The mayor of New York City has involved himself in controversy by stating that he won’t separate church and state, which is one of the principles the founders of the United States included in the Constitution.
According to The Huffington Post, Democratic NYC Mayor Eric Adams created an uproar while attending an Interfaith Breakfast at the New York Public Library on Feb. 28. In a speech, he asserted that he walks and talks with God and he “will always be a child of God.” He claimed that he can’t separate his religious beliefs from what he was sworn to do as Mayor of New York City.
But, one of the founding fathers, Thomas Jefferson, stated in an 1802 letter that there should be “a wall of separation between Church and State” on interpretations of the First Amendment.
Adams said to the audience, “Don’t tell me about no separation of church and state. State is the body, church is the heart. You take the heart out of the body, the body dies. I can’t separate my belief because I’m an elected official. When I walk, I walk with God. When I talk, I talk with God. When I put policies in place, I put them in with a God-like approach to them — that’s who I am.”
“I … will always be a child of God, and I won’t apologize about being a child of God,” he added.
The mayor also said, “When we took prayers out of schools, guns came into schools.”
The New York Daily News reported that other religious leaders and politicians who were in attendance, did not necessarily agree with what Adams’ statements.
The executive director of the New York Civil Liberties Union, Donna Lieberman, also commented on the thought process of the NYC mayor.
“It is odd that Mayor Adams would need a refresher on the First Amendment,” Lieberman said. “After all, he has sworn to uphold the Constitution more than once, first as a police officer, later as a state representative, and then last year upon becoming mayor. The very opening passage of the Bill of Rights makes clear that church and state must be separate.”