I will confess my love of church-state separation does not get into a particular tizzy because the 4th verse of "The Star-Spangled Banner" is pretty theistic. In part that's because I suspect about 0.1% of the population actually knows the 4th verse of Keyes' poem. In part because the idea of a national contest to select a new national anthem fills me with dread.
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Switzerland Will Soon Replace Its Religious National Anthem with a Godless One
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I don't have as much of an issue with The Star Spangled Banner as I do with the Pledge of Allegiance. For one, the national anthem had those words in it from the start whereas the pledge did not. For another, while I realize the intended purpose of both is to increase patriotism, I take pledges much more seriously than anthems and would prefer that ours be all inclusive.
I agree. And, to my second point above, one could excise the theistic language from the Pledge as easily as it was inserted, so no "Hey, we want a new Pledge of Allegiance, so please submit your suggestions" madness.
What Les said.
That and I am still pissed off at the whole inclusion of “God Bless America” for baseball games. One more thing to hate the Yankees about.