Last year I wrote for First Things on John Wesley's reaction to anti-Methodist riots in the mid-1700s as it relates to contemporary assaults on religious liberty. Recently a letter by John Wesley revealing his views about law enforcement and religious freedom was tweeted by its owner, the Wesley Hobart Museum of the Uniting Church in Tasmania, Australia. The letter,
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Yesterday, in a brief order published at the head of an otherwise miscellaneous list, the Supreme Court made a summary disposition of University of Notre Dame v. Burwell, the case involving the university's resistance to the HHS contraception-sterilization-abortifacient mandate under Obamacare. Here is the whole of what the Court said: Continue Reading »
An article in the latest Harvard Law Review points to the wider significance of the historic moment which the Hobby Lobby decision represents.
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Complainants, a same sex couple, alleged that they were unlawfully discriminated against when Respondent refused to perform their marriage. Continue Reading »
Requiring church ads—and only church ads—to include disclaimers is a kind of disparagement that places churches at an unfair disadvantage in the marketplace of ideas. Continue Reading »
The famous phrase “wall of separation of church and state” today enjoys the status of legal precedent, but here’s a curious fact. The phrase comes from the letter Thomas Jefferson wrote to the Danbury Connecticut Baptists who feared that state politicians would suppress them. When the Baptists received the letter, however, they didn’t celebrate and publicize the statement. They didn’t even record it in the minutes of their proceedings. “They pretend it never existed.” Continue Reading »
Many of the responses to the Marriage Pledge from both sides of the divide on same-sex marriage have reflected substantial confusion over the distinction between Christian and civil marriage and what the role of the clergy is in the marriage ceremony. My purpose here is to clarify that distinction and then to evaluate criticisms of the Pledge when the distinction between the two types of marriage is properly understood. Continue Reading »
In anticipation of tonight’s Erasmus lecture by Archbishop Chaput, and for those who aren’t familiar with his writings, here is a short essay by him at Public Discourse two months ago that lays out a particular pressure suffered by faithful at the current time. It is the role of law in their religious observance, or rather, the conflict between the two. Continue Reading »
Most of our fights about the Establishment Clause boil down to this: What can a religious minority reasonably require of the majority? Or, put differently, how far must the majority go to accommodate the sensibilities of the minority? Here, the Court seems to be saying, if a town is overwhelmingly Christian, non-Christians cannot legitimately expect that legislative prayers will be anything but overwhelmingly Christian. To insist on something else would be unreasonable. Continue Reading »
A growing number of legal scholars question whether a justification exists for protecting religion as its own category. Yes, the text of the First Amendment refers specifically to religion, they concede, but that’s an anachronism. As a matter of principle, religion as such doesn’t merit . . . . Continue Reading »
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