I think we indulge in too much public one-upmanship on the role of God, not only in the creation of this country, but in our present-day lives. I say that even though I am a Baptist and a regular churchgoer.

Things really got out of hand in recent days with the torrent of attacks on those California judges who ruled the words “under God” out of the Pledge of Allegiance. There are those who refer to the judges as knuckleheads and claim they have offended the Founding Fathers.

Balderdash! Forget the misleading headlines declaring “God is unconstitutional” or “Pledge of Allegiance is un-American.” For all their personal flaws, the Founding Fathers who set up our remarkable Constitution it was signed by George Washington and 37 others had the foresight to make clear in the First Amendment that “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.”

In other words: Keep the government out of our religious lives. They recognized how difficult the task would be to forge 13 disparate states into one nation if an official religion were chosen.

That’s why I believe Ol’ George and the others would agree that the California court interpreted the Constitution perfectly in our pluralistic society.

While the decision in the case brought by Michael Newdow has given the talk-show gasbags a lot to howl about and the candidates something to run on, it really doesn’t affect how and what we believe theocratically. It merely limits our abilities to force others to see, feel and believe as we do.

I always think of the hypocrisy of the Pilgrims and their contemporaries who supposedly came to North America from England in search of religious freedom. Once they got here, they usually set up such an oppressive system that religious freedom was denied to dissenters.

Have no fear: You may still live your life “under God,” but the Constitution does not mandate God in our polity or our civic lives. Speaking of which, how many people have actually taken the time to read the document and learn that?

The court’s decision “does not sit well” with President Bush, so maybe he should go back to the Constitution, too. One can have an unshakable allegiance to this country and its brand of democracy without having to be an adherent of any religion.

The Constitution does not require any political officeholder to be religious, though you’d be hard-pressed to know that by the speed with which members of Congress rushed to the Capitol steps to say in front of the cameras the pledge and shout out “under God.”

That phrase, by the way, was injected into the old World War II-era Pledge of Allegiance during the 1950s McCarthy witch hunt days, presumably as a way of sticking it to the “godless” Soviets.

The sort of hysteria that reigned in that period came back with a vengeance after Sept. 11, with an infusion of God and patriotism in all aspects of public life, practically coercing people into waving flags. Even the New York Board of Education made recital of the Pledge of Allegiance mandatory in city schools.

Newdow and the 9th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals, the villains in this drama as far as preachers, politicians, editorialists and talk-show hosts are concerned, may have really done the country a favor by reminding us that we are a democracy, not a theocracy. And that no matter what, we should be “one nation indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.” Period.

E.R. Shipp is a columnist for the New York Daily News. Her e-mail address is eshipp2002@hotmail.com.