Letter from Karen Mihan

Church, State Must Remain Separate

In this year marking the 250th anniversary of the founding of the nation, the Trump administration held a prayer vigil for our nation sponsored by Christian Nationalists and Christian Evangelicals.

Christian Nationalists would like our country to throw away the constitutional protections against Church and State impinging upon one another, and they would like to enshrine the idea that the U.S. has always been a Christian nation. It hasn’t been, for good reason.

The founders and authors of the Constitution insisted on the separation of Church and State so that all may worship freely in their own tradition, or not worship at all, without coercion or prejudice.

Our founding fathers knew they did not want a monarchy who would have the power to favor one religion over another and violently punish protesters, so they wrote into the Constitution three equal branches of government to put a check on power and affirm the separation of Church and State.

From what I have heard of the Christian Nationalist agenda, I fear that only a certain, particular strain of Christian doctrine will be endorsed and laws will be codified to prevent any deviation from the perceived right interpretation of the Scriptures. That leaves all other religions in jeopardy and also threatens main stream Catholicism and Protestantism.

I want to live in a free country where all religions are protected, where the three branches of government function properly and give the checks and balances the founding fathers intended, and where peace, justice, and service are the bywords of the day.

Karen Mihan
Cooperstown