Religious Liberty in 2009
- Jan 13, 2009 - 2
America will reflect this week on one of her foundational principles: religious liberty. In one of his final acts in office, President Bush will set aside Jan. 16 as Religious Freedom Day, calling on all Americans “to engage in appropriate ceremonies and activities in their homes, schools, and places of worship.” The tradition, begun in 1993, commemorates the 1786 passage of the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom, a forerunner to the First Amendment right to freedom of worship.
Yet in the new Congress, the religious liberty Americans have enjoyed for more than two centuries may be eroded. The chipping away at our foundation of religious freedom is expected to come mostly in the form of legislation billed, ironically, as expanding the rights of individuals. Chip by chip, bill by bill, the crumbling could take place before our eyes in 2009.
Hate Crimes. The erosion might begin with the expansion of protections for homosexuals. Just one day after the 111th Congress was sworn into office, hate crimes legislation that would grant special protections for homosexuals who are victims of violence was introduced (H.R. 256). In effect, it could well serve as a muzzle on Christians’ speech against the homosexual lifestyle. Suppose, for example, someone commits an act of violence against a homosexual and a prosecutor later reveals that the perpetrator had at some time listened to a sermon on the biblical view of homosexuality. Some have theorized the pastor could be charged with inciting a hate crime. All violent crimes should be condemned. But criminalizing thoughts, as hate crimes legislation would do, is an almost certain means to dampen biblical messages from the pulpit.
Employment Protections. A second means of mining away our religious liberty is the expansion of protections for homosexuals in the workplace. The Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA), a cousin of the hate crimes bill, would force the business community at large to treat homosexuality, a lifestyle choice, with the same protections as immutable traits such as race, age, and gender. Some suggest that merely keeping a Bible on an office desk or a Scripture verse on a cubicle wall could trigger lawsuits for discrimination based on “actual or perceived sexual orientation.”
Homosexual Marriage. Another strike at religious liberty comes with the expansion of marriage. We can expect to see a push to repeal the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), the law that protects other states from being forced to recognize same-sex “marriages” performed in states like Massachusetts and Connecticut. How would the expansion of marriage harm religious liberty? It is not unthinkable that churches would potentially lose tax exemptions for refusing to host same-sex weddings and that public schools would indoctrinate children with a definition of marriage counter to the students’ religious beliefs. It could be that adoption agencies would face the ultimatum of either placing babies with homosexual couples or shutting down operations. And picture physicians being ordered to compromise their religious beliefs by providing fertility treatment to same-sex couples.
Conscience Protections. Then there’s the targeting of conscience rights for healthcare workers. Effective Jan. 18, regulations signed by President Bush will protect healthcare workers’ right of conscience on morally objectionable services such as abortion and end-of-life care. Many observers expect President-elect Obama to sweep away the regulations with the stroke of a pen. That could force Christian physicians into a difficult decision: career or conscience.
Fairness Doctrine. Talk radio may be another prime target. Some in Congress have stated in no uncertain terms that they intend to resurrect the so-called Fairness Doctrine, requiring balanced perspectives on the airwaves. The microphones of programs, including those that tackle current issues from a biblical perspective, such as Richard Land Live! hosted by the ERLC’s president, could be effectively silenced.
Each of these radical measures will likely find wide support on both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue in 2009. And the list of potential assaults on religious liberty could go on. Most pro-family observers do not expect the incoming administration and liberal-controlled Congress to use a jackhammer approach to mine at the foundation of religious liberty. We should instead expect attempts to whittle away our bedrock of religious liberty one chip at a time.
As America celebrates Religious Freedom Day this week, President-elect Obama and our new Congress should be reminded of Thomas Jefferson’s sentiment in that time-honored Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom: Religious freedoms are the “natural rights of mankind” given by God, not government. All of America should be vigilant to help our elected officials recognize and guard this God-given freedom in our land and seek to promote it throughout the world.
The Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission works to preserve religious liberty in America and across the world. If you would like to help us continue our fight to protect this freedom, please click here.
Further Learning
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comments
1 On Jan 14th, 2009, at 12:23pm, Rev. Kathy Earley wrote:
I think you comments are far reaching and you seem to have it in for homosexuals. The only person that even mentions this is Paul and it is always included with a list of other sins. You, however, want to catorgize sin and determine that one thing is worse than another.
Don’t you think there is room in God’s church for all of humanity?
President Obama can’t do anything with out it passing through the house and senate. He clearly stated during the campaign that marriage should be between a man and a woman.
It seems to me that the economy is the first and foremost thing on his agenda and he seems to be working hard to address that.
2 On Jan 15th, 2009, at 12:53pm, James E Reeves wrote:
Some socio-economist believe that the life of global economics depends on the death of an absolute lawgiver, and a belief in a living changing constitution,and is evident as our schools of higher learning have been teaching an anti-absolute perception of the purpose and defining reasoning of the authors credited for the draft of a document called “ The Constitution Of The United States Of America”. Today that document has been and continues to be attacked as out dated, with basic freedoms from the bill of rights being stripped from it by lawyers, judges, and legislators through lobbyists legal engineers.Just like the words that read, “All men are created equal” and the judgment that had to satisfy the cries of black people, Native Americans, and women who were not yet counted as equals then. Words from that concept of freedoms are as powerful today and will bring judgment to this nation as it did in 1860s “Civil War”.
Your brother,
James