"..."an" is an all important little word in there, don't you think?"

no... My 'misquote' is irrelevant in this context.


"...I have to argue that those same positions were not extreme. They were, as you say, the "norm"."

That is either irrelevant nit-picking or superficial reading of the point I was making - perhaps both.

slowly...Positions that we, today, view as extreme, were once the norm...(as you say) THEREFORE, because religious positions change over time, there is no particular reason to say that any of them are 'more' correct than others...except subjectively.

"But virtually every instance appealed to divine authority to bolster and substantiate whatever code they were attempting to enforce."
   Yes...and thank you for helping to make my point. *IF* they made such appeals, when "divine authority" could not possibly support all the requests for support, the conclusion ought to be that there is NO rational way to base a code on any 'divine authority'. Yet, we have regular attempts, both silly & serious, to insert such things into the various legal codes in order to control the behavior of those who do not recognize religious authority!
   (the most obvious examples of issues which regularly arise are abortion, prayer in schools, teaching of evolution, display of religious themes on public property, insertion of "under God" in our Pledge of Allegience, placement of "In God We Trust" on our money...etc..)
   

finally, you say you agree with me....."the proposed legislation looks pretty harebrained. With the First Amendment in place it is wholly unneeded."...yet, it WAS proposed: and it feels very much like an attempt to weaken aspects of the 1st amendment, or to define a specific interpretation of it.

I keep responding to some of these threads and arguments because there is an ongoing implication that because there were some various historical religious themes in our past, the imposition of laws based on them is somehow justified. Lest you be tempted to make light of this, I note that I hear regularly assertions that 'we are a Christian nation'. We are NOT...we are a nation which protects the right to BE Christian....a position I approve of, as long as I can safely and comfortably be non-Christian.