an since you are in a hurry you can if you wish reply to my next posting at your leisure. I present a hypothetical situation but one that is not outside the realm of possibility. Before I do proceed, I also agree with most of your reply but still have differences with "Love thy neighbor as one self" in how you presented it. Nonetheless please consider this ....

Leviticus 17:10-14 has a very clear message concerning the abstinence from ingesting blood. It clearly says, “You must not eat blood”. It is considered a command as serious and important, as “You must not kill”. Let us suppose I am a man of great influence socially and financially. In fact I have tremendous power due to the fact I am a founder of a new movement that believes in this command ”You must not eat blood”and a following of high ranking positions of office. As a God fearing Christian I take it upon myself to spread this message for I to believe that I should "Love thy neighbor as myself" and are concerned for everyones soul. To eat blood is to ingest it in any way shape or form be it, thru the mouth or thru transfusion. So having the ability and social backing of my movement I thru non-violent action seek to close all blood banks across America in fact I also try to prevent transfusions in all hospitals.

This movement not only thinks that no one should eat blood but it also is against cannibalism. Cannibalism is another form of ingesting blood and is extended to refer to any species consuming members of its own kind. Organ transplants is a form of cannibalism. Using my power and with the movement’s backing I petition Congress and try to persuaded them to remove “organ donor approval” from the back of driver’s licenses. All Doctors performing organ transplants are picketed, offices are surrounded and the doctors themselves are dragged into to court to justify their actions. In fact my movement is so persuasive that the Supreme Court is presented with this case to decide if cannibalism and organ transplants are one in the same and should be illegal.

This is where it gets personal. Receiving a blood transfusion and an organ transplant can easily become the right in question due to the imposition of another man and or movement. Having set the scene lets bring it home, Dorothy you find yourself in the hospital in need of both a blood transfusion and a heart transplant. There I stand at the foot of your bed holding in my hand a court order preventing you from getting them. Why, because I have found a way to impose my beliefs and interpretation about the word of God upon you. So ask yourself Dorothy if this scenario is indeed possible, yes it is because with the right amount of money anything is possible. Just a few short years ago we never thought Tom and Harry could marry and a black man would be in the white house. Let me continue, how would feel having me tell you that you are no long allowed or responsible for your life. How would you feel me imposing my beliefs on you? How would you feel knowing I had the ability to prevent you from getting a blood transfusion and a heart transplant. It’s your life; you should be able to make these choices right wrong or indifferent. Who am I to quote the Holy Scriptures to you “ You Must Not Eat Blood”!!! Yet this is a very real possibility where you would be left dying in a bed because I thought you were about to commit a sin.

I hope to God that you are not in this situation due to your heart and please forgive me I wish you no ill will. But Dorothy my point here is this, It is not that you believe if abortion is right or wrong, it is not that the eating of blood and cannibalism is right or wrong. We both live in a world where we have religious freedom and can practice our faith freely. Spread your religion, viewpoint, and faith amongst your fellow worshipers, do so openly. The point I am trying to make is that the imposition of these beliefs on another human being, no matter how strongly you feel about them, is ethically, morally and religiously wrong !!! I hope and pray I never nor any other man or woman has this much power that they can go around saving souls in such a way.

Sincerely
Ron

Dorothy,

In the aim to focus on what is genuinely debatable and controversial, it helps to distinguish between two kinds of reliance’s on religious grounds. An assumption from which I start is that legislators and also citizens fail to fulfill appropriate roles in liberal democracies if their grounds for political behavior are to promote constitutional violations or to undermine basic features of liberal democracy. These conclusions carry us some distance in respect to possible self-restraint about religious grounds; but great care is needed.

Basic premises of liberal democracy definitely preclude practices of “religious imposition” and reliance on what I call imposition reasons, but some reliance’s on religious grounds neither generate impositions nor amount to imposition reasons. Whether self-restraint is appropriate for these latter religious grounds is the critical controversial subject. A substantial degree of religious liberty is a basic requisite of liberal democracy. Many think the government should not encourage any particular faith or religion in general; others disagree. Dorothy I am sure you concur that the government should not actively suppress religions or sharply discourage the exercise of particular faiths. To take a concrete example: although most people in the United States are Christians, forbidding or actively discouraging the practice of the Jewish religion would be antithetical to existing premises of our political order. Legislation that imposed a special fee for the practice of Judaism would offend a widespread sense of what is just and it would violate constitutional rights, not only as those rights are presently construed, but also as people would construe them who would allow many more connections between government and religion than has the modern Supreme Court. A fee to practice a particular religion would be a “religious imposition” at odds with premises of liberal democracy. Such a fee would by its objective operation constitute an imposition, independent of the motives of those who adopted and administered it.

Dorothy, one of many imposition reasons can be illustrated with respect to classroom prayer in public schools. People disagree whether such prayer itself constitutes an imposition on those whose beliefs do not correspond with the prayers. Many people are critical of the Supreme Court decision barring such prayer and do not think modest state support of religious practice violates basic premises of liberal democracy. Supporters of school prayer tend to say that so long as students need not participate and can be excused from the classroom, the pressure on nonbelievers is not very great and is acceptable. Suppose that Herman is a local school board official who is supporting a constitutional amendment to permit organized classroom prayer. It happens that Herman is extremely hostile to the Jewish religion and wants the school environment to embarrass Jewish children into abandoning their faith. Herman assumes that in his dominantly Christian community most school prayers will be explicitly Christian, and he believes that school prayer will actually put tremendous pressure on nonbelieving children. That, indeed, is his main but unexpressed reason for supporting school prayer. His reason is an imposition reason. Whether or not school prayer objectively amounts to an imposition, Herman's reason for supporting it is an aim to impose that itself conflicts with basic premises of liberal democracy.

"Religious liberty does not mean the freedom of a religious sect or a combination of groups to organize for a political takeover and impose religious beliefs or requirements upon minorities."
by Paul D. Simmon in his 2000 book Freedom of Conscience

There are quite a few people in the United States who seem to think that when they are not able to impose their beliefs on others, their religious freedom is being imposed upon. They need to be helped to understand that religious freedom applies to all, even religious minorities, and that the imposition of beliefs or requirements upon others is a violation of *their freedom.

Here's a sentence from Princeton philosophy professor's Kwame Anthony Appiah's new article in Slate: "We can encourage religious engagement in the public square but insist on freedom from religious imposition and the widest workable range of religious expression."

Tom Brokaw, the moderator of "Meet the Press," Speaker Pelosi was asked, "When does life begin?" She responded: "We don't know. The point is that it shouldn't have an impact on the woman's right to choose…. I don't think anyone can tell you when life begins, when human life begins."

In speaking to Brokaw on "Meet the Press" several weeks after the interview with Pelosi,Senator Joseph Biden was asked the same question, "When does life begin?" He responded, "Look, I know when it begins for me.… I'm prepared as a matter of faith to accept that life begins at the moment of conception. But that is my judgment. For me to impose that judgment on everyone else who is equally and maybe even more devout than I am seems to me is inappropriate in a pluralistic society."Senator Biden suggests that the answer to the question of when life begins is knowable, but albeit only as a matter of faith, not as a matter of scientific fact. Therefore he argues, since the USA does not allow matters of religion and faith to be legislated, it would be unconstitutional to force a "belief" on others.

Sorry for the lengthy delivery and I apologize for posting this after your invitation of email ...
Ron