Meet the Cathars.
They were a group of people who didn't believe the exact same things in the exact same way of the prevailing religious authorities back in medieval times. They believed in a more gentle faith that spoke about respect for all living things and not just for humans. They eschewed the dietary mores of the day and they advocated a diet that was low in killing of living things and high in the eating of vegetables and breads. They wanted no part of fighting or going to war, they believed in peace and they took seriously the commandment that said, "Thou shall not kill." The bottom line was the Cathars believed in peace and non violence all the way around, peace towards other humans and peace towards animals. This all of course pissed off people at Catholic HQ in Rome. They told the Cathars that they must bring their faith in line with the teachings of the mother church or they'd face excommunication. The Cathars said, and I'm paraphrasing here, "Fine, excommunicate us. We believe we're following God's word and you aren't, so what you say doesn't matter. We're going to live how we like and do what's best for us."
The folks at Catholic HQ in Rome said, and again I'm paraphrasing, "Oh hell no you won't." The Cathars were then not only excommunicated, they were hunted down and slaughtered for daring to believe something different from the theocratic leadership. There was one point when some Cathars were trapped with others in a church who may or may not have been followers of their doctrine and when the commanding Papal army person was asked if the Papal army soldiers should try to sort out who was and who was not a Cathar before the mass murder took place, the Papal commander infamously said, and I am not paraphrasing here, "Kill them all. God will know his own."
And that's the problem with theocracies in my opinion. If you don't believe the same things as the religious group in charge then you're going to be persecuted and perhaps killed. It happens in every theocracy sooner or later. In fact it's happening here in this country now and we're not a full blown theocracy yet. Senator Obama's minister is singled out for daring to have opinions that differ from the ones most of the mainstream churches have and now he's being hounded and persecuted for it, for the record I agree with most of what he said and whether you believe it or not we got attacked on September 11, 2001 not because terrorists hate our freedom but because we've supported oppressive regimes in the Middle East for many many years and because we treat people with brown and black skin like they are shit. On the other hand people who have made more hateful and insanely inflammatory remarks like Pat Robertson and John Hagge are not persecuted, they are applauded and lauded for being courageous enough to speak out.
Only when we get religion out of government all together can all our beliefs be safeguarded. I could care less if you choose to believe in Jesus or Buddha or Golems or Vishnu or Allah or the Flying Spaghetti Monster. As long as you keep those beliefs out of the sphere of government and you don't put one religion or belief system above any other then we'll all be fine. If we keep all religion out of government then all religions can concentrate on the thing they like to do best, hating atheists like me.
