We may sit in the pews of one or another house of worship on the weekend, but that does not preclude our vociferous disagreement on political matters. Why? Because this is the United States of America, which by law prohibits the establishment of any religion.

In this great country, founded by people who fled religious persecution, you may be of any religion or no religion, and whatever your choice in that matter, it need not affect how you see political issues nor how you vote.

When a religious leader assumes the pulpit in order to tell you how to vote, it’s not a long step from there to telling you what you may read, with whom you may associate, how you may dress, whether and how you may work outside the home or local community, how your daughters and sons will be educated as they grow up to define the realities of tomorrow for all of us on planet earth.

Fundamentalist preachers of any allegedly Christian stripe in the USA may see themselves as bringing enlightenment to their flocks. However, to the rest of us they may look curiously like the imams of radical Islam.

Personally, if some preacher opened his or her mouth to tell me how to vote in the USA, that would be the last time I’d be found in that particular house of worship, and the last time my wallet would be opened in support of its allegedly charitable endeavors.

Do not imagine that some kindly pastor in the pulpit up there who is telling you how to vote today will be a cleric of the same religion telling your great-grandchildren how to vote, or that he will limit his dictates to matters of voting. What you wish for this afternoon may look very different thirty years down the road.

Think ahead. Give your great-grandchildren the same First Amendment rights you have. The only way to do that is to insist on the separation of church and state. Both church and state may make mistakes in their guidance of human beings. The chance of their making the same mistakes at the same time are fewer if they are separated than if they are sleeping in the same bed.