Our U.S. Rep. Lauren Boebert recently said, “The church is supposed to direct the government. The government is not supposed to direct the church. That is not how our Founding Fathers intended it. I’m tired of this separation of church and state junk that’s not in the Constitution. It was in a stinking letter, and it means nothing like what they say it does.” Really?

The “stinking letter” was written by President Jefferson stating, “Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between Man & his God, . . . I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should ‘make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,’ thus building a wall of separation between Church & State.”

James Madison, considered the author of the Constitution, said, “Strongly guarded as is the separation between Religion and Government in the Constitution of the United States, the danger of encroachment by Ecclesiastical Bodies may be illustrated by precedents already furnished in their short history.”

Article VI of the Constitution provides that all state and federal officials “shall be bound by oath or affirmation, to support this Constitution; but no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States.” So Boebert’s opinion that the church “directs” the government is blatantly false. If you agree, make your voice heard on Nov. 8.

John Porco

Pagosa Springs