+25

Although my intention in the preceding two posts is probably easily reached, it is still good if someone ask: 

What view point are you talking about? All the verbs you mentioned in the Amendment describe things from the doer side?

to be capable to respond with:

I am referring to the view point that was applied at the earlier level in constructing the sentence and involved choosing those verbs which contains the grammar level you just described.  

+24

Continuing from the preceding post:

In trying to take account for a passive side of "respecting" I missed that by default there is no such side here unless proven otherwise. That is because I probably mistakenly compared the situation here with other situations where the word used, because of targeting the action from the receiving  side, is, unlike here, wide enough in its meaning to include a passive effect. The way the Amendment was written helped or directed me to notice that. 
By the way, I probably needed to do more thinking before putting the example of giving Christmas as holiday just because people like that, without intermediate reasons, in post +22, in the same basket with those in the lower half of the post preceding it.       

+23

Continuing from the preceding post:
One may wonder why the first Amendment was written in this manner. One benefit that just appeared for me here is in answering if "respecting" should be taken to count also passively. One can see the other two verbs used, "prohibit" in "prohibiting" and "abridge" in "abridging". Both of those verbs describe actions from a point of view focusing on their effect on the affected thing . "respect" on the other hand describe the action from a point of view focusing on the affecting thing. If "respecting" was also intended to apply for passively causing such effect it could have been replaced with a word directed toward the effect on the affected party like  "honoring".     

+22

I changed my mind from stating that giving holiday on Christmas violates the establishment clause to that I do not know. That is because it is very reasonable that the reason could be caring not about the religion itself but about what the people want and having a day off does not by itself contain anything honoring to the religion. That makes it similar to the examples I mentioned in the lower half of the preceding post for which I also need to change from affirming their validity to the I do not currently know position (However the point of contrasting them with the example in the upper half of that post remains the same). That is because I feel that I may have not given enough attention to the passive side in applying the establishment clause.
By the way, even with the way the court took things here according to its opinion in that case, how did Thanksgiving get thrown to the same basket with Christmas in relation to that clause? Thanksgiving could have been called Thank The Giving of God and people would generally go to their worship houses to thank God on that day and there would still be no proof of violation to that clause. That is because one very reasonable understanding here, if not the main one, is that the celebration is for a history event not related to religion.  Choosing to Thank God for that event no matter how wide spread would not change it to an establishment of religion. 

+21

Continuing from the preceding post:

In other words, the issue is different with that city than it is with the Congress chaplain example because even if the government of that city is certain that taking votes of all persons with right to vote in that city would approve the display of those establishments of religion, and assuming that would be representing the want for the whole city like how such process represent the want for Congress, unless this representation materialize and chooses those Christmas displays, the action of the government in making those displays would still be respecting those establishments of religion of those religious displays because it depends on the connection of those establishments to the people, in its decision to show those displays (This got to be the longest written sentence in history).
On the other hand, if for example, it is known that there is usually a traffic congestion on Christmas day and the government want to make that day a holiday because of that, or simply the government thinks that there is enough probability that there would be enough of missing work on that day because of being late to justify benefiting from counting it as one of the holidays it gives, then doing that wouldn't be respecting an establishment of religion even though there is a dependence on the connection of Christmas to people in recognizing the fact or probability that is the reason. The difference from the above situation is that the government in this is not doing something that is honoring or emphasizing the significance of a religious establishment (like a Nativity Scene or a Christmas Tree) and therefore needs the respect involved in doing that to be a pass through to another reason. Here, in the traffic congestion example for example, what the government interfacing is simply that traffic congestion or the probability for it to occur.     

+20

Continuing from the preceding post:

Here is a wikipedia LINK to an 1984 case in which the Supreme Court reversed the lower courts in their ruling that the Christmas decorations in question violate the First Amendment. I think that the court was wrong here and one can respond to the examples mentioned in the "Ruling" section there as follows. Yes, giving federal holiday on Christmas Day violates the establishment clause. But that practice began on 1870. The legislation providing for paid chaplains in the House and Senate, on the other hand, has much more importance here because of its proximity to the making and makers of the Amendment. However, that action does not necessarily violates the Amendment. That is because unlike the situation with the Christmas decorations of that city or giving Christmas Day as holiday, starting the action in question from the want of the same entity to which it applies and has the choice to accept or refuse can be claimed to be motivated by respect for the need or want of that entity without having that respect follows from a respect that was applied to the religious establishments first. Congress is good fit for that because representing its want is no different from making any other law.
The above was written with the assumption that the establishment clause also applies on the government there because I have not yet thought about the issue of the Fourteenth Amendment incorporating to this one.

+19

Continuing from post +17 and the issue of Congress making a law for printing "In God We Trust" on the money, as the main focus, I want to say that I cant see holding that as not in violation of the First Amendment except as clear denial and for a whole nation to agree on that, especially through out all this time, except as huge shame.

HERE is a link to the case of 1970.  Of course more can be said about that opinion but my focus here is on the two quotes from the final court at the end starting from "The course of constitutional neutrality...". One could easily point out here that the establishment clause could have been written as "Congress shall make no law establishing a religion" and one could still argue that it prohibits the action mentioned above. But it was not even written like that. Instead, the expression "respecting an establishment of religion" gives more weight to the lack of none religious interpretation for the "In God We Trust" statement than to its harmlessness. That expression is impressive with how much it seems to hit things from far. Although expressing the effectiveness of this expression in the establishment clause in terms of distance might not be that fitting because it is more like that the word "respecting" changed the dimension of the conformity measure with the clause from effect to meaning.    

Unless you show me a behaviour contradicting this interpretation that was very wide spread and very close to the making of the Amendment, I really do not care much how far this "motto" goes back in history. The signs I saw in relation to the focus and the careful way this constitution was written make me feel even more confidence in that it was written to be sufficient through merely its own content without any additional help.

I thought that this was printed on only paper currency but it turned out to be even on coins.

         

+18

Where I lived before here I was oppressed  as a citizen which, as bad as it is, also makes it easier to escape moral responsibility for the actions of my government toward others in the world. Democracy on the other hand as much as it is better, also brings harder moral responsibility because it is the citizen who is the decision maker at least at the root level. For this reason I, as a citizen here, refuse that my government does the injustice of helping in installing or supporting the continuity of nondemocratic systems anywhere in the world. Furthermore, nondemocratic systems do not have the right to represent their people and therefore dealing with them should be as limited as possible and things should be judged by what we see as good for the people there not what those governments seek. As a citizen here, I want the protection of being on the just side and not only the material protection from the outside.

In addition to the moral obligation to conform to the above, it is much more closer to your identity than printing "In God We Trust" on all paper currency. Is there a better example of a country that was rooted in democracy and still has it ongoing than here? And of course this is also much more on the path to God.  

  

+17

Continued from the preceding post

While this is far from being as important as the issue with the Second Amendment, it still demonstrates another scary example for how much people may allow themselves to follow their wishes blinding themselves off the facts. So the mentioning of God has nothing to do with religion? Are you people serious? Could the excuses to justify the "In God We Trust" on the dollar bill be more lame? I cant see how something as purely religious as this can be seen in conformity with the First Amendment. But lets assume there is a room for a doubt here. Still, the question to the legislators is do you people really think that you are more on the side of God when you take such risk of violating the agreement on the Constitution? Or is it that you do not care about hijacking God's name like this just to continue with an identity established based on the contrast with the communists?  

+16

We have a constitution saying that "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion" but still we put "In God We Trust" on the Dollar. For which one of those two things we should admit to just kidding ourselves?