No Response to New Decalogue Display: Puzzling?

There is a new Ten Commandments display in the rotunda of Alabama's state judicial building - have you heard about it? Judge Roy Moore's stone monument might be gone, but a replacement has been installed... and no one is complaining about it. Isn't that puzzling?

As Agape Press explains, John Giles, president of the Christian Coalition of Alabama, sure finds it puzzling:

Giles says he is surprised this latest exhibit has not resulted in another lawsuit from the SPLC. "What's disturbing about this is it doesn't necessarily seem that the Ten Commandments were the target of the Southern Poverty Law Center, but Chief Justice Roy Moore was the target," the Christian activist says. "The comments that the [Center] has made about this display and another display at the Capitol clearly indicate that they're not going to sue for the removal of these documents."

Actually, it's not puzzling at all - there is a very good reason for the difference in reactions. Roy Moore's monument featured only the Ten Commandments and was designed to promote belief in and worship of a particular god via a religious document of certain Christians. This new display includes the Ten Commandments as part of a larger exhibit focusing on the foundation of Western law - it includes the U.S. Constitution and the Magna Carta.

For some reason, Giles can't quite tell the difference between the two. Displays like Moore's have consistently been found unconstitutional because it's wrong for the government to single out particular religions and religious beliefs for promotion. Displays like this new one have consistently been found constitutional - they might not quite pass the "smell" test because they often are created as means to promote the Ten Commandments and not for the stated historical reasons - but in form, at least, they are legal.

That Giles doesn't see this shows that he just doesn't "get" the fact that the American government needs to be secular, which is to say that it needs to be as neutral as possible in religious matters. No level of government in the United States should abuse its authority by promoting or endorsing any religions, any religious scriptures, or any particular religious documents.

Read More:

• Secularism 101
• Separation of Church and State 101
• Ten Commandments