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Internet Deconstructing State Church in Finland
Agnostic writes "Freethinkers of the city of Tampere, who advocate separation of state and church in Finland, created a Web site
in 2003
to assist people in resigning from the church. The Web site soon became a big success in Finland. 39% of all resignations in 2004 went through the web site and 69% of all resignations in 2005. In the same process 22% more people resigned from the church in 2005 than in 2004. The most common reason cited for resigning from the church has been saving church income tax (1.3% on average)."
Could someone from over there please explain how this Church Income Tax works? sounds scary. Of course, over here in the U.S. the old traditional Baptist churchs do their best to get everyone to tithe (10% of income), but it's not a line item on our form 1040
When I went through this process, it was not yet possible to resign through Internet. I had to visit the church office and the priest wanted to have a serious discussion with me. I was a bit rude and cut it short...
The exodus from the Church of Finland is just another example of the desire of citizens to opt out of certain government services that do not serve them. As an American I would like to opt out of Social Security, farm subsidies, K-12 public schools, and public television.
an ill wind that blows no good
Here's your paragraph slightly changed to demonstrate exactly how rediculous and hypocritical it is.
Aww. Are the little evangelicals scared the same tactics used against them that they use all the time? Boo hoo. People might decide religion is total garbage and embrace the 20th Century, we cannot have that!
The difference is the source by which they claim to derive their authority. Religions claim to derive their authority from god(s) while governments claim to derive their authority from the people.
That's about the only difference, though.
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
Everyone's knee-jerk reaction is to say 'good for you' but I wonder how much of a part their church instidution plays in providing support and services we now associate with government. Are these taxes simply lining the coffers or going to things such as a version of welfare and social services?
...at least from a German point of view, which is quite naturally the only one I can have with regard to this topic. ;-)
That term suggests that the church is somehow an official organ of the state. In Germany, that is not true. The churches (!) that are officially acknowledged as churches (!) by the state have the right to have their members pay taxes. This has been laid down in "concordats", i.e., treaties between state and churches, several of which exist since 1924.
The churches themselves are still independent, and so is the state.
It's not too much money, by the way. Not a reason for me to resign from my church anyway. Which, in turn, is just a personal opinion, of course. :-)
Political reasons. A functioning state church attracts religiously inspired people into one flock and under one "official" Lutheran doctrine that's very, very stable - and dare I say pseudo-secular in its tolerance towards minorities and other religions - in the long run.
This marginalizes the influence of the more miltant lunatic (evangelical) fringe and enhances the stability of our society. I would go as far as atttributing the complete absence of a credible religious right in Finland to the existence state church.
Those who seek the destruction of the one, monolithic state church should think about what they're wishing for.
The owls are not what they seem
Massachusetts was the last US State in to disestablish its state church in 1833 (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Established_church). The state church in MA was Congregationalism (which I think is now part of the very liberal "United Church of Christ"). When MA abolished state religion, they did it as a matter of public policy, not because the US constitution forced them. The idea that the several states are forbidden by the Federal constitutions to have a state religion is fairly modern and was only expressed by the Supreme Court in the 1940s. Up until then, established religion by the individual states and local communities was considered compatible with the federal constitution because the Bill of Rights was usually interpreted to only apply at the Federal level. However, as a practical matter, AFAIK every state has had a prohibition on offically established religion as a part of their state constitutions for a very long time.
In the US a church is a tax-exempt entity, a charitable organization. If they don't pay taxes for the revenue they bring in, and their members can write off the contributions to the church, doesn't that in effect mean the rest of us are paying money that people paying the church don't?
So if I take a vacation with my family I don't get to write it off. But if I donate the same amount of money to my church, who then sponsors an trip to Europe that we participate in, that money is deducted from my gross income. And I directly benefit from money I "donate" to my church.
If you move a few signs around the equation, isn't that the same as taxing people who don't go to church? Double-time? Because if I donate to Oxfam they don't take me on a field trip to another country. They use the money to help someone else.
You are checking your backups, aren't you?
You're failing to mention that every company operating in Finland also has to pay to the church. Part of the "communal tax" that's mandatory to all companies is paid to the Lutheran Church, no matter who works in the company. Effectively this causes everyone spending money in the country contributing to the Church. Last year they got 86 million euros this way, or about 17 euros per capita. I'd rather have that in my pocket and have a couple more pints. ;)
"Although it is not true that all conservatives are stupid, it is true that most stupid people are conservative."
I think you are mistaken. Bin Laden does not consider him a freedom fighter.
Bin Laden considers himself to be the next caliph of a new massive islamic state. He wants a strictly run theocracy free from immorality. He does not even want freedom for himself. I mean, you have a very wealthy but religious guy who could do anything he wants. He chooses to push islam, try to prevent corruption of a certain population by non-islamic values, and lead his own private little army.
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
Ironic, really when you consider how many of these revered founding fathers were as close to atheism as their contemporary society allowed.
Not at all - while many of them were not Christians, they were most certainly Deists. And that's definitely not atheism. However, they were also men of their times and the religion of their time was emerging from a period in which it had maintained a virtual stranglehold over politics.
Nonetheless, although some of the founders of the US were not Christians, they certainly held a moral code that is very Christian-like. Not necessarily because of the effect of Christianity, but simply because, to a rational, enlightened person, there are certain things that are simply "right" - or, as Jefferson put it, "self evident".
Enough were Christians, however, to have changed Jefferson's original wording of the Declaration of Independence to include the phrase "...endowed by their creator..." That's not what Jefferson wrote.
But I do agree that the US was not formed as a Christian country - in fact, the treaty with Tripoli from the late 1700's states that fact explicitly! However, since, for the majority of its history, the settlers of the US have been white, European Christians, laws and social mores have tended to reflect Protestant Christianity in general.
-h-
Hah! When I asked my college's priest (of my parents' religion) to remove me from his mailing list, the dialog was just like what you describe! He looked into his records and found that we went to the same (religous) high school, and asked me what was wrong with their brainwashing. (Brainwashing is my word; by the time I attended the religous high school, they primarily regulated religous education to be objective views on world religions and classes about ethics.)
No, I will not work for your startup
My standpoint is that a child in the womb is a special case. Pregnancy is different because the baby is literally living inside of its mother. I think that a person's body is their absolute domain. It's the one thing that you, or I, or a pregnant woman should have absolute control over. So I think she gets to kill it (or him/her, if you like) if she wants. Because I think her right to decide how she uses her body supercedes the child's right to live. If there were an alternative that allowed her to stop bearing the child but not kill it, I might be in favor of outlawing abortion. Now that I read my previous post again, "Do what you please about it" isn't quite what I meant. I probably should have said, "Do what is necessary to stop it." If it were possible to move it to an artificial womb or a surrogate mother, then outlawing abortion would be another matter.
It differs from a born infant's dependance on its mother or a patient's dependance on a hospital because in neither of those cases is a person forced to use their body in a way they don't want to. It's not about the child's dependance on its mother; it's that the one right supercedes the other. While I lean towards calling abortion morally wrong, I think that forcing a person to use their body in a way they don't want to is morally wronger. Or at least as wrong. It's her call to make, but that doesn't mean both alternatives are right.
I don't argue that a fetus isn't a human being. That's kind of a bitch move. For that matter, I don't think it makes a difference whether it is or not. In a few months it's *going* to be one, so it doesn't make sense to me to treat it with different moral standards.
Pregnancy is avoidable. I think it's a bad thing if a girl gets herself knocked up then has daddy pay to get the kid killed. It's especially stupid since she could have prevented it so easily. She's definitely going to Hell for it (not that I believe in Hell). But it's her body, and it's between her and the gods.
Pregnancy is different because the baby is literally living inside of its mother. I think that a person's body is their absolute domain.
Did you see the Simpson episode where Wigam (what's his name? - the police guy) tells Homer he can do whatever he wants to someone who comes into his house? So then Homer's like "hey Ned, come over" and grabs a club. And as Ned walks over Chief Wiggam says "it doesn't work if you invite them in".
Same principle here. A woman - or any person - has absolute sovereignty over their own domain unless they are the ones responsible for bringing someone else there. It's like (and this is a weird, stretched example - but a valid one) if I were to kidnap somebodys small child and surgically insert it into myself - does that mean I can do whatever the hell I want with it? Because now it's in me? NO - because I'm responsible for it being there in the first place, so I can't play that card.
Same deal.
And finally, don't act like in American law or morality you can do whatever you want with your own body. You can't inject certain substances and you can't commit suicide. There are limits here.
So again, BECAUSE the child is inside the woman as a result of of the woman's own choice the "my body" argument is not as valid, and the childs right to LIVE trumps the womans (self-compromise) right to have dominion over her own body (for a limited period of time).
One more thing. Imagine we could create an artificial womb - what then? I'd say a woman has the right to expel the child, but would then (as with a man) by financially obligated to it. You can't just create a kid and walk away.
-stormin
The Southern Baptist Convention has creationism. On Slashdot, we have porn.