The second round of the French presidential election happens a week from today. Incumbent President and conservative Union for a Popular Movement leader Nicolas Sarkozy faces a stiff challenge from Socialist candidate François Hollande. (With that name, it’s like America Ferrera running for President of the United States. François pour la France… America for America!)

Among the topics of discussion in the French presidential campaign is la laïcité, the French concept of political secularism. The first line of the first article of the French Constitution declares France an “indivisible, secular, democratic, and social Republic.” The Republic’s 1905 law on the Separation of the Churches and the State put la laïcité into practice, but the French Constitution contains no clear equivalent to the Establishment clause in the American First Amendment. La laïcité has evolved to include a 2004 law banning the display of religious symbols (hijabs, crosses, you name it) in schools. To the laïcité-minded French, official pious displays like opening Congressional committee hearings with prayers are inconceivable.

Hollande: Aaah! A Socialist! Run and hide!

As I review the candidates’ Twitter feeds (the French President and his Socialist opponent both Tweet hard on Sunday), I find Hollande, who wants to put church-state separation more explicitly in the Constitution, expressing a comforting defense of la laïcité:

Je n’accepte pas que les religions soient instrumentalisées dans le débat public! (I do not accept the exploitation of religion in the public debate!)

Je demande l’application du stricte principe de laïcité dans tout le pays! (I demand application of the strict principle of secularism in all the country!)

Hollande does enjoy his points d’exclamation.

Sarkozy: Je dis ceci de cela...

And how does the conservative, kinda Catholic President respond to the call for strict separation of church and state?

La Laïcité est une frontière qui protège les enfants, les femmes, la République. (La Laïcité is a border that protects children, women, the Republic.)

Sarkozy has expressed in the past a desire to open up a little more breathing room for religious folks to express their faith. However, like most French believers, Sarkozy spends more time defending la laïcité than groaning about it Here’s a summary of comments from President Sarkozy from a 2009 chat with the Council of European Episcopal Conferences:

He developed the point that we’ve heard him express before, namely that religions deal with the meaning of life, with the search for living together peacefully and seeking the common good, and act as a possible source of hope. We live in a society and in a Europe that needs that. The role of the state is not to give meaning to life, but to organise life. The meaning of life comes not only from religions, but from other schools of thought as well. Everyone develops his own convictions. But in this domain, religions have their place and their role to play” [Cardinal Jean-Pierre Ricard, quoted in Tom Heneghan, "Sarkozy Explains French Laïcité to Visiting Catholic Bishops," Reuters: FaithWorld, 2009.10.02].

Ah, France, where the conservative presidential candidate agrees with the genuine Socialist candidate that government is here to organize life, not provide meaning, and that people of all faiths, as well as those who reject faith, have a place in building that meaning and building their government.

Update 11:30 MDT: Don’t think that, were I a Frenchman, I’d automatically vote for the Socialist. President Sarkozy makes my choice difficult with this Tweet:

“Mon sport favori, c’est le cyclisme, que je pratique” #Stade2

— Nicolas Sarkozy (@NicolasSarkozy) April 29, 2012

Moi aussi, Monsieur le Président! Vive la vélo-cité!

Prairie atheists, take heart! South Dakota is not the most religious state in the nation. Gallup finds that we rank just 13th:

Maybe being only 13th is why South Dakota hasn’t struck oil yet: 55% of us just aren’t praying hard enough. Texas may be getting a petro-piety boost, but we out-Jesus North Dakota, Wyoming, and Palin-Land, and they’re reaping/ripping all sorts of wealth from the Earth. Hmmm….

The above map doesn’t capture all of the granularity, but it reminds us that, at 13th, South Dakota is the most religious state outside of the Bible Belt and the great Mormon Promised Land. And not that I want to impose a religious test on any candidate, but some of my Republican friends might find it interesting to note that Mitt Romney got his university education at Brigham Young in Utah, one of the most religious states, and at Harvard in Massachusetts, one of the least religious states. He chose to live in Massachusetts. Maybe he saw Massachusetts as an opportunity for more missonary work?

Gallup defines its categories thus:

1. very religious: ”religion is an important part of their daily life and… they attend religious services every week or almost every week”;
2. nonreligious: ”religion is not an important part of their daily life and… they seldom or never attend religious services”;
3. moderately religious: the squishy middle, either calling religion important but not going to church regularly or occupying a pew while not considering religion important (why? why?).

Other Gallup data suggest that South Dakota’s not-very-religious majority should get more religion if they know what’s good for them. The most frequent churchgoers experience 18% fewer negative emotions and 9% more positive vibes each day than non-pew-fillers. The very religious tend to beat us non-believers on every aspect of the Gallup Well-Being Index except for physical health (Trying to catch me on your bike? You really don’t have a prayer!).

Interestingly, the “moderately religious” fall below both the very religious and non-religious on the Well-Being Index. Riding the fence must give saddlesores….

All of these well-being stats are generalizations, not guarantees. You can find joyful secularists and depressed pew-sitters. Contrary to the belief of some nameless colleagues across the aisle, I find great pleasure and satisfaction in my teaching, my writing, my outdoor adventures, and my family. And if you’re looking purely for practical effects, I suspect a good breakfast can do as much for your well-being as that weekly trip to church… and you can do breakfast in your PJs.

Prayer kills. At least that’s the message Black Hills right-wingnut Bob Ellis wants you to believe. In today’s American Carrion, Ellis runs this morally and theologically offensive screed from William J. Federer to persuade us that if we just pray hard enough, God will kill our enemies.

Lincoln’s National Day of Humiliation, Fasting and Prayer was observed April 30, 1863. Two days later, a freak accident occurred which changed the course of the war.

One of the greatest generals the South had, Lt. General Thomas J. “Stonewall” Jackson, was surveying the field before the Battle of Chancellorville.

Returning to camp at twilight, May 2, 1863, one of his own men shouted, “Halt, who goes there,” but without evaluating the reply, a volley of shots were fired.

General Stonewall Jackson was hit by three bullets, two in the left arm and one in the right hand [William J. Federer, "Prayer Changes Things," American Clarion, 2012.03.30].

General Jackson was knocked out of the war. He died weeks later, praising God as he went that he could die on a Sunday.

God as sharpshooter—Why doesn’t that sound right?

The South had plenty of Christians praying as fervently for their deliverance from Northern aggression and the preservation of their dark-skinned human property. Their prayers went unanswered. Americans offered the Lord George Jesus Bush as their divine leader in 2000, then got walloped by bad guys on September 11, 2001.

But let’s not spend all morning cataloguing the coincidence of prayer and catastrophe. Let’s offer Bob this simple theological reminder: prayer doesn’t change God; it changes us.

A concerned neighbor highlights a quote I missed during the legislative session (yes, HB 1234 really was a plot to distract the Madville Times from other tomfoolery coming out of the Capitol):

HB 1253… is about as brief as they come — one line: “No court, administrative agency or other governmental agency may enforce any provisions of any religious code,” it reads.

Gov. Daugaard’s general counsel Jim Seward testified that the bill served to “answer the question of the Sharia law” without being unconstitutional or interfering with business interests.

This bill was motivated by a “growing demographic concern in Sioux Falls,” Seward said, referring to the influx of immigrants from majority Muslim countries [Kari Huus, "South Dakota Lawmakers Tackle 'Shariah Question'," MSNBC.com, 2012.03.02].

Forgive me if I make a big deal about the words of a man who is purportedly interested in running for Congress someday. But what does our governor’s lawyer Jim Seward mean by “growing demographic concern”? If a South Dakota city is growing, that’s a good thing, right? We’re not concerned about what religion the folks driving the growth may follow, are we?

As Gadeir Abbas, staff attorney for the Council on American Islamic Relations, wrote in a letter to Governor Daugaard before passage of our latest bout of official Islamophobia, HB 1253 “communicate[s] to the world that South Dakota does not welcome religious minorities.”

You’re telling me!

Please spare me the “War on Christianity” baloney. I’m not out there arguing Christians have no place in making in America greater. My fellow atheists, as well as American Muslims, Jews, and Buddhists aren’t telling Christians to get with our program or leave the country.

That message of rage and exclusivity is what Baptist preacher Dennis Terry is saying to all non-Christians. And that’s what GOP presidential candidate Rick Santorum stands up and applauds. Here’s the video from a Sunday night event in Baton Rouge:

I don’t care what the liberals say, I don’t care what the naysayers say, this country was founded as a Christian nation. The god of Abraham, the god of Isaac and the god of Jacob. There’s only one god, there’s only one god and his name is Jesus. (wild audience applause) I’m tired of people telling me that I can’t say those words. I’m tired of people telling us as Christians that we can’t voice our beliefs or we can’t no longer pray in public. I’m, listen to me, if you don’t li..love America and you don’t like the way we do things, I’ve got one thing to say, GET OUT (wild audience applause).

We don’t worship Buddha.  I said we don’t worship Buddha. We don’t worship Mohammed. We don’t worship Allah. We worship god. We worship god’s son Jesus Christ.

I believe the church is to be the conscience of the nation. The church needs to be the conscience of our state and our local community. Listen closely. Now hold on for just a moment. As long as they continue to kill little babies in our mother’s womb, somebody’s got to take a stand and say, it’s not right. God be merciful to us as a nation. As long as sexual perversion is becoming normalized, somebody needs to stand up and say, god forgive us, god have mercy upon us. And as long as they continue to tell our children they cannot pray in public schools or pray in open, public places today, somebody’s got to take a stand and say, god forgive us, god have mercy upon us. As long as they continue to tear down traditional marriage. Listen. God intended for marriage to be between a man and a woman and as long as they continue to attack marriage, somebody needs to take a stand and say NO! NO! NO! NO! (crowd erupts in wild applause)

I tell you my friend, I believe that Christians in America are the key to revival. I believe that Christians in America is the key to the economy turning around. I believe that Christians in America is the key to the jobless rate continuing to go down. I believe it’s a spiritual thing. If we’ll put god back in America,  put god back in our pulpits, put god back in our homes and in our State House and then in Washington D.C., then we can have revival in America and the holy spirit will show up and great and mighty things will happen for this country [Rev. Dennis Terry, transcribed in "Dennis Terry Introduces Santorum - tells non-Christians to GET OUT," Daily Kos, 2012.03.19].

We can only hope that such rhetoric is not supported by South Dakota Santorum supporters like Jason Gant, Lee Schoenbeck, Allen Unruh, and Leslie Heinemann. If you do, well, I may not want you folks winning elections, but I don’t mind if you stick around.

Last month the esteemed Dr. Blacnhard offered an intelligent explication of the Supreme Court’s Hosanna-Tabor ruling, which said in short that if you work for a church or religious organization, you do not have the same legal protections against discrimination as us secular workers. That ruling makes me queasy, but I can understand the logic presented by a unanimous Court and the good professor.

Now Dr. Blanchard pivots to show how Hosanna-Tabor undermines the argument that the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act’s requirement that church-affiliated hospitals include contraception in their health coverage is unconstitutional:

Hosanna-Tabor seems to work against the argument that the new rule violates Free Exercise of Religion. Pastors and “called teachers” are religious functionaries and thus enjoy the ministerial exception. The Court left open the possibility that, even in a Church, certain employees might be coverable by anti-discrimination laws if their mission was purely secular. I suggested the example of a gardener….

However, if a pastor is a religious functionary and even a gardener hired by a church may be such, doctors and nurses in a church-affiliated hospital manifestly are not religious functionaries. One might argue that they certainly are covered by all relevant employee discrimination laws for precisely the reason that pastors are not [Ken Blanchard, "Is the Catholic Hospital Rule Unconstitutional? No," South Dakota Politics, 2012.02.09].

As usual, when Dr. Blanchard talks Constitution, he gets serious and cites lots of precedent. See his discussion, particularly of Employment Division of Oregon v. Smith (1990), a case on peyote and employment rights. Justice Antonin Scalia wrote the majority opinion in this case, a fact pointed out with great glee by Pandagon in its similar argument that the Catholics riled about ObamaCare can’t make a Constitutional case out of it.

I joined several dozen fellow citizens for a town hall meeting with Congresswoman Kristi Noem today. I’ll have full video and a breakdown of the hour-long program tomorrow.

But I want to turn first to a heinous screed issued by a citizen toward the end of the meeting. The audio is weak, so listen closely (I’ll provide a transcript of the key statement below):

Tsars, Saul Alinksy, yadda yadda… but then, at 0:30:

…Recently here, Obama and Janet Napolitano appointed two Muslims, Kareem Shora, and Arif Alikhan, to the Department of Homeland Security. Now didn’t we have some devout Muslims—now this is important for Janet, they were both devout Muslims—didn’t we have devout muslims crash twice into the Trade Center? Didn’t we have devout Muslims that killed 13 peoople at Fort Hood? Didn’t we have devout Muslims that took over Flight 93 and crashed it? Didn’t we have devout Muslims that cut Daniel Pearl’s head off and threw Leon Klinghoffer over the side of a ship?

When I heard this anti-Muslim bigotry, regurgitated from e-mails that started getting forwarded in 2009 when President Obama appointed Kareem Shora and Arif Alikhan to serve their country, I almost spoke up. I almost interrupted and made a scene. My respect for the office and quasi-parliamentary decorum held me back. So did my fear that Noem’s aides would see my outburst as cause to throw me out. I held my breath, turned the camera and my eyes directly toward my Congresswoman, and hoped she would have a John McCain moment and tell this uninformed rube to stick his religious bigotry and tired memes where the sun doesn’t shine.

But she didn’t, not at the mic. The speaker had rambled on to his issues with the media and with Republicans who, in his imagination, somehow don’t sell their message with as much unity or aggression as Democrats. He thus tossed Noem a lot of manure around which to carefully step. She did not call the man out.

I hung around after the show. Nearly 40 minutes after the scheduled end of the program, after shaking hands and talking and taking photos with numerous other constituents, after doing a few minutes with the professional press, the Congresswoman made time to talk to me. I tried to keep it short. I said I was alarmed by the anti-Muslim bigotry expressed by the audience member. I asked her if she would disavow for the record such bigotry.

She nodded. ”I definitely believe that we have freedom of religion in this country,” she said.

I asked if that meant that she agreed that there is no place for anyone to say that Muslims are not qualified to serve in public office. She said yes. She does not believe in judging people by their religion. She does not condone such bigotry.

So hey, neighbor, Mr. “Outraged at the Lack of Outrage,” Mr. “Hiring Muslims shows you’re un-American.” I regret not coming up to you earlier and saying this to your face. I should have. So should have our Congresswoman. But your bigotry is the outrage. Your bigotry is un-American and un-Constitutional.

And Kristi Noem agrees with me. Thank you, Kristi.

Update 2012.02.05 07:05 MST: Meanwhile, in another glaring example of tone deaf doltishness, Gordon Howie’s Tea Party blog lets Brad Ford post another half-plagiarized racist screed lamenting the demise of White privilege. Apparently Brad Ford thought being called offensive and ridiculous was a compliment. And apparently, Ford can’t make up his mind whether we white folks are the oppressed or the oppressors. As Troy suggests below, maybe I just need to learn to leave crazy alone.

Neither vote on Hickey legislation went the way I wanted it yesterday. The Senate approved Rep. Steve Hickey’s silly Bible-study-in-public-school resolution, HCR 1004, and didn’t have the courtesy to add a clause putting conscientious and unbiased secular humanists in charge of such literary instruction. Meanwhile, across the hall, the House killed Rep. Hickey’s perfectly sensible speeding ticket bill, HB 1170, on a 30–39 vote.

As the good Representative notes, the Bible resolution got all sorts of press, more, I would argue, than his bill to make it possible to revoke the drivers licenses of habitual speeders. That shows the backward priorities of our media and our Legislature. Revoking the drivers licenses of habitual speeders promised to do more concrete good for the health and safety of South Dakotans than a toothless resolution that coddles insecure Christians whose faith apparently cannot survive without government support.

Alas, the most speeding you may see on South Dakota’s highways may be good people with a sense of Constitutional separation of church and state, rational education policy, and responsible government speeding away to other states not suffering the red-state failure with which my friend Mr. Kurtz diagnoses us.