The Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission

The Weakened State of Religious Liberty

By Doug Carlson - Jan 12, 2010 - 2 -

Our nation will give special emphasis this week to a constitutional protection and timeless right conferred to us by God: religious liberty. President Obama will set aside Jan. 16 as Religious Freedom Day, continuing an annual tradition begun in 1993 to commemorate the 1786 passage of the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom, a forerunner to the First Amendment right to freedom of religion.

As we begin 2010, it is fitting that we pause to take inventory of our religious freedom. In short, our “first freedom” has fallen on hard times. Consider its weakening condition over the last 12 months.

Conscience Protections. Shortly after assuming the Oval Office, President Obama announced his intent to repeal a regulation set in place by his predecessor, George W. Bush, protecting the right of conscience for health care workers. The Bush regulation clarified a series of federal laws added to the books over the last three decades protecting the right of medical professionals not to participate in procedures to which they object on religious grounds. Now, with the conscience regulation swept away, Christian physicians could be forced into a difficult decision: career or conscience.

Hate Crimes. A second blow to religious freedom was dealt with the aid of a liberal-controlled Congress. Under the cloak of compassion, a hate crimes measure, signed into law by President Obama, grants special federal protections to homosexuals that most others are not afforded. That’s bad enough. But the law goes much further, opening the door to religious persecution by giving federal authorities the legal right to investigate religious speech against homosexuality. One such investigation could cast a deafening silence on speech in pulpits across the nation.

Marriage. Then there is the coordinated march toward same-sex “marriage.” In the District of Columbia, a council of 13—not the city’s residency of nearly 600,000—gave hearty approval last month to same-sex “marriage,” joining five states that have expanded marriage. The District is set to begin validating the “weddings” in a matter of weeks. Congress, which has the authority to turn back the law, remains content to leave the decision unchallenged, and the District’s Board of Elections and Ethics refuses to allow the issue to come before the people for a vote.

In California, the people have been given a say on marriage. Yet the voter-approved November 2008 Proposition 8, which bans same-sex “marriage” in the Golden State, is now being challenged in court. The argument: Prop 8 is rooted in bigotry toward homosexuals. In response, the Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission has filed an amicus brief with the U.S. District Court for Northern California contesting the claim, stating that “support for traditional marriage is not motivated by animus toward homosexuals but by deeply held religious convictions by many faiths….”

But how would the expansion of marriage harm religious liberty? Just ask Elaine Huguenin, a photographer who has been charged with discrimination by a New Mexico court for refusing to photograph a same-sex “commitment ceremony.” Similar accounts undoubtedly will follow. It also 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 students’ religious beliefs. It could be that adoption agencies would face the ultimatum of either placing babies with homosexual couples or shutting down operations, which in fact happened recently in Massachusetts. Catholic Charities of Boston chose to close its doors rather than compromise its faith convictions against homosexuality. And picture physicians being ordered to compromise their religious beliefs by providing fertility treatment to same-sex couples.

All told, the year in review on religious freedom in our nation is distressing. But what of its future? In the coming months, Congress intends to push more legislation that would further curtail religious liberty. Ongoing attacks on marriage in Congress and in courthouses can be expected. Two other issues are also worth noting.

Employment Protections. The expansion of protections for homosexuals in the workplace is high on the Congressional agenda. The Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA) 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.”

Fairness Doctrine. Talk radio may be another target. Since the general public is now well versed on the severe implications of the Fairness Doctrine, we can expect to see efforts to silence conservative voices on radio under a different name and through a different mechanism—localism. The microphones of programs that tackle current issues from a biblical perspective, such as Richard Land Live!, could be effectively muted.

The list of potential threats to religious liberty goes on. This is hardly an encouraging direction for a nation that is celebrating religious freedom this week. Now more than ever, our leaders need a reminder of Thomas Jefferson’s sentiment in the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom: Religious freedoms “are of the natural rights of mankind” given by God, not government. To interfere with those rights is to frustrate something much greater than a construct of man.

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.

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