About 80-85 percent of people in this country identify themselves as Christians, according to several polls I've seen. I have to assume that those include Roman Catholics, even though there's a lot of confusion about the terminology in that regard. (There's an old joke about Protestants having to stay quiet in heaven because the Catholics think they're the only ones there...)
Nick > -----Original Message----- > From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On > Behalf Of Jim Sharkey > Sent: Tuesday, December 04, 2001 9:54 AM > To: Brin-L > Subject: RE: Tragedy in Israel > > > Jeroen wrote: > >If you are not Christian, your chances of getting a job in politics > >seem to be considerably smaller; how many members of Congress and > >the Senate do NOT call themselves Christians? And when was the last > >time the US had a non-Christian (FREX, a Muslem) president? > > But isn't that a function of the population in the U.S. being > predominantly > Christian? You make it sound like some vast conspiracy to keep the other > religions out of office. I'm curious as to what percentage of > people in the > U.S. are at least nominally Christian of their own accord. Assuming that > percentage is sufficiently high, which I believe it most likely > is, doesn't > it follow that it's more likely that the people entering politics > are going > to be Christian statistically? It also follows, I'd think, that the > Christian majority in this country would be more likely to vote for > Christian candidates. > > Does this make the U.S. a Christian country? In a manner of speaking, I'd > have to agree. It was founded by Christians, and is still > populated largely > by Christians or people of a Christian background. But the U.S. is no > theocracy in any case. There may be some measure of social > stigma attached > to being of another religion, but that is no mandate from the government, > regardless of what the Pledge or our money may say. > > > > > > __________________________________________________________________ > ____________ > Send a friend your Buddy Card and stay in contact always with > Excite Messenger > http://messenger.excite.com > >
