Fired For Mentioning Jesus!

Damn, what's the world coming to?

Our blog, thenewswalk.com (formerly The Reform Club), mostly leaves the reblogging to others, like Glenn Reynolds' essentially bookmarkable Instapundit.

But it's always nice to put in a plug for your pals, and I'm happy to do it today for Jonathan Rowe's excellent blog, which is oriented toward examining Christianity and the general role of religion in the Founding. His research is thorough and honest, and he was also linked the other day by the notorious and notoriously popular crooksandliars, whose name betrays its leftist bent. (Ooops, sorry, somehow I can't find a link to that one. What were the odds?) That this right-leaning blogger also links to him speaks very highly of Jon, I think.

In short, via the also-notorious World Net Daily, a Navy chaplain was fired for bringing up Jesus Christ in a White House benediction, even though he was ordered not to. (They were looking for something a bit more generic.) Law prof Rowe persuasively---to my mind---argues why the firing was justified and even necessary, and I add a few words of support for his conclusion in his comments section.

I often defend religious expression in the public square on general principles, specifically Christian religious expression, even when I find it obnoxious (also often). But this one's a slam dunk. As a practical matter, the issue of Jesus' divinity gives many people heartburn, and for whomever it doesn't, assertions of Muhammad's status as God's authoritative and final prophet by a different chaplain certainly would.

The Founders were wise in keeping G-d as generic as possible in order to gather us to Him, as a nation under Him, without setting us apart.