religion’s values.
   That is—all foot-stomping by the religionists notwithstanding—ALL religious people are FOR faith and since the Christian Bible isn’t 100% wrong in that it is true that ... “No man", per Jesus's own words (Matthew 6:24, New Testiment, King James Version of The Holy Bible) "can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other.”
   So that--we can and will argue--since faith and reason are as different as different can be (that is, they are mutually exclusive) they are the two Masters you cannot serve. It is either reason OR faith, YOU HAVE TO CHOOSE, you can’t have both. Which one you choose to worship is of course up to you but if it is faith then you are not a secularist but a religionist.
   Secularists and Religionists IN THE WAR OF IDEAS are enemies.
   And they can coexist in peace and prosperity (of the material kind) if and only if they both worship ... freedom.
   Since I am a secularist and I worship freedom I believe that to so worship is a necessary part of the definition of what a secularist is.
   And let me add that when I was (an American) religious (person) I also worshipped freedom as did I also value reason. But eventually I worshipped reason AND freedom so-much-so that I ceased being religious.
   So even though I no longer am religious I still agree with The Bible on this one, you cannot--and let me repeat this so as to emphasise it and draw your attention directly to it--you cannot, cannot, cannot worship two masters.
   It is either reason OR faith.
   It cannot be both.
   It cannot that is, IF moral perfection is your goal.
   But of course, If not then-not.
   But, if the ‘then-not’, then not without payment (the nature of which is usually) in some percentage of your “life energy” pool that is not available to you because it is being used to ‘maintain’ the contradictory in two worlds: that is, in both your material world and in your mental world.
   Next, lets look more closely at freedom.
   {We’ll leave it for some f.u.t.u.r.e date the dealing with the thought that since it’s 2 worlds does this mean its doubly draining or since, conceptually/metaphorically, it’s (life) Nrg (energy) and in Mechanical Engineering energy is usually a power function – eg, Einstein’s relativity equation E = mc² , or more down to earth velocities, Kinetic Energy = ½mv² and so on – so that it’s quadruply draining???. Dunno (what about potential energy, e.g. that of hydroelectric plants = function of (mgh), a linear function. What about this???. Like I said, Dunno. To be revisited later and/or elsewhere, eg. level 3/Plateau 1 inside www.gdeering.com Gary’s Venns webside.) }
   Next, lets look more closely at freedom.
   Freedom is the value that links secularists and religionists together – at least that is, it does in America.
   Americans value freedom so much so that they have agreed to a kind of ‘live and let live’ mentality for the society that they have created here on planet earth and that just so happens to be located on the land mass known as USA, North America.
   To our knowledge, in No-Other-Land-in-No-Other-Continent on Any Planet Anywhere in the known Universe ( ←look in here--the FantasticTrip slide show--if you don’t believe me and not to deviate too far but notice end of this slide show PROVES ITS OPPOSITE ... *here for more* ) do volition possessing beings worship freedom as much as they do here ... in America ... on Planet Earth.
   And to repeat, even here in America so do religionists value freedom to a high degree.
   Which is to say, since even religionists in America have agreed to not succumb to the natural link between faith and force it is possible for all Americans—that is, not just those who readily accept the natural link between reason and freedom (p.80), but for all Americans—to live with each other in relative peace and harmony.
   So that if we want to maintain (that is, remembering that value is something we act to gain and/or keep, that is maintain so that if we want to maintain) freedom in America all-we-have-to-do is see to it that no faith-based group succeeds in taking over the political mainstream—be that group Religious or Secular Humanist or Environmentalist or whichever’ist.
   (You are right to feel here that I have not proven that the Secular Humanists and Environmentalists are faith-based so I guess this will just have to be another hypothesis for now ... ).
   Faith based groups—as the history of religion on planet earth so amply demonstrates—are expert at cashing in on human weaknesses (for example, take one of the worst of human weaknesses: the desire to get something for nothing, e.g., infinite longevity simply by wishing) as the means to controlling the minds of men and women and specifically of the minds of those men and women who have learned how to control reality.
   (That is, “t.h.e.y” want to control the Atlas Shrugged type Hank Readon Producers though not necessarily the Atlas Shrugged type Orin Boyle type “business men”).
   (Or as we like to think in Gary’s World: the would_have_made_its in-spite-of-the-system Bill Gates type producers versus the made_its because-of-the-system Donald Trump type “business men”.)
   (The fact that the American, Mixalistic Business Men Producers—via Globalization—are desparately leading the charge against being ruled—that is, being controlled in law--by their inferiors—who are in some cases their very own customers--is a different issue and one that is beyond our current scope.)
   Voila! since reason and freedom are now established beachheads as it were in our War of Ideas we can settle in to Winning the War after we add one more of the secular values to this beachhead.
   That value is, rights.
   (Man's) Rights (Appendix Article) are conditions of existence required by man for his proper survival.
   Individual human beings, qua volition possessing beings, are the only beings who possess ... and the only beings to possess ... rights.
   Consequently, anyone who is not for ... wait ... halt ... stop.
   Since I have dealt with the rights issues many many times over elsewhere I link the interested reader there for some of these dealings and move on to the rest of our secular values.