Tag: Religion

Facebook, Twitter, and Jewish Passover Songs

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Someone on Facebook post complained about a Tweet calling Obama a Neoliberal tool.

I observed that many of his behaviors served the neoliberal playbook, and they replied, “You’re wildly wrong on the powers of POTUS if you think Obama was able to singlehandedly do quite a lot of that list,” and I replied:

He had a literal blank check or mortgage relief, and he “Foamed the Runways” (Geithner said that) for insolvent banks, it’s on him.

 His decisions on target assassinations and his embrace of torturers and torture enablers were his decisions as CinC, it’s on him.

 His decision not prosecute banksters was his AG’s decision, and he supported it, it’s on him.

 He tried to push through TPP, it’s on him.

 He did not lift a finger to support card check, it’s on him.

 Sing to the tune of “Chad Gadya.”

I am feeling very smug about my bon mot right now.

Well, This is a Fine Kettle of Fish

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In Australia, a royal commission charged with reviewing child abuse has released a damning report on child sexual abuse:

A royal commission investigating the sexual abuse of children in Australia found Friday that the nation was gripped by an epidemic dating back decades, with tens of thousands of children sexually abused in schools, religious organizations and other institutions.

 The commission, the highest form of investigation in Australia, urged government action on its 189 recommendations, including the establishment of a new National Office for Child Safety and penalties for those who suspect abuse and fail to alert the police, including priests who hear about abuse in confessionals. It also urged Australia’s Roman Catholic leadership to press Rome to end mandatory celibacy for priests.

 “Tens of thousands of children have been sexually abused in many Australian institutions,” said the report, which was particularly critical of Catholic organizations. “We will never know the true number. Whatever the number, it is a national tragedy, perpetrated over generations within many of our most trusted institutions.”

The bomb shell is that they are recommending that the church end priestly celibacy, and to report to law enforcement child abuse admitted in confession:

Delving into sensitive territory for the Catholic Church, the report recommended that clergy be required to report suspected abuse that they hear in the confessional booth. Church officials, however, argue that confidentiality is integral to the ritual, and Archbishop Hart took issue with the proposal.

I rather imagine that there are a whole bunch of folks at the Vatican reading this report, and its recommendations, and they are banging their heads against their monitors.

Notwithstanding Pope Francis’s moves toward greater inclusion and economic activism, these two recommendations will clearly a bridge too far for him.

Midvale School for the Gifted

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I was going to Maariv* at the local Kollel†, so that I could say Kaddish‡ for her.

Charlie came with me, because we studied some Gemara€ before services.

Charlie walked into the study area, and pushed the door open (it swings both ways) despite the large signs taped to it marked “Pull.”

I said, “Midvale School for the Gifted,” and Charlie gave me a blank look.

I had to remind him that it was a Gary Larson cartoon.

*Evening services.
†Community religious study center.
‡A memorial prayer, it is the 41st anniversary of her death.
€A companion work of the Mishna, together they constitute the Talmud.

For All Your Craft and Hobby Needs, Now with Grave Robbing

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I am referring, of course to Hobby Lobby, which has been caught smuggling antiquities to provide exhibits for their “Museum”:

The packages that made their way from Israel and the United Arab Emirates to retail outlets owned by Hobby Lobby, the seller of arts and craft supplies, were clearly marked as tile samples.

 But according to a civil complaint filed on Wednesday by federal prosecutors in Brooklyn, they held something far rarer and more valuable: ancient clay cuneiform tablets that had been smuggled into the United States from Iraq.

 Prosecutors said in the complaint that Hobby Lobby, whose evangelical Christian owners have long maintained an interest in the biblical Middle East, began in 2009 to assemble a collection of cultural artifacts from the Fertile Crescent. The company went so far as to send its president and an antiquities consultant to the United Arab Emirates to inspect a large number of rare cuneiform tablets — traditional clay slabs with wedge-shaped writing that originated in Mesopotamia thousands of years ago.

 In 2010, as a deal for the tablets was being struck, an expert on cultural property law who had been hired by Hobby Lobby warned company executives that the artifacts might have been looted from historical sites in Iraq, and that failing to determine their heritage could break the law.

 Despite these words of caution, the prosecutors said, Hobby Lobby bought more than 5,500 artifacts — the tablets and clay talismans and so-called cylinder seals — from an unnamed dealer for $1.6

 million in December 2010.

 In addition to the complaint, the prosecutors on Wednesday filed a stipulation of settlement with Hobby Lobby that requires the company to return all of the pieces, and to forfeit to the government an additional $3 million, resolving the civil action.

………

Hobby Lobby’s purchase of the artifacts in December 2010 was fraught with “red flags,” according to the prosecutors. Not only did the company get conflicting information about the origin of the pieces, its representatives never met or spoke with the dealer who supposedly owned them, according to the complaint.

Instead, on the instructions of a second dealer, Hobby Lobby wired payments to seven separate personal bank accounts, the prosecutors said. The first dealer then shipped the items marked as clay or ceramic tiles to three Hobby Lobby sites in Oklahoma. All of the packages had labels falsely identifying their country of origin as Turkey, prosecutors said.

Multiple transfers to accounts, deliberate and varied mislabeling of their country of origin, and the CEO of Hobby Lobby is claiming that they should have been better at dotting their “I”s and crossing their “T”s.

This is bullsh%$.  This was an organized effort by Hobby Lobby boss Steve Green to smuggle artifacts into the United States: He went to the UAE to inspect the artifacts, ignored conflicting data regarding provenance, and was scrupulous in using an intermediary to avoided dealing directly with the dealer of the artifacts.

Prosecutors should be pursuing him personally over this.  The federal conspiracy statutes should cover this nicely.

Speaking of Terrorist Threats………

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Religious Right activist “Coach” Dave Daubenmire declared on his “Pass The Salt Live” webcast this morning that America needs “a more violent Christianity.” He cited President Trump and Greg Gianforte as examples of violent men who are properly “walking in authority.”

“The only thing that is going to save Western civilization is a more aggressive, a more violent Christianity,” he said.

That’s what Timothy McVey said.

Seriously,  the most successful terrorists in the United States have been anti-abortion activists, who have used a campaign of violence and murder against abortion providers while law enforcement is taking off a hands off approach.

This policy of forbearance will bear bitter fruit.

Welcome to Trumpistan

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A man on a light rail train in Portland, Oregon, was berating two “Muslim appearing” women, one in a hijab.

When some bystanders attempted to intervene, he slashed three people, killing 2:

Two men were killed in a stabbing on a MAX train Friday when they tried to intervene as another man yelled racial slurs at two young women who appeared to be Muslim, including one wearing a hijab, police said.

A third passenger who tried to help was also stabbed, but is expected to survive, said Portland police spokesman Sgt. Pete Simpson.

Officers arrested the suspect as he ran from the Hollywood transit station into the neighborhood near Providence Portland Medical Center in Northeast Portland, Simpson said. Police are still working to identify him and the three men stabbed.

The suspect was ranting about many things, using “hate speech or biased language,” and at one point focused on the young women, Simpson said.

The suspect then turned on the passengers who tried to help, Simpson said.

“In the midst of his ranting and raving, some people approached him and appeared to try to intervene with his behavior and some of the people that he was yelling at,” Simpson said. “They were attacked viciously.”

One good Samaritan died at the scene and another at the hospital, he said. The third victim was undergoing evaluation, but didn’t suffer life-threatening wounds, he said.

It has since been revealed that the assailant was a well known white supremecist:

Memorial Day weekend started with a horrific attack on a MAX light rail train at rush hour Friday night. Here is what you need to know about the latest developments:

Police identified the victims who died as two local men. Rick Best and Taliesin Myrddin Namkai-Meche died and a third, 21-year-old Micah David-Cole Fletcher, was injured. Authorities have said his injuries were not believed to be life-threatening.

Police Chief Mike Marshman said the three men were stabbed in the neck.

Best died at the scene, and Namkai-Meche died at a hospital. Family and friends say the fact they both intervened was in keeping with their personalities and values.

Namkai-Meche, a 23-year-old Reed College graduate from Ashland, was remembered as the sort of person who would stand up for what he believed was right, even if it meant putting himself at risk.

Best, 53, had retired from the Army in 2012 after 23 years in the military. He lived in Happy Valley and had worked for the city for the past few years. He had three teenage sons and a 12-year-old daughter.

The accused was a convicted robber who spewed hatred. Jeremy Joseph Christian, 35, remained in jail on accusations of aggravated murder and attempted murder, as well as lesser crimes.

He had filled his Facebook posts with threats to kill people and Nazi sympathies. He came to wider attention in Portland during a march in April. The march occurred after a larger planned parade along 82nd Avenue was canceled over fear of disruptions.

A video of the event shows Christian, wrapped in a Revolutionary War-era American flag, casting Nazi salutes while shouting, “Die Muslims!”

He described himself as a sociopath. His only criminal record appears to stem from a hapless 2002 robbery. When he was 20, he stole cash and cigarettes from a North Portland market. The owner said the robber walked in wearing a black ski mask, with openings cut out for the eyes, nose and mouth, but he knew all his customers and immediately recognized Christian. During the ensuing police chase, Christian was shot in the face.

BTW, the Tweeter in Chief has been studiously silent on this.

My guess is that he lacks the courage to offend his base by condemning what is clearly an act of domestic terrorism.

And in the Further Adventures of Florida Man………

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This Picture Positively Screams “Florida Man”

A man in Florida, Devon Arthurs, shot his Neo-Nazi roommates because they mocked his recent conversion to Islam.

Before converting,he was also a Neo-Nazi, so I really don’t understand how how Mr. Arthurs did not anticipate the reaction of his wannabee Aryan roommates:

A man in Florida who shot two of his roommates dead gave an unusual defense, the authorities say: they were neo-Nazis who had disrespected his recent conversion to Islam.

 The arrest of the gunman, who said he had also been a neo-Nazi before becoming Muslim, led to the discovery that a fourth roommate had been stockpiling materials that could be used to create a bomb, according to a federal criminal complaint. That roommate, a member of the Florida National Guard, kept a picture of Timothy McVeigh, the Oklahoma City bomber, on his dresser, the authorities said.

 Both men are now in custody. The accused gunman, Devon Arthurs, 18, has been charged with two counts of murder, and his surviving roommate, Brandon Russell, 21, has been charged with two counts related to the explosive material and devices.

Only in Florida, or maybe Montana.

I Like Frank

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I mean of course the Pontiff.

In his latest acknowledgement of reality, he has recognizes that the Big Bang Theory is real and throws a shindig:

The Vatican has invited the world’s leading scientists and cosmologists to try and understand the Big Bang.

Astrophysicists and other experts will attend the Vatican Observatory to discuss black holes, gravitational waves and space-time singularities as it honors the late Jesuit cosmologist considered one of the fathers of the idea that the universe began with a gigantic explosion.

The conference – which runs through the week – is part of an increasing admission by the church that scientific theories were real and not necessarily in contradiction with theological doctrine.

Pope Francis declared in 2014 for instance that God is not “a magician with a magic wand” and that evolution and Big Bang theory are real. 

Considering that the Vatican Observatory had a significant role in the genesis* of the Big Bang theory, this is very apropos.

*Pun not intended.

Ireland is a 3rd World Nation in Europe

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Any country which has working blasphemy statutes on the books cannot be considered a modern nation state:

Police in the Republic of Ireland have launched an investigation after a viewer claimed comments made by Stephen Fry on a TV show were blasphemous.

Officers are understood to be examining whether the British comedian committed a criminal offence under the Defamation Act when he appeared on RTE [Ireland’s National Television and Radio Broadcaster] in 2015.

Fry had asked why he should “respect a capricious, mean-minded, stupid god who creates a world…. full of injustice”.

………

Appearing on The Meaning of Life, hosted by Gay Byrne, in February 2015, Fry had been asked what he might say to God at the gates of heaven.

Fry said: “How dare you create a world in which there is such misery? It’s not our fault? It’s not right. It’s utterly, utterly evil. Why should I respect a capricious, mean-minded, stupid god who creates a world which is so full of injustice and pain?”

He went on to say that Greek gods “didn’t present themselves as being all seeing, all wise, all beneficent”, adding “the god who created this universe, if it was created by god, is quite clearly a maniac, an utter maniac, totally selfish”.

The Irish Independent reported a member of the public made a complaint to police in Ennis in the same month the programme was broadcast. He was recently contacted by a detective to say they were looking into his complaint.

The viewer was not said to be offended himself but believed Fry’s comments qualified as blasphemy under the law, which carries a maximum penalty of a fine of 25,000 euros (£22,000).

The law prohibits people from publishing or uttering “matter that is grossly abusive or insulting in relation to matters held sacred by any religion, thereby causing outrage among a substantial number of the adherents of that religion”.

If you think that your  God has such a thin skin, I kind of think that either you do not understand your God, or you are worshiping a very small and petty being.

Why Do I Even Bother?

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Yesterday, I wrote a lengthy post explaining the profoundly dysfunctional Presidential campaign in France.

Today, I came across John Oliver’s summary of the campaign on his show, and I am feeling profoundly inadequate.

It covers the issue and entertains at the same time, though I think that there could be a little less focus on the laughs and more on the humor.

The only thing that I object to is his characterization of Le Pen’s position on the wearing of religious regalia in public.

It’s not outrageous by the standards of France:  French republics have been thoroughly and militantly secular since Charles de Gaulle was a teen,* to the degree that religious wedding ceremonies are not recognized by the state, and couples have to be married in a civil ceremony to have their union recognized.

The policy is called Laïcité, and while Le Pen’s absolutism regarding this policy is a minority position, it is well within the bounds of what is considered mainstream French political thought.

Still, I feel really inadequate right now.

*Specifically, since the passage of the 1905 French law on the Separation of the Churches and the State, though secularism was a significant portion of French political discourse since at least the French revolution.

It’s the Start of the Crazy Season

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Spent most of today cleaning for Pesach (Passover).

It’s a period of high anxiety for Sharon*, and I am doing my level best to be as supportive as possible.

Light blogging for a while.

BTW, anyone know a good way to split the Red Sea?

Have a Pesach joke:

Once upon a time in a far away land there lived a king who had a Jewish advisor. The king relied so much on the wisdom of his Jewish advisor that one day he decided to elevate him to head advisor. After it was announced, the other advisors objected. After all, it was bad enough just to sit in counsel with a Jew, but to allow one to ‘lord it over them,’ was just too much to bear. Being a compassionate ruler, the King agreed with them, and ordered the Jew to convert. What could the Jew do? One had to obey the King, and so he did.

As soon as the act was done, the Jew felt great remorse for this terrible decision. As days became weeks, his remorse turned to despondency, and as months passed, his mental depression took its toll on his physical health. He became weaker and weaker. Finally he could stand it no longer. His mind was made up. He burst in on the king and cried, “I was born a Jew and a Jew I must die. Do what you want with me, but I can no longer deny my faith.” The King was very surprised. He had no idea that the Jew felt so strongly about it. “Well, if that is how you feel,” he said, “then the other advisors will just have to learn to live with it. Your counsel is much too important to me to do without. Go and be a Jew again” he said.

The Jew felt elated. He hurried back home to tell the good news to his family. He felt the strength surge back into his body as he ran. Finally, he burst into the house and called out to his wife. “Rifka, Rifka, we can be Jews again, we can be Jews again.” His wife glared back at him angrily and said, “You couldn’t wait until after Passover?”

*Love of my life, light of the cosmos, she who must be obeyed, my wife.

Human Sacrifice, Dogs and Cats Living Together… Mass Hysteria!

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It appears that we are now having Pennsylvania Mennonites protesting Donald Trump policies:

Mary Beth Martin and Lindsey Martin Corbo each held one side of the large cardboard poster, the mother and her adult daughter eager to deliver a personal if unconventional message to their congressman, Republican Rep. Lloyd Smucker.

“Hey Smucker,” said the sign, written in red, green, and blue marker. “300 years ago our Mennonite family took sanctuary in PA, just like yours did.

“Lancaster values immigrants.”

The anger might have been directed at Smucker, but Martin and Corbo were really there – like 100 others – because of President Donald Trump.

The two women were among a hundred newly engaged activists assembled in Republican-heavy Lancaster County – an area that went to Trump in November by 57 percent – braving toe-freezing temperatures to protest Trump and the lawmaker, who was 200 yards away at a chamber of commerce breakfast.

That Martin and Corbo were protesters was – by their own admission – a remarkable development. Both are members of the Mennonite Church, a religion that encourages its members to stay away from politics just as it asks them to shun the wider culture.

This is like a half step away from the Amish engaging in civil disobedience, and I ain’t talking about Rumspringa here.

H/t Charlie Pierce.

The Term Here is Mensch

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Alexander Rapaport is an Orthodox Jew who runs a soup kitchens in and around Borough Park.

He expressed support for the plight of immigrants shut out by Trump’s now enjoined immigrant ban, and what followed was an exodus of donors who turned out to be bigots:

Alexander Rapaport, a Brooklyn Hasid, says his experience being the victim of anti-Semitism forces him to call out hatred against others. So Rapaport, who runs a network of kosher soup kitchens, helped organize a communal show of support last week for a local Yemeni-owned bodega in reaction to President Donald Trump’s executive order temporarily banning immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries.

Not everyone was happy about the gesture.

 “I received your solicitation letter in the mail along with this phone number,” read a text message he received Wednesday. “After seeing, though, that you protested President Trump’s executive order, and thus shamefully sided with those who are putting American lives in danger, I am no longer able to donate to your organization.”

 ………

 Rapaport, who lives in the strongly Hasidic Borough Park neighborhood, said that other donors approached him in the street to complain about his stance on immigration following his show of support for the shop. Last week, after Yemeni-American bodega owners organized a strike to protest the president’s temporary travel ban, Rapaport showed his support by going to a local store with other community members and pasting Post-it notes with “messages of love and solidarity” on its storefront.

 ………

 The 38-year-old father of seven has gotten complaints after he spoke up for immigrants previously and lost funders who were unhappy that the strictly kosher soup kitchen serves anyone who wants a meal, regardless of religious background.

 In December 2015, Rapaport attended a protest at New York City Hall following a call by Trump, then a presidential candidate, for “a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States.”

 While Rapaport has considered being less outspoken, he said hiding his views wouldn’t be honest.

 “I don’t want to take anyone’s money under false pretense. Yes, I am personally very pro-immigrant, and if that makes me unqualified for your donation, please don’t give it to me,” he told JTA.

Rapaport has received support from many parts of the Orthodox community, but I have a message for those parts of the community who seem determined to allow their personal bigotries rule their actions:

The stranger who sojourns with you shall be as a native from among you, and you shall love him as yourself; for you were strangers in the land of Egypt. I am the Lord, your God.

 :כְּאֶזְרָח מִכֶּם יִהְיֶה לָכֶם הַגֵּר | הַגָּר אִתְּכֶם וְאָהַבְתָּ לוֹ כָּמוֹךָ כִּי גֵרִים הֱיִיתֶם בְּאֶרֶץ מִצְרָיִם אֲנִי יְהוָֹה אֱלֹהֵיכֶם

Drops mic.

Quote of the Day

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The point is to stop pretending that religion (and in the US we mean good Christian religion) necessarily steers people away from horrible moral and political beliefs, because all that does it give people a magical cloak to hide how horrible they are. Religion might be wonderful for individuals but it doesn’t elevate the morals of one group over another. I think this should be somewhat obvious by now.

—Duncan “Atrios” Black

The point that Black is trying to make is that the religious right is right first, and religious second, and that the suggestions by some that appealing to God/Jesus/Allah/Vishnu/The Flying Spaghetti Monster/Etc. is a lost cause.

The religious right’s answer to “What would God/Jesus/Allah/Vishnu/The Flying Spaghetti Monster/Etc. do?” is that he/they/his noodley goodness would kick the crap out of those hippies who want to keep lazy black and brown children from starving.

This is how they worship, and it is what it is.

To suggest, as the liberal religious pundits suggest, that we can dictate how they worship is patronizing and wrong.

More particularly, I need to go back to the noted theologian The Right Reverend Shelby Spong, who asked, “Has religion in general and Christianity in particular degenerated to the level that it has become little more than a veil under which anger can be legitimatized?”

I would add bigotry and hatred to the retired Bishop’s list.

I Didn’t Go There, but Other People Are

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On Friday, I made it a point to reflect on other victims of the Holocaust.

I did so in a way that specifically mentioned Jews.

Saturday, I took a rare day off from blogging, and on Sunday, I noted, among other things, that Trump had not mentioned Jews at all in their Holocaust Remembrance Day message.

Given the sh%$ storm that erupted, it was at the end of this post, though.

Now Tim Kaine, of all people, is saying that the omission of Jews is a form of Holocaust denialism:

Senator Tim Kaine said on Sunday that it was “not a coincidence” that the White House did not mention Jews or Judaism on Holocaust Remembrance Day yet Donald Trump signed an executive order banning travel from seven Muslim-majority countries.
“The final solution was about the slaughter of Jews,” said Kaine, Hillary Clinton’s running mate in her defeat by Trump in November, in an interview with NBC’s Meet the Press on Sunday. “We have to remember this. This is what Holocaust denial is.

“It’s either to deny that it happened, or many Holocaust deniers acknowledge, ‘Oh, yeah, people were killed. But it was a lot of innocent people. Jews weren’t targeted.’ The fact that they did that and imposed this religious test against Muslims in the executive orders on the same day – this is not a coincidence.”

Kaine spoke after White House chief of staff Reince Priebus, appearing on the same show, stood by the original statement.

“I don’t regret the words,” Priebus said, adding: “I mean, everyone’s suffering in the Holocaust, including, obviously, all of the Jewish people.”

On Friday, International Holocaust Remembrance Day, the White House said: “It is with a heavy heart and somber mind that we remember and honor the victims, survivors, heroes of the Holocaust. It is impossible to fully fathom the depravity and horror inflicted on innocent people by Nazi terror.”

Pressed on the omission on Saturday, after criticism from the Anti-Defamation League and Anne Frank Center, Trump spokeswoman Hope Hicks told CNN: “Despite what the media reports, we are an incredibly inclusive group and we took into account all of those who suffered.”

Certainly, one of the tropes of Holocaust deniers from the more antisemitic side of that crowd (there is also a more pro Nazi side) is to assert that the deaths of Jews,* and say that everything has to be viewed in the context of overall Nazi brutality.

Steve Bannon is clearly on one of those sides, and given that Trump just put him in every meeting of the National Security Council, it’s pretty clear that he is the power behind the throne right now.

So I am inclined to agree with Kaine’s assessment, though it is unclear to me whether or not this was Bannon freelancing or not.

In the final analysis, it does not matter, and my Orthodox Jewish friends and relatives who voted for Trump need to keep this on their list when asking God for forgiveness on Yom Kippur.

*Pretty much everyone ignores the Roma (Gypsies), because they are perhaps the most despised minority in the Western world.

In Some Ways, India Is Very Much Like the Us

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It appears that in response to advance notice of speeches by Indian PM Narendra Modi bars are scrambling to come up with drinking games:

India’s teetotaler Prime Minister Narendra Modi almost fueled a booze binge on New Year’s eve in the nation’s cities.

 As his scheduled speech drew nearer, pubs announced Modi-themed drinking games while Indians sought solace through social media humor. The last time Modi had addressed the nation, on Nov. 8, it had ended with him canceling 86 percent of currency in circulation and unleashing chaos in a country where almost all consumer payments are made in cash.

 Modi had likened the move to a bitter medicine to help cure tax evasion and graft. Many saw it differently.

 “Come get a drink on us,” pub chain Social, which has 15 outlets across the nation, announced on Facebook. “If we’re going down, we’re going down together.”

 ‘Mitron’

 Social offered a pint of beer or an alcohol shot for 31 rupees ($0.5) each time Modi uttered “mitron,” which means friends in Hindi. That compares with 85 rupees for a pint of Kingfisher beer it normally charges customers. Mobile wallet company Mobikwik — backed by Sequoia Capital — promised lucky users a 100 percent cashback.

I think that Donald Trump, another teetotaler, will be a similar inspiration for bars in the United States.

On the other hand the recent ruling by India’s Supreme Court banning overtures to religion and caste by political candidates is something unimaginable in the us.

Hell, such a ruling would effectively outlaw the Republican Party:

The Supreme Court on Monday ruled that politicians cannot seek votes on the grounds of caste, creed or religion.

The landmark judgment came while the court revisited earlier judgments, including one from 1995 that equated Hindutva with Hinduism and called it a “way of life” and said a candidate was not necessarily violating the law if votes were sought on this plank.

Several petitions filed over the years have challenged the consequences of that verdict. “It is a fallacy and an error of law to proceed on the assumption that any reference to Hindutva or Hinduism in a speech makes it automatically a speech based on Hindu religion as opposed to other religions … (Hindutva and Hinduism) are used in a speech to emphasise the way of life of the Indian people and the Indian cultural ethos,” the 1995 judgment authored by Justice J.S. Verma had said.

In its decision on Monday, a seven-judge constitution bench of the court ruled that the relationship between man and God is an ‘individual choice’ and the state cannot interfere in it, Economic Times reported. It added that an election is a secular exercise, and that should be reflected in the process that is followed.

Four judges of the seven-judge bench headed by Chief Justice T.S. Thakur (who retires on Tuesday) ruled that “the constitution forbids state from mixing religion with politics”, Livemint reported. While Thakur and justices Madan B. Lokur, S.A. Bobde, and L. Nageswara Rao formed the majority and hence gave the ruling, the other three judges – Adarsh Kumar Goel, U.U. Lalit and D.Y. Chandrachud – dissented and said that the matter must be left to parliament.

I have mixed emotions on this one, I tend to be absolutist on free speech issues, but the fact that this kneecaps the Indian Fascist party (BJP) is a positive outcome.