One American's Pledge for Justice Sunday

While Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist and others have sought to transform today into "Justice Sunday" and try to make the issue of the Senate filibuster into an "us vs. them" debate - and mind you, the "us" Frist is representing amounts to a rather small but highly vocal part (the "religious right") of the population - Shakespeare's Sister and others have decided to redefine it into a broader and yet more individual premise.

I like Shakespeare's Sister's pledge:

On Justice Sunday, I vow to passionately pursue true justice for all. I will fight for the rights of the oppressed and minorities. I will fight for people of every race, creed, color, ability, sexuality, gender, religion or lack thereof, class, and political affiliation to have a voice and a place in our democratic process, guided by the principle my rights end where yours begin. I will fight for an honest national discourse. And I will not be deterred by those who claim to have cornered the market on faith. I acknowledge the potential for goodness and wickedness in all people, and I will not bow to those who seek to harm any of my fellow Americans for any reason, even if they come carrying a cross and wrapped in a flag. The stars and stripes represent us all, and my voice will be heard. For all.

That flag, and all it stands for, represents a struggle for freedom, for equality, for the rights of all, and I’m taking it back. It’s my fucking flag, too, and it doesn’t belong in the hands of those who would ignore the two most important words in the oath which we use to pledge our allegiance to that for which it stands. Liberty and justice for all.

Beautifully said.

At this turbulent point in America's history, we're at a turning point that could very well tip virtually everything to one part of America.

The so-called left (and remember, these days, left is used to refer to anyone left of Ronald Reagan with too many arguing that Reagan was "too liberal") is being made to seem "against faith", "against Bush just because of who he is", "against morals". Yet among the so-called left are many people who feel just as Shakespeare's sister does: justice and freedom for all.

None of us want to burn the Bible. We don't want to affect how people worship. We're not into opposing Bush just because his name is Bush. Even centrist Republicans feel great concern about some of what this man's administration represents because we "own" it as Americans.

Instead, we're FOR everyone being able to express their spirituality in faith as they choose although not in a way that forces others to agree and participate in the other person's belief system. We're "moral" people as well, but we do not see that the correct way to go is to force our individual morality on others.

You can be a person of faith without forcing your family, your neighbors, your city/town, your state, your country or even the world to conform to your doctrine. If you happen to believe, as I do, that God is everywhere and yet He gives us infinite room to make greatness and terrible mistakes on our own, then you don't need to make people recite a loyalty oath or a prayer, or invoke God's name in everything you do.

If you happen to believe that God is great, how can you possibly force others - who are also God's creatures - to shut up, sit down, and just go along mindlessly with what you want?

But beyond that, how can you possibly love God and then try to insert God in the terrible conflicted messiness of American politics? Contrary to Mr. Frist's words, God probably doesn't want anything to do with our Senate and our House of Reprehensibles or our White House. People can love God and really, really, really think Tom DeLay is one of the sleaziest politicians ever to come down the pike. Even more than that, thinking people can choose not to believe in God and still be moral, still be lawful, and still be resprected to make their own decisions without some other so-called Godly person forcing them to believe.

And God isn't taking sides in the filibuster. Man's law is not God's law. And our country was founded on the principle that while God may affect much of what we do, the importance of a separation between religion, politics, courts, and American life and policy is vital.

Anyone like Mr. Frist, Mr. DeLay, Mr. Bush, et al, who insists that God is on their side and everyone else be may be breaking one of those 10 commandments: lying. But they're doing something even worse: not just taking God's name in vain but also trying to stir up pain, injustice, and and intolerance.