Last week, at the monthly meeting of the atheist discussion group I attend, someone, a retired urologist, offered this observation.  What bothered him the most about Christians, he said, was that, "They insist that the Bible is the word of God."  As a result, he continued, "We see Christians making proclamations about what is good for everyone solely on the basis of what they read in the Bible.  It's an affront to me and a threat to my lifestyle."
     George has a good point.  Although it doesn't need to, religious certitude can indeed make people culturally intolerant.  Hence, as when our ancestors' rulers invoked a divine mandate to govern, making any criticism of them inherently wrong and sinful, so do religious believers today, by attaching divine sanction to their political views, render any dissent as words from the gates of hell.
     Unfortunately, political pluralism doesn't work this way.  When the right to speech and religion is universal, everyone in a society must make compromises, to a point, about the extent to which she believes her religious laws apply.  Atheist George must be as comfortable expressing, verbally as well as practically, his viewipoint as does a Christian, Muslim, or Jew.
     God didn't make each of us unique for no reason.  We therefore mar the Bible's picture of human dignity when we stifle, without legitimate reason, one another's freedom to be who circumstance, upbringing, and pyschology have made her to be.
     Believe in God, yes, but believe in the integrity of what he has made, too.