A City in North Carolina Elects an Atheist,
But the State Constitution Says He Can't Take Office

 
         Goats on the rise

    A sign of the times? Or perhaps the End Times? Either way, the unthinkable has happened: an openly atheistic candidate has won election to public office in North Carolina. Cecil Bothwell was due to take his seat in Asheville's City Council yesterday, but a furious campaign is underway to bar him.

    Bothwell: no horns on him.

        During the campaign, one of those standard-issue Swift Boat attack groups tried derail Bothwell's campaign by quoting him as having written, "I don't believe in supernatural beings of any stripe." Though he fought back against other charges, Bothwell stood by this statement and went on to win.   
    Opponents now rely on North Carolina's constitution, which has a quaint provision disqualifying from public office anyone "who shall deny the being of Almighty God." It's one of a half dozen states that persist in enshrining the deity in their election laws. Nevermind that the supreme law of the land, the U.S. Constitution, bars religious tests for office, that the 14th Amendment applies that ban to the states, and that the Supreme Court has laid down a string of decisions invalidating all such creed-traps. The local Taliban types are relying on the state constitution to keep Bothwell out.
   But the God-botherers are bound to lose, and an atheist will take office in the heart of Dixie. What does this mean?
    A little science from the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life confirms what many have suspected: we are in the midst of a great upheaval. Nothing like it has occurred in America since the early 1700s, when Jonathan Edwards helped touch off the Great Awakening with his fiery sermons. The sheep, to get a little biblical about it, are being separated from the goats.
    Sheep, as you know, are followers. Goats notoriously refuse to submit. Last year, the Pew Forum published a broad-based study that shows goats on the rise. The statistics are jaw-dropping: 44 percent of adults have, at a minimum, switched denominations. Morethan half of those have changed or dropped religion.
   At the core of the upheaval is the rapidly growing number of people who are disaffiliating -- just over 16 percent of Americans, if the survey holds true. Disaffiliation does not necessarily imply atheism. Without a doubt, many people are retreating into a kind of personally defined spirituality. It is, however, a firm statement against organized religion.
    The awakening, then, is to the bankruptcy of the traditional church model. Although at least a third of America is firmly entrenched in old-time religion, with its shepherds, hellfire, and scriptural laws, the rest is much more inclined toward tolerance, exploration, and individualism. The contradictions of traditional churches and other religious institutions -- from sexual predators in the clergy to money-grubbing televangelists to politburos in the hierarchy -- have woken up a lot of Americans. They are not only awake, they are a-walking to a new beat.
    This will only intensify the culture wars, of course, but for the moment it is good to be a goat.

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