The First Amendment & I

For many years, a couple of decades in fact, I've been an outspoken proponent of the separation of church and state. What haven’t been readily apparent are the reasons why.
My spiritual path in my youth was a wandering one. My mother always made sure that we attended a church; she wasn't particular what church we attended as long as we went. Between the ages of six to fourteen, I attended Methodists, Baptists, Assembly of God, Church of God and various evangelical churches. Each church had its own approach to Christianity, and many were openly hostile towards the others. In 1976, my stepfather introduced me to Catholicism. After attending for a few months, I decided to join the faith; I was attracted to it, and it seemed to be the most original.
Before I joined the church, though, I heard various negativisms from the other denominations about Catholicism, though I paid little heed to each one. None of them seemed to be based on reality, at least to my young mind.
In my senior year in high school, I was very active in the CYO, the Catholic Youth Organization; I even held a number of offices in it. I also served as an altar boy as needed. I grew to love the religion. About this time, I decided to attend a couple of meetings of the Bible Rap club at school. Those meetings turned out to be rather cold.
Whenever I tried to talk, I was basically ignored. This hurt; these were my classmates, after all. One day, after a meeting, I approached one of the club members and asked her why I was ignored. Her response stunned me; "It's because you're Catholic, you're not a Christian." She was Baptist, she went on to explain, and they all knew about my religion.
I quit the meetings at that time. The truth was, the vast majority of my hometown leaned Baptist, and her opinion was not an isolated one. This situation made it difficult to be Catholic anywhere, it seemed. It was going to get worse.
A group known as Campus Life began having rallies at my school. I attended these, and really enjoyed them, fully aware that there was a definite Christian undertone to them. After one of the rallies, I was approached by one of the spokespeople, who asked, "Robert, are you saved?"
"When you asked, 'saved', you mean accepting Christ as my Savior?" I responded.
"Yes... are you?"
I looked at her with incredulity. "I was just confirmed into the Catholic church..."
"Oh, then, you're not saved..."
That was the point where I walked away. About this time, Campus Life was no longer holding its meetings on school grounds, but instead at a public park in the Glynlea area of Jacksonville. However, most of the schools in the area backed, even encouraged, students attending, regardless of their faiths.
As a young Catholic, I was angered to tears. I wanted so badly to fit in, and these social events seemed like a good way. Because I was Catholic, "not a Christian" to many of my fellow students, I was made to feel ostracized. I may have been a good person, but I was still going to hell, it was certain. The fact that many of these happened under the auspices of school extra-curricular activity, public school, didn't help.
Up to that time, I never paid the First Amendment much attention. Afterwards, after I had succinctly experienced why it was needed, I began to understand. America is a plural society. There are many forms of Christianity here, as well as other faiths. Allowing one religion to dominate too many aspects of public life is rife with problems. The First Amendment exists not only to keep religion out of government, but to allow the various religions to exist together in a legal manner, not allowing one to dominate another. It's not anti-religious, as some pundits would write, but irreligious; it cares not the faith, nor does it prohibit the exercise of.
Allowing one faith's religious views to dominate public discourse is a slippery slope. There are people who want a constitutional ban on flag burning, yet many of these people hold the flag above that cherished document, the one which our very freedom is based. The flag is just a symbol, the Constitution is a statement of what we, as Americans, believe. Or at least what we believed.
Don't let go of our freedom, the freedom to worship as we see fit.