Recently seems to me that only countries with strong church which is not subordinate to state, want church and state separation.
I’m not American and I assume you are American, so I will be happy to hear why I’m wrong. Before that, I need to write why I write my previous, maybe truly bizarre, statement.
This is what I see. Many USA’s churches prominent in the past, but now in going through long decline seems to have leaders very eager leadership that support fight with climate change, to mention United States Conference of Catholic Bishops which have on they site Why Does the Church Care About Global Climate Change. I know few American Catholics that are really disheartened that they hear more in the church about evil of not stopping climate change that about evil of not stopping abortion. And controversy over president Biden, very pro abortion, very pro fighting climate change and very vocally catholic (how true it is, is another problem) is quite good illustration of that problem.
Leaders of Presbyterian Church seems to have similar position. This what I found about his stance on climate change simple googling it and seems quite typical.
At the same time, it looks that most church members is in more conservative churches and they mostly sceptic about climate change or denying it as bad science. So depend on which part of the church you watch, you can get very opposing impressions of it stance.
I can be wrong about that, so I want to know what I understand in wrong way. Can you explain it to me?
That’s a work of fiction, with some characters loosely inspired by historical people.
Because it is fiction, and with quite strong view forming it, it is quite bad reference point to discussion about religion in society.
I should clarify may statement that many states, like this in G7, desire fight with climate change. They are very vocal about that, like Paris agreement that current USA administration rejoin at day 1, or something like that. And they are very welcome to have vocal support of religious leaders of all kinds to this.
If they change anything for better, this is another topic. I personally have a limited knowledge about that and quite a mixed felling about things that I know. I’m physicist by training so I have soft spot for nuclear energy (most physicist that I know have such soft spot), but many people seems it as something “evil” or wrong choice. Regardless of that I see nothing good in that Japan and Germany closed most of their nuclear power plants and compassed it mostly by burning gas and brown coal. Germany is vocally very pro environment.
I think we should distinguish between “temporary alliances” around certain issues, and full-out union. There would be a deafening cry here in the U.S. if the state tried to unite itself (in the 2nd sort of way) with any denomination or formal religion. But very few here are against churches trying to be the moral conscience of society (even if they can’t agree on what about, or on which side). In fact, most of us wish our churches would find their prophetic voice(s) again (always on the sides we ourselves approve of - obviously 
.) But whatever it is a church is promoting - would you agree that the state shouldn’t be exempted from its obligation to at least hear all its citizens’ voices? And what an indictment on our religious convictions if none of those voices have their roots in our religious belief and life!
I suspect these are the real issues that take higher precedence for you (and maybe rightly so!) rather than “church and state” stuff. And that’s good that you can identify those. It also means that at least some of it (abortion) is beyond the edges of what this particular forum has as its mission. There are many other web sites where the church can exercise its prophetic voice(s) about abortion - and many here will have their strong opinions and convictions (almost certainly not all identical ones) about it too; and that’s good. Biologos doesn’t weigh in (nor discourage) such things on issues beyond its specific mission. But we will discourage trying to use this forum to become a debating platform for them.
Climate-change, on the other hand, is very much in the intersection of science and faith topics (what this forum has been set aside for); and so we can discuss and debate that to your heart’s content. And we have - you can check out many threads on the topic, or read articles about it.
You aren’t wrong. Churches here are very divided, and you are probably largely correct with your general impression of a conservative / progressive divide being a predictor then, of the sorts of reactions churches here have about climate change. But it isn’t a clean divide - it’s messy. Lots of religiously conservative people do take climate-change science seriously; you’ll find some of them here! Their denomination as a whole may be silent about it - or even adversarial. So when you delve down to the individuals to find out what we each think on specific issues, then life gets interesting, and all sorts of unexpected political “bedfellows” are discovered.
Sure. After work I can retype what I wrote earlier in more detail reinstating the same thing once.
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If it’s a bad reference point why bring it up?
Sorry what was that again?People cannot debate their opinions with civility is what its beign implied here?
I think the deal is that citizens who practice a religion as well as citizens who don’t practice a religion all have a say in what the state does. All citizens can vote. The church can advise but can’t enforce anything.
Which is why i like this quote
“In a democracy, the majority of the citizens is capable of exercising the most cruel oppressions upon the minority.”
The majority could well mean the current elected goverment so . If the majority of the voters are anti or no christians at all well the rules the goverment will impose ,would be legally against the christian voters sometimes(ie abortion maybe)or not but you get the point
That’s not too different from what we see in the US today. There are Christians who want to base laws on edicts from the Bible, and at the same time talk about how their religious freedoms would be violated if Sharia law were established in the US. Double standards are a common human flaw.
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Not about abortion they can’t. This is a science and faith forum. Other hot button political topics can be discussed privately or elsewhere.
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but by law that is not allowed now. Hopefully it will stay that way.
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Abortion isnt a "science: topic? Weird .I know you dont make the rules but this is illogical since there is a whole section and a lot of threads discussing morality (and a lot of debate actually whether conception starts so i would consider this “science”).Anyway since this is specifically to “abortion” i wont continue although ive seen moderators here poor handling stuff they consider “not science” where in reality they are .
Nick, some subjects we avoid, not because they are not important or interesting, but because they are not the focus of Biologos and the forum, or they tend to be devolve into heated and angry discussions. Those topics can be discussed elsewhere. The moderators have to use their judgement, and there will always be disagreement as to whether too much freedom is given to posters, or whether we should maintain more rigid boundaries. However, it is what it is.
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I’ve been trying to understand your complaint but if what I’ve quoted isn’t the gist of it, I’m still unclear. Are you complaining that people who are progressive politically and the parties they support are inconsistent religiously since they only seek religious sanction when it favors an issue they agree with?
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It should be considered an environmental issue, not a conservative, liberal, or progressive issue. If we were talking about PCB’s or radioactive waste would we be discussing how Christians should not be agreeing with the “progressive” idea of not poisoning our environment? It was my understanding that God wanted us to be stewards of the creation. Climate change should have never become a partisan political issue to begin with.
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Another important point is that in other countries the state can pay a subsidy to a church. Sweden does this, and the default church is the Church of Sweden (Lutheran), but the citizens get to select the church that receives a subsidy if they wish. But the U.S. doesn’t pay subsidies to any church.
I didnt write that instead what i wrote is that some are poor-handling some threads because according to them “they dont fit with the mission of Biologos”.
Which sometimes is false no?After all we are all human
I agree so lets just stay at this
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