Monday, August 30, 2010
Friday, August 20, 2010
N.C. Court of Appeals: Religious NC College Can't Have Police
You read that headline right.
Davidson College, is a private liberal arts college located in North Carolina, just 20 miles north of Charlotte. Davidson is a Presbyterian college of about 1,800 students and is rated as one of the best liberal arts schools in the United States. Like many other schools in the state, Davidson College has its own police department.
Under North Carolina law, a police department for a school or a community must be certified by the North Carolina Attorney General’s office. The department must have undergone the training required to certify the department and its officers must meet the law enforcement standards and training required by state law.
Now, let’s get to how this started.
In 2006, a Davidson College police officer stopped a car on a street adjacent to the college campus. The driver, Julie Ann Yencer, who was not a Davidson student, pleaded guilty to driving while impaired but appealed.
The Court of Appeals ruled that because Davidson College has a religious affiliation, it's officers should not be allowed to carry out laws on behalf of the state. The court called it a violation of the U.S. Constitution’s prohibition of laws establishing religion. Judge Jim Wynn in writing the unanimous opinion for the court said that allowing the officers to do so created "an excessive government entanglement with religion".
Wynn, who left the state bench last week to join the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals also said in the opinion that the school's police power "is an unconstitutional delegation of 'an important discretionary governmental power' to a religious institution in the context of the First Amendment".
The unanimous ruling by the state Court of Appeals means that there is no automatic appeal to the state Supreme Court. If an appeal is sought, the other two judges urged the Supreme Court to consider the case so as to clarify whether a religious affiliated college or university should be delegated the authority to carry out the state’s laws if that school does not seek to impose it’s beliefs or indoctrinate students.
At no point in this case was it ever claimed that the officer chastised Ms. Yencer in any way that had any religious context or undertones. He cited her for driving while impaired, and she pleaded guilty.
So, just how far reaching can this ruling go? If a police officer is wearing a Cross, a Crucifix, or a Star of David, could it not be possibly claimed that delegating that officer the power to enforce laws for the state is a violation of the U.S. Constitution’s prohibition of laws establishing religion? Could not some other court, or even this court say that would be “an unconstitutional delegation of an important discretionary governmental power” to a religious individual?
What about hospitals, nursing homes, retirement centers, children’s homes and orphanages that have a religious affiliation? Could not someone somewhere bring court proceedings against these because they are recipients of some governmental fundings? After all, why would the courts not rule that this was also a violation of the U.S. Constitution’s prohibition of establishing religion?
Davidson College, is a private liberal arts college located in North Carolina, just 20 miles north of Charlotte. Davidson is a Presbyterian college of about 1,800 students and is rated as one of the best liberal arts schools in the United States. Like many other schools in the state, Davidson College has its own police department.
Under North Carolina law, a police department for a school or a community must be certified by the North Carolina Attorney General’s office. The department must have undergone the training required to certify the department and its officers must meet the law enforcement standards and training required by state law.
Now, let’s get to how this started.
In 2006, a Davidson College police officer stopped a car on a street adjacent to the college campus. The driver, Julie Ann Yencer, who was not a Davidson student, pleaded guilty to driving while impaired but appealed.
The Court of Appeals ruled that because Davidson College has a religious affiliation, it's officers should not be allowed to carry out laws on behalf of the state. The court called it a violation of the U.S. Constitution’s prohibition of laws establishing religion. Judge Jim Wynn in writing the unanimous opinion for the court said that allowing the officers to do so created "an excessive government entanglement with religion".
Wynn, who left the state bench last week to join the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals also said in the opinion that the school's police power "is an unconstitutional delegation of 'an important discretionary governmental power' to a religious institution in the context of the First Amendment".
The unanimous ruling by the state Court of Appeals means that there is no automatic appeal to the state Supreme Court. If an appeal is sought, the other two judges urged the Supreme Court to consider the case so as to clarify whether a religious affiliated college or university should be delegated the authority to carry out the state’s laws if that school does not seek to impose it’s beliefs or indoctrinate students.
At no point in this case was it ever claimed that the officer chastised Ms. Yencer in any way that had any religious context or undertones. He cited her for driving while impaired, and she pleaded guilty.
So, just how far reaching can this ruling go? If a police officer is wearing a Cross, a Crucifix, or a Star of David, could it not be possibly claimed that delegating that officer the power to enforce laws for the state is a violation of the U.S. Constitution’s prohibition of laws establishing religion? Could not some other court, or even this court say that would be “an unconstitutional delegation of an important discretionary governmental power” to a religious individual?
What about hospitals, nursing homes, retirement centers, children’s homes and orphanages that have a religious affiliation? Could not someone somewhere bring court proceedings against these because they are recipients of some governmental fundings? After all, why would the courts not rule that this was also a violation of the U.S. Constitution’s prohibition of establishing religion?
Sunday, August 15, 2010
The Digital Catholic Bible
There is a free version of the Catholic Bible available for download. It is called the Digital Catholic Bible (DCB).
Here is the information available from the DCB website:
Digital Catholic Bible contains 9 free distributable bible versions:
* Nova Vulgata (Bibliorum Sacrorum Editio) / VATICAN (Latin)
* Christian Community Bible / SOBICAIN (English)
* Douay-Rheims Bible (Challoner Revision) / JMC (English)
* La Bibbia / SOBICAIN (Italian)
* Biblia Sagrada / SOBICAIN (Portuguese)
* La Bible Des Communautés Chrétiennes / SOBICAIN (French)
* El Libro del Pueblo de Dios / SOBICAIN (Spanish)
* La Biblia Latinoamericana / SOBICAIN (Spanish)
* La Santa Biblia / SOBICAIN (Spanish)
DCB also offers 4 bible text operations:
* Read - read a chapter or specific verses of a book.
* Search - search the bible text for specific text.
* Query - invoke the bible text directly from a short biblic notation.
* Compare - compare a chapter of a book from two different bible versions.
DCB supports 5 interface languagues:
* English
* Spanish
* Portuguese
* French
* Italian
On their download page, there are also versions available for almost any java-enabled mobile device. You can download one language version for your device.
There is also an Android version that works with Android version 1.6 and higher, and the setup includes all 9 Bible versions.
The PC version works on any version of Windows and in Linux and MacOS under WINE, and includes all 9 Bible versions available in DCB.
You may download DCB by going to: Digital Catholic Bible
The two images on this post are my screenshots of DCB. Both show the first chapter of The Gospel of John. The one at the top is the Douay-Rheims version in DCB, and the bottom is the Latin version.
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