The Christian Right has been organizing hard for their version of religious freedom for at least a decade. So much so, that a major state legislative campaign called Project Blitz frames their entire package of model bills under the rubric of religious freedom. While many in public life have declared the Christian Right to be dead, dying or diminished (and some still do) in fact they have gained power beyond their wildest dreams, and have the Trump administration implementing as much of their agenda as they can.
There is a battle for the meaning of religious freedom in our time, and the stakes may be as high today as they were when Jefferson, Madison and others of the revolutionary era sought to lay the foundation of democratic aspiration. The Christian Right and the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops are seeking an agenda that would exempt themselves from a range of civil rights and labor laws.
Today’s Religious Freedom Day proclamation by the governor of Nebraska features the views of the Christian Right and the Roman Catholic Bishops. Donald Trump last year also fronted for the agenda of conservative evangelicals and the Catholic Bishops’ in the president’s annual proclamation commemorating the Virginia Statue for Religious Freedom. He continued in this style in today’s proclamation, using the occasion to brag that “in January of 2018, the Department of Health and Human Services undertook major policy changes to protect religious freedom, including forming a new Conscience and Religious Freedom Division within the Department’s Office for Civil Rights and proposing a comprehensive new conscience protection regulation to reinvigorate enforcement of religious freedom laws within existing health care programs.” What this meant as a matter of practice, was shielding health care workers who refuse to provide health services for religious or moral reasons in such matters as providing reproductive health care and medical care for LGBTQ people.
But even as these reactionary forces have gained the upper hand, and cloaked their agenda in the bunting of our highest aspirations as a democracy — there are other many diverse voices who are increasingly being heard. Here at Daily Kos, the Religious Freedom Day group has been staging blog-a-thons for Religious Freedom Day for several years. (Group member and Native American scholar Ojibwa this year reminds us about how religious freedom has not always been extended to all and that Christianity has been forced on native people.)
There are many different voices participating in the Twitter Storm for Religious Freedom Day, now underway at #ReligiousFreedomIs There is a wide range of participating groups, from American Atheists to the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice. ( See also #ReligiousFreedomDay #ReligiousFreedom and #ReligiousLiberty )
But for those who are not ready to dive into all that, consider historian John Ragosta, who has written two books on religious freedom and is an expert on the Virginia Statute. He wrote today in the home town newspaper of the Virginia Statute, the Richmond Times-Dispatch:
Americans are free to believe what we want, to worship where and how we want, or not to worship at all. The government cannot take our tax dollars and use them to support religion, nor can the government declare or endorse, directly or indirectly, what is “orthodox” in religion and belief.
For Jefferson, this was a pillar of our republic. Not only was religious freedom a natural right, which the government had no legitimate power to touch, but it was absolutely essential in a diverse republic with a broad mixture of peoples of different religions, ethnicities, and nationalities.
Ragosta is concerned about the rise of intolerance and what it means for religious freedom in our time:
Undoubtedly foreseeing the strife that was inevitable in such a broad and diverse nation, he realized that the broadest possible toleration and acceptance, even love, would be critical.
Yet, he also suggested an important limit to toleration: “Perhaps the single thing which may be required to others before toleration [is granted] to them would be an oath that they would allow toleration to others.”
Also rising to the occasion is veteran Minnesota State Senator John Marty who was attacked on Fox News last year for his principled stand for separation of church and state. Marty has introduced a resolution commemorating Religious Freedom Day in Jeffersonian instead of Trumpian terms. (Tweeted here ) (DC Councilmember David Grosso has one too. Tweeted here.)
In a press release Marty stated:
“James Madison warned that government promotion of certain beliefs ‘degrades from the equal rank of citizens all those whose opinions in Religion do not bend to those of the Legislative authority.’ When some politicians use religion to divide us from each other, promoting certain religious beliefs at the expense of others, it is important to speak out,” Sen. Marty said. “As a person with deeply-held religious beliefs, I find it offensive that people want government to promote or attack my religion or any other religion.”
Senator Marty’s resolution reads:
1.1 A Senate resolution
1.2 expressing the sense of the Minnesota Senate concerning Religious Freedom Day.
1.3 WHEREAS, on January 16, 1786, the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom, which was
1.4 written by Thomas Jefferson and championed by James Madison and served as the model for the
1.5 relationship between religion and government taken by the Framers of the Constitution in 1787,
1.6 and the First Amendment in 1789, was enacted in Virginia; and
1.7 WHEREAS, today we understand that religious freedom is a fundamental American and
1.8 human right. We declare that religious freedom is a cornerstone of democracy. We declare that
1.9 religious freedom is not a privilege for the few, but a right for all. We embrace this fundamental
1.10 right as one that applies to people of all religious affiliations or beliefs and people of no religious
1.11 affiliations or beliefs; and
1.12 WHEREAS, we recognize that the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom has equality as a
1.13 guiding and governing principle in declaring: "...all men shall be free to profess, and by argument
1.14 to maintain, their opinions in matters of religion, and that the same shall in no wise diminish, enlarge,
1.15 or affect their civil capacities." Thomas Jefferson made it clear that religious freedom encompasses
1.16 "the Jew and the Gentile, the Christian and Mahometan, the Hindoo, and infidel of every
1.17 denomination"; and
1.18 WHEREAS, we hold that religious liberty remains essential to the health and future of our
1.19 democracy; and
1.20 WHEREAS, in 1992, Congress designated January 16th as Religious Freedom Day, to
1.21 celebrate the enactment of the Virginia Statute; and
1.22 WHEREAS, in that spirit we recall the centrality of the Virginia Statute in shaping religious
1.23 freedom as one of the highest aspirations of the American experiment; and
2.1 NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED by the Senate of the State of Minnesota that it
2.2 recognizes January 16th as Religious Freedom Day, a day in which we celebrate the diversity of
2.3 Minnesotans and recognize the right of each person to hold beliefs and practice religion according
2.4 to their conscience.
2.5 BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that we promote and encourage respect for all others regardless
2.6 of their religious beliefs or affiliations or lack of such beliefs.
2.7 BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED by the Senate of the State of Minnesota that it will work to
2.8 protect the rights of all people to practice their religion, free from interference in their beliefs,
2.9 whether from government or any other institution or group.
All this is really just the beginning -- as progressive, religious, and civil rights groups, and elected officials are increasingly recognizing that we need to revive our capacity to defend and advance religious freedom in our time. This will happen not as an after thought or a side issue, but as a central concern that will inform everything we do for a long time to come.
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Like anything else, it can take some reading to come up to speed on these things. In addition to the source material at the links in this diary, here are two books I have found very useful
Peterson, Merrill D., and Robert C. Vaughan. The Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom: Its Evolution and Consequences in American History. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 1988.
Ragosta, John A. Religious Freedom: Jefferson's Legacy, America's Creed. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2013.