Privileged Faith
With the recent statements by the President that our country will prioritize Christian immigrants, one once again finds renewed energy behind the idea that his is a Christian nation and always has been. It isn't and it hasn't. Though heavily influenced by Christianity, we are not a Christian nation in the same way we call other nations "Muslim." That's not my point, though. My point is that whenever a country, state, or government prioritizes a particular religion, that comes with a number of perhaps not so obvious consequences. To begin with, to prioritize means to rank and if one religion is ranked as a top priority, all others have to be relegated to secondary, tertiary, etc. or be dumped completely. Second, when a religion becomes state sponsored it no longer has a voice that can run counter to that of the government. While the religion may have been favorable to a government (which usually lead to preferential treatment), it now has great difficulty...