Summer 2015—Enmity Of Church And State: The Value Of Religion And Religious Freedom

I’m a Mormon. I’m a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. As such, I am a zealous believer in the rights of all men and women to practice their religions with freedom guaranteed by the governments and laws of the land.

I’m also a conservative. I believe in the traditions and principles which have made the United States of America great since this nation was first founded. It is my fervent belief that religions, in general, provide a great benefit for our republican way of life and deserve an honored place in both the public and private spheres of life.

A lot has happened in my life recently that has served as a reminder to me of the importance of religions and religious freedom.

In April of this year, one of the highest-ranking leaders of my church, Robert D. Hales, gave a speech that was broadcast around the world which renewed the call for all of us to do our part in protecting religious liberty in every corner of the globe. Hales reaffirmed the Mormon belief that “no government can exist in peace, except such laws are framed and held inviolate as will secure to each individual the free exercise of conscience…the civil magistrate should restrain crime, but never control conscience [or] suppress the freedom of the soul.” When I first listened to his speech, it seemed to me that Hales was especially concerned that many people and governments around the world were forgetting the value of religion’s presence in the public arena.

I recently finished reading two very influential books, both written by amazing women whose ideas have always meant a great deal to me and my outlooks on life. In Treason: Liberal Treachery From The Cold War To The War On Terrorism, Ann Coulter made the point that the United States is a country uniquely founded upon the twin virtues of liberty and belief in God. She also argued that modern American liberalism is an ideology focused on removing morality from the public discourse. According to her, the fundamental difference between liberals and conservatives is: conservatives believe man was created in God’s image; liberals believe they ARE God. In her own words, “liberals believe they can murder the unborn because they are gods. They try to forcibly create ‘equality’ through affirmative action and wealth redistribution because they are gods. They can lie, with no higher power to constrain them, because they are gods. They adore pornography and the mechanization of sex because man is just an animal, and they are gods.” I have plenty of personal experiences which definitely confirm, in part, the validity of Ann Coulter’s statements.

In Statecraft: Strategies For A Changing World, the esteemed former prime minister of the United Kingdom, Margaret Thatcher, based her entire world outlook on the ideological pillar of the moral supremacy of the United States, that the U.S. is a unique country because it was founded upon principles of faith in God and adherence to the strong English traditions of freedom. Mrs. Thatcher believed that America alone has the moral and material capacity for world leadership. Power without principle is dangerous; Mrs. Thatcher claimed that power must be given only to those who will exercise it morally and according to a set of righteous principles. Since the terrorist attacks of September 11th, 2001, the need for moral clarity and the courage to wield coercive power in defense of Western civilization has become more important, not less.

The words and teachings of Robert D. Hales, Ann Coulter, and Margaret Thatcher have been some of the strongest reminders to me that religions and religious freedoms are some of the most important things we have in our lives.

And with the United States Supreme Court’s decision on June 26^th, 2015 to legalize gay marriage without regard to the will of the American people or the individual state governments, I now know that a reexamination of the value of religion and religious freedom is something that all conscientious Americans should consider undertaking.

On 25 June 1988, in Williamsburg, Virginia, a group of farsighted U.S. religious, political, and community leaders came together to sign a document known as the Williamsburg Charter, which celebrated and reaffirmed religious liberty as the foremost freedom of the First Amendment of the United States Constitution. The 100 signers of the charter sought “a fresh articulation of the ground rules for relating religion and public life in our time.” The authors of the charter believed that problems surrounding the Constitution’s religion clauses can only be solved by America’s citizens if they properly understand the nature of the clauses themselves. The Williamsburg Charter declared that non-religious hostility towards religion is just as dangerous to a democracy as religious hostility towards non-religion or to other religions.

Six representatives from prominent American faith communities made brief statements as they signed the Charter. Dallin H. Oaks, who signed on behalf of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, said this:

“The people called Mormons have known the sting of official repression and the lash of popular fury. We endorse the need and join in this celebration and reaffirmation of religious liberty.

“The Declaration of Independence had posited these truths to be ‘self-evident’: that all men ‘are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights’ and that governments are instituted ‘to secure these rights.’

“The first words of the Bill of Rights provide the dual guarantees of religious liberty. The subsequent words that guarantee the freedoms of speech, press, and assembly provide the means to make our liberties secure, but it is the initial guarantee of religious freedom that explains why all these other liberties are desired.

“In our nation’s founding and in our Constitutional order, religious liberty is the motivating and basic civil liberty.

“In its Articles of Faith, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints declares: ‘We claim the privilege of worshiping Almighty God according to the dictates of our own conscience, and allow all men the same privilege, let them worship how, where, or what they may.’”

Freedom of religion is the most basic and important ingredient to any working democratic republic. The Williamsburg Charter declares: “The First Amendment Religious Liberty provisions have both a logical and historical priority in the Bill of Rights.” This is because religious liberty—one of Western civilization’s oldest and most internationally-recognized human rights—provides motivation, precedent, and support for our understanding and appreciation for other liberties involving speech, the press, and assembly. For many of the Founding Fathers, and for many Americans today, religious liberty is the basic civil liberty because faith in God and his teachings and the active practice of religion are the most fundamental guiding realities of life. Thus, for many citizens, religious liberty provides the reason all other civil liberties are desired. The Declaration of Independence affirms that governments are instituted to secure the inalienable rights with which men and women are endowed by their Creator. The United States Constitution was established to provide a practical and official guarantee of those rights.

All Americans would be wise to exercise these rights. Religious practice promotes the well-being of individuals, families, and the community. Regular attendance at religious services is linked to healthy, stable family life, strong marriages, and positive outcomes for children. It correlates with reduced rates of domestic abuse, crime, substance abuse, and addiction and an increase in physical and mental health, longevity, and educational attainment. Americans engaged in the free exercise of religion participate actively in charitable giving and volunteerism, including through organized volunteering and informal acts of compassion. Yet, despite the societal benefits of religion, the expression of faith in the public square has faced many challenges. The law ought to make as much room as possible for the practice of religious faith.

Religion deserves to hold an honored place in the public arena. The Williamsburg Charter reminds us that despite our constitutional prohibition against establishing a state religion, there is very little that legislatures and laws can do to prevent a dominant religious (or anti-religious) culture from arising in the American body politic. The charter points out that “in more recent times, and partly in reaction, constitutional jurisprudence has tended, in the view of many, to move toward the de facto semi-establishment of a wholly secular understanding of the origin, nature, and destiny of humankind and of the American nation.” Atheistic resentment towards all religion has, in general, become a dominating facet of American and Western civilization. Over time, these “wholly secular understandings” have attained “a dominant status,” until there is a “striking absence today of any national consensus about religious liberty as a positive good.” The Charter concludes: “The renewal of religious liberty is crucial to sustain a free people that would remain free.”

The United States of America has, historically, been a very religious society; this facet of American life has been an overwhelmingly positive one. By providing education, health care, and countless social services, religious groups have contributed mightily to the health of American society. In the future, religious individuals and institutions should be free to exercise their religious belief in private as well as in public. The ability to work, live, and provide services compatible with one’s beliefs is essential for maintaining a just and free society, yet this freedom has suffered erosion in recent years.

Freedom of religion has suffered from the false socio-cultural premise popularly embraced and referred to as the “separation of church and state,” one of the most misunderstood U.S. constitutional concepts of all time (it may interest the reader to know that even The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints supports the idea of separation of church and state—but the church does NOT support the popular understanding of this concept). It is a false dichotomy to believe in or teach the notion that one must choose between religion on the one hand and the whole body of secular learning on the other. “Separation of church and state” seems to have somehow morphed into “enmity of church and state.” Hostility towards religion and indifference towards religious liberty has unfortunately characterized many court decisions, much media publicity, and some public understandings for more than a quarter of a century. In the United States, we have seen what the Williamsburg Charter calls “a breakdown in understanding of how personal and communal beliefs should be related to public life.” Recapturing that understanding is a task that will require a high order of intelligence, tolerance, and goodwill, but it is vital that we do so.

The ideal situation, of course, is for the laws of the land to treat religion—just as it ideally treats everything and everyone else—with complete neutrality. Unfortunately, we seem to be living in a time where people have become so indifferent to the importance of religion that laws hostile towards religion are passed and given official sanction. Many understand the law today as being hostile rather than neutral toward religion. The Constitution was designed to prevent instances of state-sponsored religion, but it was not intended to unleash forces which prevent the free exercise of religion.

The forces opposing the presence of religion in American public life have been ascendant since at least the early 1960s when prayers in schools became the subject of so much contention. In the days following the Supreme Court’s decision to ban Bible-reading from public schools, David O. McKay, then president of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints said:

“Recent rulings of the Supreme Court would have all reference to a Creator eliminated from our public schools and public offices. It is a sad day when the Supreme Court of the United States would discourage all reference in our schools to the influence of the phrase ’divine providence’ as used by our founders of [sic] the Declaration of Independence. Evidently the Supreme Court misinterprets the true meaning of the First Amendment, and are now leading a Christian nation down the road to atheism.”

History has shown that President McKay’s concerns were well-founded. Now, in the year 2015, we see a dangerous gulf developing between religion and public life. In the past, religion has been an accepted part of public life in the American tradition. Now, it apparently must prove its right to remain in the public square. The principles first trumpeted in the early 1960s had by the 1970s hardened into mechanical constitutional formulas that are now interpreted in ways that are hostile to religion. Gradually, what used to be a supportive relationship between church and state has become what many perceive as a hostile one. Now many see religion as suspect, while many others see government as repressive toward religion.

The right of Americans to live and work in accordance with their deeply held beliefs is increasingly under assault, especially from burdensome government policies. For example, many provisions of Obamacare weaken family choice of coverage, undermine parental participation in minor children’s health care decisions, and undercut family values in health care. The law’s anti-conscience mandate forces countless religious organizations, family businesses, and other employers to provide health plans that include coverage of abortion-inducing drugs, contraception, and sterilization—regardless of their religious or moral objections. It is now essential that we be reminded of our religious heritage, to remember the value of religious liberty to a nation that was, in truth, founded to protect that liberty.

As a future teacher, I am particularly concerned about the lack of religion in the American public school system. There is a need for religion to play a role in the educational experience of any truly pluralistic society. An American education is incomplete if it does not give attention to the role of religious liberty in American life. The need for such teaching should be obvious. As a result of misunderstanding the importance of religious liberty in our constitutional order, many citizens and even some educators have come to consider it bad taste or even illegal for public school teachers even to mention religious influences or commitments. No wonder we suffer an appalling ignorance of our political and cultural origins. Religion has always played a central role in determining the American historical and cultural experience (and if that ever changes, the power and worth of the American republican experiment will be made null and void). Removing the name of God and ignoring the influence of religious motivations in U.S. history distorts facts and clouds understandings. In a 1986 editorial, the Washington Post called attention to this and observed that “the absence of any discussion of a subject that has motivated, inspired, and, at times, torn apart important elements of the population is ridiculous…a student who has no curiosity about the beliefs of others will never be an educated person.”

Again, the inspired and inspiring words of Dallin H. Oaks:

“I prefer to believe that individuals have always had the good sense to understand that a person cannot be educated without understanding religious traditions and conflicts. One cannot understand the great music of the Western world, such as music composed for the mass or Handel’s Messiah, and one cannot understand the great art of the Western world, such as the religious themes of the masters of the Middle Ages, without understanding the religious beliefs and traditions of the people by whom and for whom those works of art were created. It is surely true that a reader cannot understand the language and imagery of the great literature of the Western world without understanding the Bible.”

It should be emphasized that including religion in public life—and, especially in educational life—does NOT signify that government at any level of jurisdiction deserves the right to force or dictate religious devotion. Rather, conservatives like me simply push for—at the very least—more awareness of religion (particularly its beneficial effects upon civic virtue) and a diverse awareness at that. Such public perceptions and academic explorations and discussions could only be of benefit to the United States and its citizens.

Of course, no discussion of religion in public life will be complete unless the issues of marriage and family life are also tackled as well. Religious liberty in America is not merely the “freedom to worship.” Individuals should be free to work, speak, and serve according to their deeply held beliefs seven days a week, not just within the four walls of their house of worship. The freedom of Americans to live and work in accordance with their deeply held beliefs is increasingly under assault, especially from burdensome government policies and efforts to redefine marriage. In addition to promoting the many benefits of marriage, policy must continue to tell the truth about marriage and maintain the freedom of Americans to continue believing, teaching, and living out that truth.

The truth about marriage needs to be told. Redefining marriage is a direct and demonstrated threat to religious freedom that marginalizes those who affirm marriage as the union of a man and a woman. In many jurisdictions throughout the U.S., faith-based adoption and foster care organizations have given up the good work they were doing on behalf of vulnerable children because the government attempts to force them to place children with same-sex couples—regardless of their religious or moral objections. Family businesses like photographers, bakers, florists, and many others often involved in the wedding industry have been hauled into court because they declined to provide their services for a same-sex ceremony in violation of their religious beliefs. Governments must leave the people free to promote marriage as a union of a man and a woman for the benefit of society and must refrain from discrimination against them because of their religious belief that such a union constitutes the exclusive meaning of marriage.

Until we have politicians brave enough to champion the need to include religion in public life, I fear we will have to live with controversy. In this controversy, conservatives can expect to continue suffering defeat after defeat unless profound efforts are exerted to change the direction of the argument.

The directing council of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, known as the First Presidency, once proclaimed:

“Those who oppose all references to God in our public life have set themselves the task of rooting out historical facts and ceremonial tributes and symbols so ingrained in our national consciousness that their elimination could only be interpreted as an official act of hostility toward religion. Our constitutional law forbids that.

“As the ruling principle of conduct in the lives of many millions of our citizens, religion should have an honorable place in the public life of our nation, and the name of Almighty God should have sacred use in its public expressions.”

While America did not have a Christian Founding in the sense of creating a theocracy, it was deeply shaped by Christian moral truths, and the Founders created a regime that was hospitable to Christians as well as to practitioners of other religions. To a person, the Founders were committed to protecting religious liberty. Moreover, almost without exception, they agreed that civic authorities could promote and encourage Christianity and that it was appropriate for elected officials to make religious arguments in the public square. There was no support among the Founders for contemporary visions of a strict separation of church and state that would have political leaders avoid religious language and require public spaces to be stripped of religious symbols.

The United States must return to a more reasonable and historically accurate understanding of religious liberty, upholding religious and moral conscience as an invaluable support for healthy republican government and human flourishing. This requires that government respect the role of religious institutions and refrain from establishing religion or prohibiting the free exercise of religion.

The American Founders believed that strong religious congregations and vibrant faith communities were essential to ordered liberty. As a result, Americans have long enjoyed the fullest religious liberty in the world and have reaped the benefits of a flourishing civil society rooted in that religious freedom. Policymakers must restore a strong and stable society of individual and political self-government in which the people can give religious and faith-based institutions a central place in our civic and public life.

--Christopher Peterson, July 21^st, 2015