I was counting the change in my pocket the other day and I made an interesting observation. All the coins and bills the United States stamps and prints feature the slogan “In God we trust.” I had two immediate responses to this discovery, first that we’re supposed to have separation of church and state in this country, and second that it just isn’t true.

“In God we trust” implies that we all trust in the God of Bible fame, or at the very least that we are all monotheists. Last time I checked around, that wasn’t the case. “In gods some of us trust” is a lot closer to the truth, although it doesn’t flow quite as well.

It even seems to be overkill, since we have another motto on money too. “E pluribus unum” or “out of many, one” is an excellent motto which really captures the history and essence of the United States But it is on the reverse of coins and if you look at a dime, they had to work pretty hard to fit it in.

It turns out that the first suggestion of using “in God we trust” was in a letter to the Secretary of the Treasury from a minister in 1861. On April 11, 1864 an act of Congress created the 2 cent coin which featured the slogan.

In 1907 the motto was omitted from new gold coins, but public criticism led to 1908 legislation that reinstated the motto on all coins it appeared on previously.

On July 11, 1955 Congress passed legislation making the slogan mandatory on all coins and paper currency.

At one point this legislation was challenged in the federal courts, but it was rejected by lower courts and the Supreme Court refused to review it.

I found this information to be extremely frustrating for a number of reasons. First, of all things to print “in God we trust on” only machine guns would make less sense. Secondly, after thinking about it for several days, I don’t think anyone could convince me that this doesn’t infringe upon 1st Amendment rights of everyone except people who still use the barter system.

No Congressman or federal judge with any remote desire of having a career is going to touch this issue because of the ensuing political fallout.

The most frustrating element is that the people who make it impossible to ever get rid of the motto are the people who benefit the most from the moderate society and Constitutional rights we have in this country.

The number of Southern Baptists increased 250% between 1940 and 1980. This increase was partially due to better organization, but primarily due to aggressive missionary and revivalistic outreach and zealous preaching. This still is not possible everywhere in the world today.

Say you have a theological schism with the Southern Baptist powers that be. No problem. In the U.S. you can start your own branch of Baptism. Lord only knows you wouldn’t be the first.

It was not so easy for John Calvin, whose theology led to Presbyterianism amongst other things. Calvin was kicked out of the University of Paris in 1535 because his friend voiced his support for Martin Luther.

Calvin spent the next two years moving around a lot, hiding from church authorities. In 1536 he published “Institutes of the Christian Religion” which catapulted him to the forefront of Protestant theology.

On a visit to Geneva he was invited by Guillaume Farel to assist in the city’s reform movement. He stayed until 1538 when the town voted against Farel and asked the two to leave. In 1541 Calvin was asked back and stayed for the rest of his life.

While Calvin was in Geneva the city was constantly threatened by the Catholic armies of Emanuel Philbert, Duke of Savoy. Dissenting Christians were expelled.

Calvin even approved the burning of Michael Servetus for heresy, although he recommended decapitation. Despite all of the theology he created he was buried in an unmarked grave in Geneva.

No doubt Calvin had a rough time, but he didn’t have the Romans showing up to pound Jerusalem to smithereens or feed him to the lions like the Catholics and Jews did back in the day.

While there are definitely religious tensions around, all religions benefit greatly from our moderate society.

Religious revivals, albeit well-meaning, usually don’t end up improving society. The Great Awakening was a revival of evangelicals in the American Colonies in the 1740s, not unlike the situation today. Traveling revivalists were generally welcomed at first as they increased conversions and church membership. However, their tactics often threatened the established clergy. Revivalists accused the establishment of being unconverted and leading congregations to spiritual ruin.

The result was that churches broke into factions and new religions such as Unitarianism appeared.

The overall effect of the Great Awakening produced tension and factional rivalry and disrupted whatever religious harmony previously existed.

“In God we trust” should be removed from U.S. coinage and paper currency, not to persecute Christians, but to show that the we are committed to the religious freedoms we have in this country and avoid contributing to the factionalization of society.

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Erik Hoversten is a senior in math form Eagan, Minn.