomatically, not that you can't have your religion, but don't bring your religion to the bargaining table for the negotiating table. so we began to get this system into which the entire they began to fade away either wished to get into life in the case of the ottoman empire very aggressively wanted to stay out of jazz in the case of the chinese empire, and in some sense forced the modern history 200, 300 years as the struggle of whether the international state system can through its procedures proceed against one challenge after another and that challenge today is coming out of islam, and primarily what we are calling islamism. >> host: to what extent is your argument similar in terms of the basis the and the argument samuel huntington made when he talked about islamic utilization and it's still use, its trajectory being fundamentally in collision with the west on all sorts of levels. and i find myself sometimes reading your book thinking it was just the same basic confrontation. so tell us in what ways is your argument like huntington and in what ways is

but before let's see what religion means to russians. everything for sale that is what our commercialized culture sets but debates clear when it comes to marketing the message of jesus christ many claiming devalues pay and their religion itself would visit met in today's society the russian public opinion research center all citizens what religion means to them thirty nine percent of the respondents consider it as a national tradition the faith of their ancestors twenty six percent see religion as polling moral values twenty one percent think it to be part of world culture and another seventeen percent regard religion as they a link to god with the important role religion has in society marketing christianity looks like a beneficial idea but can it be justified. ok now we're joined by reverend david smith in sydney he's a parish priest welcome to the program we were in the first part of the program we were talking about the commodification of christianity and how its message is spread through the world and and we've been focusing on how

quoting from the from the constitution congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion and the f a r f contends that perry's participation in the event violates the constitution because it gives the impression that the american government quote prefers evangelical christian religious beliefs over other religious beliefs and non-beliefs and of course so is rick perry gone too far this time and should elected officials be pushing events that clearly support one particular religious viewpoint and they're supposed to be upholding the separation of church and state your offer to take on this issue is dr carol swain conservative commentator and author of be the people of color to reclaim america's faith and promise when welcome back thank you good to see you again. i'm a christian i believe in separation of church and state and have a lot of educational value and i think the the worst thing that would happen that could happen to this country is for any religion to take over the government you know someday they may come after me. why why should we be tolerating a political fig

ban on government endorsement of religion.y released a video promoting the event. >> with the economy in trouble, communities in crisis and people adrift in a sea of moral relativism, we need god's help. that's why i'm calling on americans to pray and fast like jesus did. >> jennifer palmieri, former white house deputy press secretary, joe watkins, republican strategist, also an ordained minister. joe, why would rick perry go out on this limb and risk alienating a lot of moderate conservatives who may not put religion on the front burner by being so welcoming, so embracing, of religion? >> well, you have to give any candidate credit for willing to be who he or she is, without compromising it. governor perry has a strong personal faith and is saying that people ought to turn to god in this time of difficulty. as a pastor, i see nothing wrong with that at all. he's willing to actually put his political life on the line for it as well. i think that says good things about his willingness to be up front and to lay it all out for am

know in telling this message and the the ideas associated with this person at the center of this religion you do have to have a business plan don't you. well yes and the and then of course there's different of the people in the world there the general genuine christians who want to present and from what jesus christ correctly and there are those who want to make money and therefore they see marketing as a means by which they can persuade people to buy their products and you listed a few already but there's many others as we know they want you to buy their products because they want to make money so their motivation isn't to win souls or to change their lives or to cause others to come to jesus as their lord and savior but to profit that's where i draw the line with those type of people ok philip you want to jump in there go right ahead. and that's exactly right part of the deal is that you know it's not so much the church is a business i suppose you can use that model because there are certain business principles that you have to use so that the institution doesn't go bankrupt but a bette

people told us that it was our religion. if you don't do it, you'll be going against your religion. all this is false. but i alone can't do this in the village. >> they say tostan has been able to insure they were not alone, that communities in which they intermarried were also thinking alike, tha their daughters would still be marriageable. the large declaration ceremonies have been critical. >> one part of bringing about a change like this is to get everyone to change at once, what we called coordinated abandonment. everyone has to see that everyone else sees that everyone is changing. >> genital cutting is not the only tradition they want to change. many communities have vowed to end the frequent practi of allowi older men to may adolesce gir, acknowleing th the health isks d e girl human rhts. molly mulching says there's plenty of historical precedent for abrupt changes in social norms and attitudes. the illinois native sees a very current one with each visit home: smoking. >> people were smoking, and nobody said anything about it too much through the '50s, the '60s, and even th

and fact there are about one point five billion muslims worldwide it was the second largest religion it's the fastest growing religion in the world so how can herman cain say that allowing somebody to practice islam is an infringement and an abuse of his freedom of religion thank you for little bit confused here but should we really be surprised about cain's latest offensive remark about as long he has made some off the wall comments about muslims before he's made them several times in the last few months actually so just this week in iowa and in progress asked cain about a comment he made about muslims serving in his cabinet if he were to be elected president and you said you couldn't leave the city and you're going to be exclusive to you because that was the stick with it i mean right out. of my street let's move over now because. look at your was ok i'll go to church probably the church members are just going to be retired from work with my kids. it kind of sounds like cain is trying to rewrite history here take a look at an interview also with think progress from may when cain wa

his political platform to promote his personal religion. this country was founded on judeo christian principles it was founded as a christian nation not it is true definitely true and i did so as your sign through the new testament and all the mirror that suffered by thomas is still. on the status of he was one person why he was that he was the d.s. and i'm here most of the other phones wide open george washington i'll use the other him up until nineteen sixty two we had a reading and prayer in school and it was an atheist that got rid of that and since the one nine hundred sixty s. that country is believed because of course there will be constant a.p.'s filed a suit and i think that the atheists have really hurt our nation the overwhelming majority of americans are christians over seventy eight percent profess to be christians even though they don't live like christians they profess to be christians so let's let people have their religion have their worldview have their perspective and live in peace but let's not have the government not ha

private family foundation dedicated to its founders' interest in religion, community development, and education. additional funding by mutual of america, designing and customizing individual and group retirement products. that's why we're your retirement company. and the corporation for public broadcasting. >>> welcome, i'm bob abernethy and it is good to have you with us. africa is now facing one of the worst food crises in more than 50 years. the united nations this week said that tens of thousands of people are believed to have died in somalia alone. many more have fled to neighboring countries, kenya, and ethiopia where drought has caused life-threatening food caused shortages as well. international relief and faith-based groups have issued urgent pleas for more funds. religious leaders, including pope benedict xvith havecalled on the international community to respond to the disaster. >>> the pentagon announced the week that it has agreed to end "don't ask, don't tell." the ban on gays. serving openly in the military. congress voted to overturn the policy in december, but the mil

in fact there are about one point five billion muslims worldwide it was the second largest religion it's the fastest growing religion in the world so how can hurricanes they even allowing somebody to practice their blog is an infringement and an abuse of his freedom of religion i think he's a little bit confused here but should we really be surprised about cain's latest offensive remark about islam he has made some off the wall comments about muslims and for he's made them several times in the last few months actually just this week in iowa in progress asked cain about a comment he made about muslims serving in his cabinet if he were to be elected president and he said you wouldn't believe this and you're going to be exclusive to your position that was a mistake that i made right now if you. get my response was not because. the preacher was almost to tears but a lot of the church of those who are just a few of those would like. it kind of sounds like cain is trying to rewrite history here take a look at an interview also with think progress from may we came was asked if he would all

so eric sets off on another journey to find a religion that works for him best and covers some religions we know well and others we don't. he goes to nepal in search of

and wrote yesterday to freedom from religion foundation filed a lawsuit to block the.