Toland reports that the family was Roman Catholic, and that during childhood, Adolf would use the ma

In �Taking the �Christ� out of Christmas could lead to worse,� Robert Kachadourian cheap one way car rental claimed that Christianity has a necessary role in government because he thinks that atheism caused the Holocaust. The only evidence he gives is his belief that Adolf Hitler was an atheist.
Anyone who reads a scholarly biography of Adolf Hitler � such as the one written by John Toland (1976, 1,100 pages in two volumes) � will learn that Hitler was no atheist. Toland�s sources included the national archives of the United States, Britain, France and Germany, plus interviews with the surviving members of Hitler�s inner circle and family, including his younger sister Paula.
Toland reports that the family was Roman Catholic, and that during childhood, Adolf would use the maid�s apron as clerical vestments while he delivered impassioned sermons. As a politician, his relationship with the church was complex. Early-on, it was mostly an alliance. Later, it became contentious as Hitler tried to assume the church�s power and began thinking of himself as something of a new messiah. His soldiers� uniforms included a belt buckle inscribed �Gott Mit Uns� (God is with us), but he also sought supernatural power through occult practices. While he doesn�t seem to have been a conventional Roman Catholic, neither was he any kind of atheist. In any case, the responsibility for Adolf Hitler�s acts rests with Adolf Hitler.
Mr. Kachadourian also argues that government should favor Christianity and host Christian displays, like manger scenes, because �the vast majority of the populace (sic) in this nation are Christians.� That is exactly why the First Amendment was added to our Constitution.
Religio-political majorities have traditionally thought that government should endorse, if not enforce, the majority religion, be it a sect of Christianity, Islam or any other. Conflict over such official religions is one major reason why warfare has been such a constant through human history. Our Founding Fathers wrote the First Amendment out of wisdom learned from experience with Europe�s cheap one way car rental wars between Catholics and Protestants.
Despite the First Amendment, Christians in public office have often given in to the temptation to use their secular, government authority for religious purposes. Their most visible violation has been acceptance of Christian religious displays on government property, especially around the time of the winter solstice. In doing this, they aid and abet a Christian cheap one way car rental effort to claim exclusive title to the season. It has only been in recent years that lawsuits against granting Christians exclusive use of public property cheap one way car rental have worked their way through the courts, forcing theocrats to allow winter solstice, and other, displays alongside the mangers.
cheap one way car rental Mr. Kachadourian complains that any effort to acknowledge winter cheap one way car rental traditions different from the Christian Christmas constitutes �constant attacks on people of faith� which �in some way diminishes our humanity� cheap one way car rental and �makes us a little less human and civil.� The existence of non-Christians who wish to celebrate our own traditions, on an equal basis with Christian celebrations, is not an attack on Christianity, and there is nothing �civil� about the way ugly Christians unthinkingly act as though everyone around them is also Christian � or at least should be. The majority of non-Christians are satisfied with the culture and traditions we practice, and Christian attempts to proselytize, evangelize and convert us � even in the course of �good works� � come across as disrespectful.
Those who still perceive cheap one way car rental animosity toward Christians might want to consider the possibility that zealous Christians may have built up a store of resentment among non-Christians through overbearing use of Christianity�s privileged status in society � cavalierly treating city council meetings and public school functions as opportunities to proselytize captive audiences, and disdaining the idea that non-Christians should have equal speaking access at these functions.
Despite what Mr. Kachadourian might think, Christians still enjoy all of the same rights they�ve always had under the First Amendment. All they�re losing these days is the privilege of infringing on non-Christians� rights without protest. Some 20 percent of Americans no longer identify with any religion, and we will no longer cheap one way car rental be marginalized.