Liberty, Equality and the Meaning of Religious Freedom

The Declaration of Independence placed the Enlightenment ideal of “liberty” at the heart of the American soul. It cites liberty among the reasons for creating our new country. “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness.”

            The basic meaning of liberty is the ability to do what one wants. Of course even school children know that unbridled liberty is impossible. If one person decides they want to kill another, an extreme example, the second person’s liberty is violated, to say nothing of their life.

            Liberty as a political or governing policy thus consists of balancing of each individual’s ability to behave as they wish against others’ freedom to do the same. The goal is to achieve an equality of liberty for everyone, with everyone attaining as much freedom as possible.

            Another widely used definition of liberty is one of freedom from oppression; as the Merriam-Webster dictionary puts it, “freedom from arbitrary or despotic control.” This notion of liberty inspired the Puritans to leave England and come to the New World. They wanted the freedom to believe and worship as they were convinced that God wanted them to.

            If America’s notion of liberty began with this bid for religious liberty, the result was initially disappointing. True, in 1620 the Puritans established a colony at Plymouth where they followed their faith freely.

            But the Puritan notion of religious freedom was limited to themselves and their own beliefs and practices. It did not extend to anyone who believed different from them. In that they were no different from the Church of England, which had developed its discriminatory policies under King James (d. 1625).

            When Roger Williams and then Anne Hutchinson developed theological positions that differed from those of the Puritans, they were banished. Roger Williams fled to Rhode Island where in 1636 he founded Providence as the first community run on the basis of religious freedom. Anne and her followers later settled there.

            Although we often call Roger Williams the founder of religious liberty, what he really created was religious equality. The practical effect of bringing together several groups with different religious beliefs in Rhode Island set up an ironic conundrum: religious freedom had to be restricted to achieve the highest level of religious liberty.

            Each group in Rhode Island was free under the second definition of liberty, that of freedom from oppression and control. But they were not free under the first one, that of the unlimited ability to do as they wished. Where one group’s free expression of belief and practice impinged upon another’s, they had to work out a comprise to prevent that. These compromises usually limited both sides’ freedom, although ideally with as little limitation as possible.

            America’s great reputation for religious freedom is therefore the reputation for religious equality. Every religion and every version of a religion is free to worship and believe as each one chooses, as long as it does not impinge upon the rights of others. The clarion call we still sound for religious liberty is a call for equal rights of all religions.

            That is what makes America the standard bearer for religious freedom. Religious refugees from around the world flock to our country because they know they can worship without persecution here.

            What is opposite of equal rights for all religions? Despotism.

            If a country allows one religion to worship and act in accordance with its beliefs at the expense of other religions, then that country no longer has freedom of religion but the religious equivalent of political dictatorship.

            This is the situation for many countries around the world. They have a political system that favors one religion or even one version of a religion. That preference permits the members of the favored religion rights and privileges others do not have.

            This is true whether the religion is Hinduism, Buddhism, Islam, Judaism and even Christianity. The difference in rights between the religion in favor and those out of favor range from mild to extreme, from England’s support of Anglicanism with public taxes, to Israel’s allowing Judaism’s Orthodox wing of Judaism to control marriage law, to frequent persecution of Christians for blasphemy in Islamic countries.

            Only equal rights for all religions and all religious people, as well as non-religious beliefs and people, ensures the most religious freedom possible. Any other position penalizes those who do not follow the privileged faith.

Religion in American History

In a recent survey, college seniors were asked questions from a high-school level test on American history.  Over 75% scored a D or below!  While the disappointment expressed by history professors, politicians and the media over the students’ performance is certainly justified, it was the questions on the test that I found most disappointing.  Despite this country’s proud religious heritage and the influence of religion at nearly every stage of our history, none of the questions asked about religion.  It was as if religion had been dropped from the curriculum. So although the survey showed that students have forgotten the names, dates, and places of American history, they were never  expected to know the importance of religion in shaping our country.

How did our education system arrive in this situation? It all boils down to the separation of Church and State. In the early part of the twentieth century,  the boundaries between  Church and State were not clearly defined with regard to schools.  All across America, school systems had a variety of relationships to local churches and religious practice. Aspects of American religious history were taught in various degrees of detail. 

Then, following the end of World War II, uncertainties began to arise concerning the appropriateness of the intertwining of churches and schools.  The doubts continued into the 1960s when the Supreme Court ruled that schools were permitted to teach ABOUT religion(s), but they were not permitted to teach religion, i.e., to indoctrinate.  Thus, the Court approved teaching of the role of religion in American history.

So it would seem that the matter had been resolved.  But not so.  The Supreme Court’s ruling banning of teacher-led school prayer ushered in an era of litigation over religion in schools, which has continued to this day.  Although the controversy focuses on religious prayer, it has spilled over into instruction about religion.  The fear of legal action has led schools to “sanitize” their curriculum, to take mention of religion out of the curriculum. This has not been from any fear of religion, but from the fear of being sued and the tremendous costs that suits entail.  School district budgets are stretched as it is, without having to find several million dollars for legal expenses.  The victory granting the ability to teach students about this country’s religious heritage has thus been squandered by the political controversy over school prayer.

So what kinds of questions should high school students, college students, and us “life-long learners” be able to answer about religion in our country’s past?   Here are three true/false questions you can test yourself on:

1) The Puritans believed that everyone in America should have the freedom to follow any religion and to worship in any way they chose.

2) At the time of the American Revolution and the founding of the American Republic, Baptists strongly supported the separation of Church and State.

3) In the slavery debate preceding the Civil War, the Bible’s explicit statements about slaves supported the pro-slavery position best. 

Check the answers below and see if you don’t agree that religion’s role in shaping American culture and history needs more emphasis at all levels of learning, from our elementary schools to our senior citizens. 

Answers: (1) false - Puritans were interested in freedom of religion for themselves only, it was Roger Williams, Rhode Island’s founder, who promoted religious freedom for all;  (2) true - historically, Baptists have been some of the strongest believers in the separation of Church and State, (3) true - the Bible never explicity condemns slavery, its statements assume that slavery is a normal part of society.

November 2016

Morality: The Face of Public Christianity

A non-Christian who read recent newspapers to learn about Christianity might arrive at the following picture. Christianity believes that marriage is between a man and woman, so no marriage between members of the same sex. Christianity believes life begins at conception, so no abortion and no stem cell research. Christianity believes that that God created the universe, so evolution should not be taught. 

In this picture, Christianity is about actions that people should or should not do; it is about morality. What is missing from this public Christianity are the religion’s core features. Salvation, Scripture, faith and belief have disappeared from public view. How did this happen?

The story begins in the early 1500s, with the Protestant Reformation. Prior to that, the Christianity of Western Europe was Catholic and centered on community. Based on their doctrinal interpretation of Scripture, Catholicism raised a group of men out of the community to become priests. These priests then mediated between God and the people to bring salvation, forgiveness, and blessings from God to the people. The church stood with individuals before God, buffering them in His majestic presence.

Starting in 1517, Martin Luther changed all that. Instead of the church standing with the individual, Luther held that individuals stood alone before God, with only their faith, based on their understanding of Scripture, alongside them.

Despite this theological change, the social reality altered surprisingly little. Individuals still lived in communities and these communities shared a single doctrinal interpretation of Scripture. Individuals did not interpret Scripture on their own, but rather followed their community’s understanding.

Often these communities were formed around the teachings of influential theologians and leaders. Luther founded the Lutherans, John Calvin founded the Reformed Church and influenced the Puritans, while John Knox organized the Presbyterians. And these are just a couple of the communities, the churches if you will, created from the Reformation.

So, early forms of Protestantism took a similar structure to Catholicism: Each was a community who brought a common interpretation to Scripture, which in turn led to common social norms (i.e., morality).

The Puritans brought this communally-organized Christianity to America, where they established a new community that would help individuals lead moral lives in keeping with the Puritan interpretation of Scripture.

But Luther’s dictum of the individual alone still rang out. When Roger Williams interpreted Scripture for himself in the 1630s, the Massachusetts Puritans expelled him. Williams believed in a radical understanding of Luther’s dictum: The church should be separate from the government so that the church could not use government powers to enforce doctrine and interpretation on individuals.

Williams’s idea become the foundation of America’s religious freedom. By the 1680s, variety was the religious flavor of the era. Formulations of Christian beliefs called catechisms proliferated. Puritan preacher Increase Mather thought that “over 500” different catechisms were circulating at the time. Over the next century or more, European immigrants brought in new Protestant denominations and Americans created their own.

By the 1800s, Christians realized all this religious freedom fragmented Christianity and interfered with its ability to accomplish the great deeds needed. So they banded together into non-denominational organizations to take on moral projects. To accomplish this unity, they overlooked doctrinal features which divided them.

Thus, the great ethical movements of the century were founded: anti-slavery, temperance, women’s suffrage, and missionary projects to evangelize both foreign peoples and the USA’s “unchurched” masses. By the mid-20th century, new non-denominational groups joined with those of a more secular bent in the Civil Rights and Women’s Rights movements. The lesson of these movements was that if the divided Christian populace overlooked matters of doctrine and Scripture interpretation, they could unify on moral issues.

Toward the end of the 20th century, a new alliance of Christians was formed. Since the great moral concerns of slavery and personal civil rights had been resolved (more or less), these groups took up new ones. Thus, the Right to Life movement, for example, took up the cause of the unborn. This brought together an alliance of conservative Protestants, Catholics, and Mormons, who were able to overlook their differences on doctrine and Scripture, to unite on what they saw as a great moral concern.

Thus, morality is the great religious unifier, where different religious groups can agree. They may arrive at those moral positions through different doctrinal interpretations of Scripture, even from different versions of Scripture. But to strengthen their unity, they ignore those differences. The public unity of Christianity, as apparent in American news coverage, comes from morality rather than doctrine.

Unfettered Capitalism and the United States’ Marketplace of Religion

Our pilgrim forebears came to America in 1620 for freedom of religion. They sought the ability to worship and believe according to their conscience. They were Separatists who fled the England of King James I, who had restricted religious freedom for those who did not follow his religious ideals, whether Separatists, Puritans or Catholics. 

At first, the Pilgrims and others of similar Calvinist leanings emphasized their own ability to worship as they saw fit and did not accord others the same right. But Roger Williams’ focus on each individual’s right to their own “Soul Liberty” took a different view. His perspective was that the problem was not that the government (e.g., King James) favored the wrong theological view, but that government favored any theological view at all.

In the end, Williams’ idea became the foundation of the United States’ approach to the relationship between government and religious organizations. The main point is that there should not be a relationship; according to the First Amendment, government should pass no laws “respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.”

The former phrase means that laws cannot give some religious group more rights than other groups, while the latter phrase indicates that laws cannot give some religious groups or individuals fewer rights than other religious groups. To the extent possible, government should pass no laws concerning religions.

While this principle has not been followed 100 percent, the United States probably has fewer laws about religion and less government involvement in regulating religious organizations than any other country.

This hands-off government approach has placed America’s religions in a free-for-all marketplace. Varieties of Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, Paganism and many other religions jostle each other to find a niche or establish their place in the religious scene.

This religious marketplace is quite capitalist in character. Some religious organizations compete at the top of the marketplace. Like a company seeking higher sales, they work to attract more members. Like advertisers, they loudly broadcast their views for all to see. Whether they are a large organization, like the Catholic Church, or a small group, like the followers of the anti-gay Fred Phelps, they compete for media attention to get their word out.

Other religious organizations participate in the market by finding a quiet niche. They do not want a big public presence, but simply wish to practice their faith and be left alone. And, of course, there are many approaches in between.

Competition in this religious marketplace occurs in many forms, from blatant advertising on the sides of buses to announcing meeting times on the Saturday newspaper “church page.” There are parades, social outreach through missions and soup kitchens, sponsorship of Boy Scouts and, especially, the erection of prominent buildings. Churches and their steeples have dominated the skylines and central squares of towns and villages for centuries.

The capitalistic nature of this competition does not prevent different religious groups from using non-capitalistic means to gain an edge. Recently, the quest has been to allow religious groups or individuals to deprive others of their rights. In particular, the present social debate over freedom of religion is the claim that one person’s right to believe as they wish includes the right to deprive others of their rights.

This is the claim of the Hobby Lobby case presently before the Supreme Court and the goal of laws recently passed in Arizona (where it was vetoed) and in Mississippi that allow businesses to discriminate on the basis of belief.

The capitalist character of America’s religious marketplace, then, is so free and open that nothing prevents religious groups from using non-capitalist means to try to make it less free and less equal for some. Success in this quest will eventually make religious belief and practice less free for everyone.