Should “So Help Me God” be Banned?

Sorted under religion on January 3, 2009

Holy Bible Should Barack Obama leave “so help me God” out of the end of the president’s oath of office during his inauguration on January 20? A number of atheists and non-religious organizations think so and even went as far as to file a lawsuit Tuesday banning the words. In addition, the lawsuit also objects to plans for ministers to deliver an invocation and benediction, knowing that they will discuss God and religion.

As a president who has fought for the past two years for real change to come to America, will Barack Obama voice his support and acceptance for the non-religious community? Do we perhaps have the opportunity to change “freedom of religion” to “freedom from religion?” I highly doubt it. Not only were two similar unsuccessful lawsuits filed for the 2001 and 2005 inaugurations, but the change America will most likely be seeing in the next four or possibly eight years will simply be reversing and improving the damage that has been done to this country by his predecessor. This is not the time where we will see the reversal of the ultimate brainwashing due to the fact that this country is fueled by how far a group of people will go for a religion that they were either raised with or follow on their own accord.

Within the past few years a study was done to predict if and how many people would vote for someone who happened to be an atheist for president. The results showed that an atheist would most likely never see the presidency. But why is that? Does having one atheist president mean that the entire country and all of its people are going to hell? Would that president not take their job as seriously as a religious follower? Do atheists taint the name of America? Many believe they do, and even more so as we saw with this past presidential campaign, people were going as far as to saying that Barack Obama would not make a good president for American solely based on the fact that he was found to be a Muslim, thus initiating an entire “faith forum” where he was forced to prove his devoutness to Christianity.

An an atheist myself I have been subject to ridicule based solely on the fact that I do not believe in a higher power. Atheists in this country are experiencing the same discrimination as anyone who does not accept the government-appointed God as their own. While it was beyond time that we accept each and every human being in this country despite the higher power they choose or do not choose to accept into their lives, I think we have much further to go before we see that happen. In fact, I do not believe that even “freedom of religion” exists in this country at this time.

What do you think? Do you think “So help me God” should be banned from the January 20 inauguration?



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  • Name159
    I am a christian, and the atheists are probably going to love my remarks on this. In the Holy Bible, in the book of Matthew 5:37 (and read the few verses before this), Jesus is preaching on the Mount of Olives, and he comments about taking oaths. In essence Jesus says not to swear an oath by anyone or anything. Simply let your Yes be Yes, and your No be No. (Also can find similar remark in James chapter 5).
    Now I do not believe that God should be taken out of Presidential inaugurations, or out of the courts. In fact I think that a heartfelt prayer should probably preceed anything of a serious matter.
  • lneely
    Not only should "So Help Me God" be banished, but also "One Nation Under God" and "In God We Trust" and any other reference to mythical supermen in the sky. I used to sympathize, thinking that atheists were perhaps "going too far" by saying that god should never even be said, but I've jumped to the other side completely. Here's why.

    Religion was never intended to be a government function, and quite frankly, to have it as such is to start down a treacherous slippery slope. In the past, to make any reference to the creator-god was purely ceremonial, and religion was OUT OF THE QUESTION. It was a tradition, and a part of the secular deism practiced by the intellectuals of the past. Now, however, that same idea has been hijacked and abused by the Religious Right and the Christian Reconstructionists in order to achieve their own ends: to establish a theocracy in the United States. That alone justifies the effort of removing any and all references to any god in the government.

    People are wrong about motives, though. Some conservatives -- and even some atheists -- would lead people to believe that it's about "offending our sensibilities" or somehow treating us as "second-class citizens" because we have to hear the word "god" on TV. I can assure everyone that I don't give a flying %#$! about your feelings, and I'm not egotistical enough to think that my own should have any real influence on public policy. However, I do think that evoking an imaginary space daddy as justification for irresponsible policy is a harmful, dangerous, and divisive trend in our government that should be stopped IMMEDIATELY. If it takes legislation or a court decision for these nutjob religious activists in our government to knock it off, then by all means...
  • If you do not believe in god that is fine, but do not try to force your non beliefs on others
  • lneely
    It's good that you can be so tolerant, however, your argument is all off. This is not about forcing a belief on anybody. In fact, it's quite the opposite. Religion in government is about as compatible with freedom as a raging bull is with a china shop. All we are doing -- those of us who are fighting against this religious nonsense in our government -- is our civil duty as custodians to the freedoms that were handed to us on a silver platter by those who had to fight and die for it.
  • well, if the question is "should barack obama leave out "so help me god" at the presidential inauguration, i'd say the answer is no. i am sure that he will have the presence of mind to get up there and talk to good ol' god, whether or not he believes it. the fact of the matter is that there are certain things that this society of ours is simply not ready for.
    being an optimist, i believe that eventually our money and our court system and our pledge of allegiance will be rid of "god" references, but not while we as human beings on this earth still participate in bloody battle over ownership of land supposedly promised us by our "gods".

    but if the question is "should "god" be in the presidential oath at all?", i would of course say "hell no". it should be banished from the rhetoric of our entire political system. but unfortunately we have a LONG way to go before we'll be able to throw that yolk off our necks.
  • you're probably right that we are stuck with "so help me god" for at least one more inauguration, though i've he may not be doing the whole hand-on-bible thing. i am in agreement with lauren and the many other commenters who'd like to see it dropped -- regardless of obama's personal beliefs. it's a governmental function, not a private one, and as such god has no place in it. i personally am not an atheist but i'll call myself one in a minute if that will help get the various churches OUT of governmental business. i thought bill maher made a lot of good points (and made them well) in religulous, and i think he's absolutely right that organized religion is the #1 threat to peace on this planet. while i do have personal spiritual beliefs that are important to me, i do not belong to any organized religion and i never will.
  • I'm really on the fence with this one.

    I don't mean to pick at semantics, but "so help ME god" is more of a personal statement than a generalization of the entire US population's religious preference like oh, say, "one nation under god." It's more of an expression of his own way of being dedicated to his job as president. Basically I read it as, "If I don't live up to my duties, may God strike me down." Sure, as an atheist I don't believe in a god and to me personally ending an oath with something like that wouldn't bear any weight. For Obama to end his oath with "so help me god" as a Christian, it means he truly believes that he cannot speak the name of God to bear witness to a lie, or else he'll face some major Godly wrath. And once again, even though I don't think it's possible for a god I don't believe exists to unleash his supposed wrath upon the poor man, HE does. It's like imagining the worst thing possible, then swearing that you'll do something or else that horrible thing will happen to you. Now that I think about it, it's amazingly grim xD

    At the same time, not a lot of people have the ability to empathize with an oath that doesn't bear weight with them personally. Even if some people DO believe in some sort of god, they still won't make that leap from one religion to another and still feel alienated by Obama including "so help me God" at the end. Yes, it is a personal statement for him to make, but as the president elect of the US, he has a responsibility to remain as objective as possible. Personal matters really have no place in politics, especially if your upcoming presidency is already expected to unite people on all fronts, whether the divisions amongst those people be political, racial, religious, etc. But really, no matter what choice he makes, people are still going to feel left out in some way or other. If he takes it out, non-theists and people from non-Christian theistic faiths may be impressed, but many Christians will be taken aback and possibly lose faith in him. If he leaves it in... well, all the Christians will be included as usual and us non-theists and non-Christians will fade into the background like we always do.
  • I don't think the word should be banned, but I'm an atheist myself, and I do believe there are too much pressure from everyone around me to believe in God. It's actually more depressive than China where I came from. At least over there, I can choose to practice a religion or choose to be an atheist without worrying about other people looking at me funny.
  • Sidhe
    I've been inspired to do a little more research due to your post here and I have to amend my initial opinion in light of the following statement which makes absolute sense to me:

    "It is one of the fundamental principles of the Supreme Court's Establishment Clause jurisprudence that the Constitution forbids not only state practices that "aid one religion . . . or prefer one religion over another," but also those practices that "aid all religions" and thus endorse or prefer religion over nonreligion."

    http://www.aclu.org/religion/gen/16037res200203...

    It appears to me that the presence of the words "so help me God," the bible and the ministers qualifies as an endorsement of religion over nonreligion.
  • Happy New Year Holly! Startin' off with a bang aren't ya? FYI - there is no constitutional 'separation of church and state' - in fact this is just a small phrase taken out of context from a letter written by Jefferson to the Danbury Baptist Convention. The Constitution only says that CONGRESS will not support any particular religion. Religion is a state issue and it should be left up to the states to determine when, how, and where any religion should or should not be applied. The Supreme Court usurped the states' rights on this one in the monumental 1963 case that formally removed any form of religious expression from public schools.

    The only part of the Presidential oath that is written in stone is the President's commitment to defend the constitution against all enemies foreign and domestic. The part regarding "so help me God" is left up to the President. Thus far, every President identified themselves as Christian and have elected to keep it in there. In fact, they do not even have to swear in on the bible - that too is a personal choice.
  • Personally, I've always thought swearing on the bible in court was silly. As an atheist (or any-nonchristian for that matter), swearing on a bible would be more of a lie than anything I could say on the stand.
    I think because Obama is christian, it makes sense for "so help me god" to be said by him. If he were a different religion, or he himself didn't think he should, then it would be different.

    As for the atheist president; I would be far MORE likely to vote for an atheist president than one who was publicly religious. I like Obama because, though he is christian, he has pointed out that he doesn't believe his religious ideals should be forced onto the whole country. Publicly religious people have the tendency to push beliefs based on faith, not science or basic logic (proof being both Bush and McCain, not to mention little miss Palin). That is what bothers me, not that they're religious, but that they believe everyone should have to uphold their believes.

    <3
    Sin
  • As a Christian...I can tell you this. I do not believe that the Bible should not even be present at his swearing in. I don't believe that the Bible should be sworn on in courts of law. There is a verse in the Bible itself that says not to swear on "God's word"...but to instead, take an oath. So the people swearing on the Bible is going against what the Bible actually says not to do! The President-elect should raise his right hand and take an oath of office - period.


    A little history about "So help me God". When George Washington took the oath of office - he added the words "So help me God" after he said the oath. The phrase was not meant to be in there, Washington just added it.



    RightWingIt.com

  • So
    What ever happened to separation of church and state? What kind of message does it send if our PRESIDENT does not abide to such a principal. He already has so much religious controversy about him...

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  • As the resident religious nut, I'll say that it doesn't matter at all to me whether the religious language is included. Having religious language sewn through our governmental documents doesn't make the country more religious. The US as a whole has rejected true religion, but for some bizarro reason we feel the need to project the appearance of religion, even if it's not sincere.

    Whether you are religious or not, you should not be persecuted or forced to do something that goes against your beliefs. So if Obama wants to say it then he shouldn't be forced not to. However, I believe a Christian should express their beliefs with their actions, not their words (so it says in the bible). Seeing as how these particular words are so offensive to atheists, and really make no difference to God, having them included does more harm than good.
  • Religion and politics are the worst combination ever and should be separated , religion is just an obstacle for us to see that this is our heaven on earth or our hell if we choose
  • I strongly agree with the idea of banning "So help me God" from the inauguration and all government functions. We need to keep religion as far from government as possible.
  • I definitely agree, and sadly separation of church and state doesn't exist in this country; not by a long shot.
  • In response to the two previous comments, personal beliefs aren't really the issue. It's about keeping religion out of our government regardless of who is taking office and what their religious beliefs/practice may be. It's the principle of religious freedom and the idea that Christianity is seen as some sort of default in this country, which is why it's so commonly accepted in the first place. There's an obvious bias there that is very deeply rooted in our country -- and that is regardless of whether or not someone can eventually CHOOSE to leave those words out, which simply would not work. Besides the bias still being evident in its original form, which would probably still be the "default" oath, the oath is supposed to be the same for everyone. We can't flip back and forth. We can't alter it every presidency based on someone's religion. We don't change it for any other reason and we can't change it because of that.

    Personally, I don't think those words should have any place in the oath for reasons unrelated to Obama's personal beliefs, but I think now is a bad time to push for this simply because of who is taking office. If Obama is the first to leave out those words, regardless of the decision making behind it, the blame will be placed on him and a lot of idiots out there will use it as "evidence" to further justify the ridiculous claims already being made about his religious background, beliefs, and sense of morality. If he wants to leave it out, he should be able to, and hell, this should've been done a long time ago. But a sudden push for it as our first black president takes office? A president already facing a lot of prejudice due to his race? A president already facing a whole mess of unjustified and unnecessary controversy surrounding his religion? Now that's just bad timing.

    More importantly, I would like to see the words "under God" taken out of our pledge and "in God we trust" taken off our paper currency (although this will probably take much longer, unfortunately).
  • I could not agree more with you about "under God" being taken out of the pledge. Reminds me of when I was in high school. I refused to say the pledge for that simple reason and it was never a problem until 9/11 occurred. After 9/11 I guess the teacher caught on to my not saying it or thought it was weird because of 9/11. In either case, I was forced to bring in a home-written letter from my father saying not only that it was okay if I didn't say the pledge, but also why I thought it was okay not to. My father simply wrote a letter saying he didn't remember giving me or the school permission for me to say the pledge in the first place so he didn't see the big deal in my not saying it.
  • Sidhe
    I absolutely agree that "under God" should be removed from the pledge which would restore the pledge to it's pre-1954 state.
  • Sidhe
    I agree with Germaine, the oath should be reflective of the oath taker's personal belief system. I'm not a Christian and sometimes I feel bombarded by it (I saw a clerk in a store wearing a pin that said "It's Christmas...for Christ's sake" which to me is an example of inappropriate expression of religion) but as the oath will be Obama's personal statement, between himself and his creator, I think it is appropriate for him to speak it. Now if you or I were to be taking that oath, I would hope that we could say it our own way.

    Your post speaks to much more than the oath that Obama will be taking. I am sure that the solution has to come from the top down, someone (like Obama) has to say it's okay to be a non-Christian and has to reinforce it in their actions. Participation in the "faith forum" was indeed counterproductive to freedom of (and from) religion.
  • Holly... if Obama didn't believe in God then I think that he shouldn't say it, but since he does then I think it should be left in. I think banning it is not the way to go, but if a non-believer is taking the oath of office, then at that time we should look at changing it for them.
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