It’s interesting to see how the state of Massachusetts–truly the birthplace of authentic born-again Christianity in North America, thanks to the Pilgrims–has now become the epicenter of atheist liberalism. Proving my point, the Democratic Party of Massachusetts has passed a resolution recognizing the religiously unaffiliated, or the ‘Nones,’ as an important and growing demographic group worthy of respect, and aligned to values the Democratic Party supports.
The Non-Theist Recognition Resolution was introduced by Stephen Driscoll, longtime Co-Chair of the LGBT Sub-Committee and a member of the Executive Committee of the Massachusetts Democratic State Committee. Driscoll is an American Humanist Association (AHA) supporter who also serves on the Resolutions Committee of the Massachusetts Democratic Party. The resolution came to the floor at the party’s full state committee meeting on November 14. It passed on a voice vote with no objections.
The resolution supports the importance of this growing demographic in political outreach and fights back against the prejudice that atheists and the non-religious have no moral values. Nearly a quarter of the American population is now religiously unaffiliated, and most U.S. adults say that it is not necessary to believe in God to be moral and have good values.
It states that the Nones have tripled as a demographic the last two decades, and have also become “the largest religious group within the Democratic Party.” The resolution also states the Nones have often been subjected to “unfair bias and exclusion in American society, particularly in the areas of politics and policymaking where assumptions of religiosity have long predominated.” It goes on to claim that those who have used religion to define morality through public policy, as well as what is calls “misplaced claims of religious liberty,” are posing a threat to both the nation and the world.
“[T]hose most loudly proclaiming that morals, values, and patriotism must be defined by their particular religious views have often used those religious views to justify public policy that rejects well-established scientific consensus on issues such as evolution, sexuality, gender, women’s health, and climate change, thus threatening not only the United States but the entire planet,” the resolution states.
It says that the Democratic Party rather “recognizes that morals, values, and patriotism are not unique to any particular religion, and in fact are not necessarily reliant on having a religious worldview at all.”