THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, July 1, 1994 TAG: 9407010014
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A14 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Letter
LENGTH: Medium: 56 lines
Are The Virginian-Pilot and The Ledger-Star editors normal people? Do they maybe read the U.S. Constitution? I don't know who you have hired to write editorials. Maybe next time you should consider adding the Constitution to the required reading list. I believe there is something in there about freedom of religion and separation of church and state.
Responding to ``Demonizing Christians'' (editorial, June 24) without resorting to sarcasm is difficult to do. It's looking as if all of this intellectual back and forth over right vs. left field has been a real waste of time. This guy is not even in the ballpark.
Some people are concerned about the influence of organized religion in politics because they expect to have the freedom in this country to practice whatever religion they choose. They want to pass this freedom on to their children. Efforts to make the religious beliefs that are peculiar to any one religion an important part of a broad-based political-party platform are frightening. It doesn't matter what the political party is or what the religion is.
The question isn't whether God is a Republican or a Democrat. God isn't a registered voter or even a U.S. citizen. Some people believe that their spirituality and religious beliefs are more important and certainly more lasting than this or that political administration. This isn't the first time that people's religious beliefs have been exploited for the gain of a particular individual or a group.
Your editorial page is becoming sadly irrelevant. We have an important game going on here. If your editors can't get a grip and get in the game, maybe you need to get back to the drawing board.
W. KEITH CANNADY
Norfolk, June 27, 1994
As Americans, as Virginians, as human beings, we need to listen carefully and cautiously to high-profile voices that condemn and yet offer no compromise or flexibility. It doesn't matter how ``normal'' these people may appear. We need to ask ourselves what lies at the root of all the fury behind moralistic politics. I doubt very seriously that it is the desire to love one's neighbor as oneself.
Allowing a fundamentalist religious group to name societies ``undesirables'' and then to police them through gaining controlling access to our judicial system is not in the direction of a free society. Our human problems are as complex as they are diverse, but we need open-minded people to resolve them. Hate-mongering is as old as the human race, and whatever its current disguise, it needs no protection.
E. H. WRAY
Norfolk, June 25, 1994 by CNB