I usually don't do this, because I don't like slamming people who come here, but this time, it's just got to be done. I am infuriated.

A comment was left on a previous entry that says: America was founded upon Christianity. Remember how the Pilgrims left Europe because they were facing religious persecution? Excuse me? America was not founded on Christianity! America was founded upon escape from religious persecution and the freedom to practice whatever the hell you feel like practicing. The Puritans didn't come here to start a land of their own religion, they came here in order to practice their religion without being shut down by the government or thrown in jail. And might I remind you that the Puritans were not the only people who came here? They were just the first to establish a permanent settlement. Many, many others help found this country -- including Jews, who were also escaping religious persecution, so does that mean that this country is also founded upon Judaism?

It is that kind of attitude that completely gets to me. Yes, the Puritans were Christians, but even they recognized the need for religious freedom and -- as far as I know -- did not actively attempt to convert anyone to their beliefs. In addition, if the Founding Fathers felt that Christianity was the way to go and that our country should be founded on it, you'd think they'd have left freedom of religion out of the Constitution -- or they might not have even written the Constitution and just based our laws on the Bible.

There is no way in hell that our country was founded on the basis of Christianity. Our country was founded as an escape for people who wanted to be free of persecution, be it religion-based, tax-based or government-based. The people who came to America came to start over in the "Land of the Free," as we've called it for so many years, in order to be in a culture where they didn't feel an overriding pressure to convert to any kind of religion or way of thinking simply because it was crushingly prevalent or the government told them to.

It is this kind of Christian arrogance that gets to me. Admittedly, not all Christians are like this, but there definitely are some -- those who believe that it is their duty to go out and spread the Word and bring everyone into the fold and scream hellfire and damnation at those who aren't. Yes, Christianity is the most prevalent religion in the world. Maybe it's because way back, 1000 years ago, the Crusades killed off so many people of other religions that they became even more dominant. (And on a side note, here's something else I don't understand. One of the Ten Commandments that the Christians claim to hold so dear is "Thou shalt not kill." So how can they justify the Crusades? "Oh, well, killing in the name of God is okay." Well, I know of a group of guys who were also killing in the name of God, except they used a few Boeing 767s, so should we forgive them? Oh wait, they were killing in the name of another God...) Maybe if Hitler hadn't wiped out so many Jews in World War II, Judaism would be a more dominant force -- if you imagine how many future generations of children also died with those 6 million, that's a lot of people.

Yes, our country was founded by Christians. That does not mean it was founded on Christianity. The Puritans came here to practice their religion in freedom. Just because they were Christians doesn't mean that they founded the country on Christianity. Most of the original settlers of this land were also English, so does that mean that this country was founded on an English way of life? So how come we're not imitating that anymore?