RELIGION DEFINED

Q: What does the word religion mean?

A: Definitions below.

1. Webster's Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary says: "a cause, principle, or system of beliefs held to with ardor and faith" (personal or institutional which can include or not include a supernatural concept).

2. Religion is a matter of opinion. The First Amendment's religion clauses include protection of personal belief and restrict ("no law") the power of government respecting personal opinion--in contrast to action. In America, opinion (religious or political) is not to be established by law--religion is not to be established by law.

3. Religion is whatever it is in life for which a person really lives, and all that he or she does in regard to that for which he or she really lives is worship.

4. Religion is whatever the Supreme Court for the United States of America says it is.

5. America's real religion is democracy (its foremost export to the rest of the world)--"the social and political expression of the religious principle that all men are brothers and mankind a family" (A. Powell Davies).

6. James Madison's definitions of an "establishment" of religion include: the use of tax money for support of teachers of the Christian religion, the donation of a piece of federal land to a Baptist Church, congressional chaplains (read Madison's essays "Memorial and Remonstrance" and "Monopolies, Perpetuities, Corporations, Ecclesiastical Endowments"--printed in the book America's Real Religion --and the essays "Madison's Veto Messages," "Ecclesiastical Encroachments," and "Establishments of Religion" printed on this web site).