ShawneeDispatch.com

To the Editor:

One of the grandest of all mankind's treasures is religion. And one of the grandest values of religion is its mystery: no one knows exactly who is right, and what, if anything, lay beyond death's door. And in America, we have one of the grandest components for religion, the idea of religious freedom: that the government cannot dictate what we believe. In fact, that there shall be no connection between Church and State, as phrased by one of the greatest thinkers to live.

And yet, we live in a time where those ideas may fall. America is not a Christian nation, nor does it need to be. That we are in danger of losing our beloved country to an ideology so similar to the Muslim regimes throughout the world frightens me. It does not matter what name of God is used to govern the state: the effect remains the same. Repression. Intolerance. Hatred. All ideas decried, and rightfully so, by religion. But all ideas that are bred when it controls the State.

Prayer in school? No, not at all. Prayer in private, as commanded by Christ. Hatred written into law? Upsetting. And most unchristian. In a time when we need to unite under love, we are divided by hatred.

Whatever deity, if any, wrought this existence, it deemed us worthy of free will, and this is a gift we must keep. Treasure. Fight for. The freedom to believe how we will. The freedom to allow our country to remain apart from the ideologies of the unknown, so that we may search these frontiers unfettered. Remember this in the coming months, the coming elections. Beware the hateful rhetoric, clothed in "love" and "morality." The proverbial wolf in sheep's clothing. And always keep in mind that no person holds the final answer to the greatest mystery ever to confront mankind.

Dustin Wilson

Shawnee