Sometimes, the Letters to the Editor are just jaw-dropping excursions into the depths of illogic. This morning’s entrant into the “it ain’t what you don’t know that hurts you, it’s what you know that just ain’t so” sweepstakes is a prime example.
The writer says there is no “war on women,” rather, it is a war for “immorality, secularism and the destruction of Christianity.” And what is the weapon being deployed in this war? The requirement that health insurance include coverage for birth control.
Where to begin?
Perhaps we might question the writer’s assumption that use of birth control equates to “immorality.” (“Procreation is a gift from God. It is not a form of recreation.”) Evidently, only participants in “recreational” sex use birth control. We probably should tell that to the doctors who prescribe contraceptives to treat a variety of medical conditions, including but not limited to menorrhagia.
We might also note that the writer’s defense of this position by Catholics who believe in the “sanctity of life” conveniently ignores the lack of Church outrage over the use of its tax dollars to fund capital punishment and war.
Finally, we might gently note that the First Amendment religion clauses are not violated when taxes paid by “Christians and people of faith” are spent for purposes of which they disapprove. If that were the case, every dollar spent on war and weaponry would violate the religious liberty of Quakers. Money spent to enforce “blue laws” would violate the rights of Jews and Seventh Day Adventists. Taxes supporting high schools would violate the religious liberty of the Amish. In a religiously diverse nation, there are hundreds of other examples.
Religious liberty does not mean government must impose your religious beliefs on your neighbors. Catholics, who not so long ago struggled against state imposition of Protestant norms, should be particularly sensitive to that bit of legal revisionism.
A friend asked me yesterday whether I thought a candidate’s religion was politically relevant–whether that religion should be included in the mix of qualifying or disqualifying characteristics we all consider when casting our votes.
My answer: it depends.
I think a candidate’s beliefs are always relevant. That is not the same thing as saying his/her religion is necessarily relevant. The issue is what a person wishing to hold a secular office really believes, what worldview really motivates him. The religion of a candidate only becomes relevant when the individual believes so firmly in the doctrines and culture of his religion that he can be expected to take public action based upon those doctrines.
This, of course, presents us with a bit of a paradox–not to mention an incentive to hypocrisy.
It’s a truism of political life that candidates must be seen to be religious, and religious in conventional ways. So candidates for political office–at least, Christian ones–routinely highlight their churchgoing ways. It’s a bit dicier for members of minority religions, and admitted atheists are just out of luck. Unlike Europeans, Americans are demonstrably leery of candidates who do not claim a religious affiliation.
But we are also leery of those who seem too invested in their theologies, especially–but not exclusively–minority theologies.
When John F. Kennedy made his famous speech reaffirming the American doctrine of separation of church and state, he was really reassuring voters that his Catholicism was tempered and attenuated, and that any conflict between the Constitution and his religion would be resolved in favor of the Constitution.
Religious affiliation is only fair game in politics when we have reason to suspect that a candidate’s religious beliefs will be a primary motivator should that candidate win office–that, unlike JFK, he will resolve conflicts between the constitution and his theology in favor of the latter, or that his policy decisions will be dictated by that theology rather than by appropriate secular considerations.
In other words, if a candidate is likely to make public decisions on the basis of his religious beliefs, the content of those beliefs becomes relevant.
Which brings us, I suppose, to Mike Pence and Mitt Romney, both of whom appear to be deeply invested in their respective religions, and both of whom can be expected to govern in accordance with the tenets of those religions as they understand them. Indeed, Romney’s own “JFK speech” actually rejected Kennedy’s strong endorsement of separation of church and state, leaving little doubt that his Mormonism would influence his conduct in office. Pence, of course, is a “Christian Nation” religious extremist who has shown virtually no interest in the nitty-gritty of secular government. For both of these candidates, religious belief appears integral to their identities and highly likely to influence their behaviors in office. If that’s true, then voters are justified in examining those beliefs.
Bottom line: If a political candidate’s theology is likely to trump other motivations–or the Constitution–the contents of that theology are relevant.
Okay, it’s time for one of my broken-record rants.
In the wake of President Obama’s endorsement of same-sex marriage, we’ve had a predictable–and increasingly tiresome–outpouring of criticisms to the effect that government recognition of such unions violates the “religious liberty” of those who oppose them.
No, it doesn’t.
Government recognition of civil same-sex marriages is no different from government’s recognition of heterosexual divorce. Divorce violates the religious doctrines of Catholics and several other Christian denominations. Those denominations remain free to expel divorced congregants, to refuse to recognize their newly single status, to preach against divorce, or to take such other congregational action as may be dictated by their particular theologies. Meanwhile, the government adjusts the legal, civil and tax status of divorced folks. It recognizes the reality of their severed relationship.
If every state in the country were to recognize same-sex marriage tomorrow–if they were to recognize the reality of same-sex relationships–churches would still be free to reject gay parishioners, to refuse to perform same-sex unions, and to preach about the sin of homosexuality in accordance with their doctrines. But gay couples could file joint tax returns. Their children would be covered under their employers’ health insurance policies. They would be entitled to hospital visitation, Social Security survivor benefits, and the full panoply of civil rights to which legally married folks are entitled. Last time I looked, there were well over a thousand such rights that my husband and I enjoy automatically because the government recognizes our marriage.
It has been obvious for a very long time that the only genuine objection to same-sex marriage is religious. There are no credible secular arguments, as was painfully clear from the trial testimony in California’s Proposition 8 litigation. Numerous studies have confirmed that children raised by gay parents–and there are millions of them–are just as well-adjusted and happy as those raised by heterosexuals. All of the public policy reasons for encouraging heterosexual marriage apply with equal force to homosexual ones. The “slippery slope” argument has best been rebutted by Bill Maher, who noted that allowing women to vote did not–surprise!–usher in voting rights for dogs or vegetables.
Furthermore, not all religions are homophobic. A growing number of denominations are welcoming gays and lesbians and celebrating same-sex marriages.
What we are seeing now is the last gasp of the fundamentalists who believe–contrary to history and the American constitution–that the U.S. is a Christian Nation, and not simply Christian, but their particular brand of Christian. When we deconstruct their argument, it boils down to a conviction that whenever the government allows behavior of which they disapprove, government has violated their religious liberty.
Since today marks both Passover and Easter, it seems appropriate to consider the role of religion in American life–or at least, theories addressing that role.
So in today’s New York Times, Ross Douthat bemoans the disappearance of what he calls “the religious center”–what many of us who are not Christians experienced as something rather less benign than the unifying force he nostalgically remembers. The problem with a generally accepted religious identity is that those who don’t share that identity are marginalized, forced out of not just the religious but also the civic mainstream.
As Douthat recognizes, the radical diversity that characterizes the modern era makes that sort of religious and civic uniformity impossible.
There’s an old rhyme: “Twixt optimist and pessimist, the difference is droll; the optimist sees the doughnut, the pessimist the hole.” Douthat ignores the “doughnut” of greater civic inclusiveness and focuses upon the “hole” of diminished identification with community.
It’s easy to fault Douthat’s indifference to the merits of inclusiveness, but there is more than a nugget of truth to his assertion that a country needs an overarching theology to which most citizens subscribe. The problem lies in identifying that theology in a way that respects our religious diversity and our constitutional commitment to religious autonomy.
The United States is one of the most religiously diverse countries in the world. Furthermore, even though the U.S. remains predominantly Christian, doctrinal differences among Christian denominations are often as deep as the differences between Christians and Jews or Muslims. Adherents of virtually every religion on the globe live in the U.S., and recent polls put the number of secular Americans (those unaffiliated with any religious body) at approximately 16%.
Douthat is certainly correct that this diversity poses a significant challenge to America’s social and governing institutions: what commonalities enable and define the collective civic enterprise? What makes one an American? The United States’ national motto is e pluribus unum, “out of the many, one.” Prominent social and political theorists have long argued that a common belief structure, or “civil religion,” is required in order to turn the many into the one.
The term “civil religion” was first popularized in 1967 by Robert N. Bellah, in an article that remains the standard reference for the concept. The proper content of such a civil religion, however, has been the subject of debate since the Revolutionary War. Over the past decades, as the nation’s diversity has dramatically increased, that debate has taken on added urgency, with political theorists, sociologists and scholars of religion all offering their perspectives to political and religious leaders. (Douthat’s column betrayed no awareness of or familiarity with that ongoing discussion.)
In a culture as diverse as that of the United States, a “civil religion” or common value structure provides citizens with a sense of common purpose and identity. Despite the claims of some conservative Christians, Christianity does not provide that social glue; the United States is not and has never been an officially Christian Nation, although it has historically been culturally Protestant.
As I wrote in a brief article a few years ago,
“The U.S. Constitution contains no reference to deity, and specifically rejects the use of any religious test for citizenship or public office. In order to be consistent with the Constitution, any civil religion must respect the nation’s commitment to individual autonomy in matters of belief, while still providing an overarching value structure to which most, if not all, citizens can subscribe. This is no small task in a nation founded upon the principle that government must be neutral among belief systems. This constitutionally-required state neutrality has long been a source of considerable political tension between citizens intent upon imposing their religious beliefs on their neighbors and those who reject efforts to enforce religious hegemony. Thus far, no proposed value system or theorized civil religion has been entirely able to resolve that conflict. To the extent that Americans do endorse an overarching ideology or civil religion, it is a belief system based upon the values of individual liberty and equal rights enshrined in the U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights.”
America’s founding principles–set out in the Declaration, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights–provide the only content of a “civil religion” capable of providing both the requisite “social glue” and respect for individuals’ right to their own religious convictions.
That sort of civil religion will never satisfy those who believe they are called by their God to impose their “Truth” on their neighbors, but the alternative is the sort of religio-political warfare that has become depressingly familiar, and that Douthat quite properly criticizes.
A friend sent me a copy of this year’s American Family Action Pac political questionnaire. Rather than characterize it, I decided to let it speak for itself. (The odd numbering and format are original.)
Indiana Family Action PAC 2012 Questionnaire for State Candidates
Please circle the response that most accurately reflects your position on the following issues.
1. Education – Protect and expand parental choice options provided in current law to allow all parents
the opportunity to receive a voucher to send their children to any public, private, religious or home
school of their choice. SF F U O SO
Education – Allow parents dedicated to their children’s education to home-school their children
without imposing additional state regulations, other than that which is already required in state law. SF F U O SO
3. Education – Redefine “bullying” so that students who express opposition to the public promotion of
homosexuality in public schools will be guilty of “bullying” if they offend students who have taken
on a homosexual identity. SF F U O SO
4.Academic Liberty – The teaching of evolution is currently an educational requirement for teachers in
Indiana public schools. Protect Indiana teachers within state law so that they can also discuss the
problems and weaknesses of evolutionary theory. SF F U O SO
5.Business – Some Indiana cities have increased regulations on businesses by adding “sexual orientation” and
“gender identity” to the list of protected classes that get special rights. State law does not require businesses
to treat these groups as protected classes. Require all levels of government to recognize the list
of specially protected classes within state law in order to give businesses uniform regulations. SF F U O SO
6. Faith – Jesus Christ is my personal Lord and Savior. I believe the God of the Bible is sovereign
over all of life, including public policy, and I will use biblical principles to guide how I vote. Y N
7. Homosexual agenda – Change state discrimination law to protect an employee’s sexual
preferences in the same way that race, religion, age, gender and ancestry are protected. SF F U O SO
8. Marriage – Increase the time a married couple with minor children must wait for a divorce
(current law is 60 days) in order to give them a longer opportunity to work toward reconciliation. SF F U O SO
9. Marriage – Amend the Indiana Constitution as follows: “Only a marriage between one (1) man
and one (1) woman shall be valid or recognized as a marriage in Indiana. A legal status identical or
substantially similar to that of marriage for unmarried individuals shallnot be valid or recognized.”SF F U O SO
10. Abortion – Prohibit abortion by law except when the life of the mother is in danger. SF F U O SO
11. Abortion – As the medical abortion field explodes (abortion pills like RU486), make Indiana law apply
the same standards for dispensing abortion pills as it does for surgical abortions (i.e., define it in the law,
require licensing and regulatory standards, require key health and safety standards, and require
informed consent/patient information standards). . SF F U O SO
12. Taxes – Increase state taxes in order to provide more services. SF F U O SO
13. Taxes – Discontinue all direct and indirect state support of the Kinsey Institute
(controversial “sex research” organization in Bloomington, IN) SF F U O SO
14. Gambling – Prohibit Casinos in Indiana. SF F U O SO
15. Sex industry – Require strip clubs to close at midnight and make them ineligible for
Liquor licenses. Require dancers to remain at least 6 feet away from customers at all times. SF F U O S
Anyone who “favors” numbers 5, 7 and 12 will clearly be opposed; the language of the others–especially #6–is simply jaw-dropping. These folks are the ones with an “agenda”– and it is anti-science, anti-gay, anti-sex and deeply, profoundly un-American.
When the American Family folks endorse someone, remember that these are the positions that candidate has promised to support.
As another friend put it–so many Christians, so few lions….
