The Meaning Of Religious Freedom In The Public Square

This book offers a new perspective on religious freedom. Its central theme is to elucidate the meaning of religion and freedom in discussions related to religious freedom and the place of religion in the public square. One often hears that either religion must be tamed by restricting its access to public power, or that in the name of neutrality and equality no religious reasoning may be used in the political sphere, as it may be coercive to other worldviews. There is also the idea that “religion” is a feature of human life essentially distinct from “secular” features such as politics and economics, and which has a peculiarly dangerous inclination to promote violence. Thus, the meaning of religious freedom in the twenty-first century seems uncertain. For that reason, it is necessary to clarify the meaning of religious freedom, especially in relation to the public sphere, in order to offer an answer that will guide us in discerning issues of religious freedom.

This book offers a new perspective on religious freedom. Its central theme is to elucidate the meaning of religion and freedom in discussions related to religious freedom and the place of religion in the public square. One often hears that either religion must be tamed by restricting its access to public power, or that in the name of neutrality and equality no religious reasoning may be used in the political sphere, as it may be coercive to other worldviews. There is also the idea that "religion" is a feature of human life essentially distinct from "secular" features such as politics and economics, and which has a peculiarly dangerous inclination to promote violence. Thus, the meaning of religious freedom in the twenty-first century seems uncertain. For that reason, it is necessary to clarify the meaning of religious freedom, especially in relation to the public sphere, in order to offer an answer that will guide us in discerning issues of religious freedom.

Recognizing that tyranny takes on secular as well as traditional guises, Os Guinness seeks a return to the first principles of religious and political freedom. Hearkening back to the "soul liberty" of English Puritan Roger Williams, Guinness argues that a society's greatest bulwark against abuse lies in its people's freedom of conscience.

In the battles over religion and politics in America, both liberals and conservatives often appeal to history. Liberals claim that the Founders separated church and state. But for much of American history, David Sehat writes, Protestant Christianity was intimately intertwined with the state. Yet the past was not the Christian utopia that conservatives imagine either. Instead, a Protestant moral establishment prevailed, using government power to punish free thinkers and religious dissidents. In The Myth of American Religious Freedom, Sehat provides an eye-opening history of religion in public life, overturning our most cherished myths. Originally, the First Amendment applied only to the federal government, which had limited authority. The Protestant moral establishment ruled on the state level. Using moral laws to uphold religious power, religious partisans enforced a moral and religious orthodoxy against Catholics, Jews, Mormons, agnostics, and others. Not until 1940 did the U.S. Supreme Court extend the First Amendment to the states. As the Supreme Court began to dismantle the connections between religion and government, Sehat argues, religious conservatives mobilized to maintain their power and began the culture wars of the last fifty years. To trace the rise and fall of this Protestant establishment, Sehat focuses on a series of dissenters--abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison, suffragist Elizabeth Cady Stanton, socialist Eugene V. Debs, and many others. Shattering myths held by both the left and right, David Sehat forces us to rethink some of our most deeply held beliefs. By showing the bad history used on both sides, he denies partisans a safe refuge with the Founders.

The presidency of George W. Bush has polarized the church-state debate as never before. The Far Right has been emboldened to use religion to govern, while the Far Left has redoubled its efforts to evict religion from public life entirely. Fewer people on the Right seem to respect the church-state separation, and fewer people on the Left seem to respect religion itself--still less its free exercise in any situation that is not absolutely private. In The Last Freedom, Joseph Viteritti argues that there is a basic tension between religion and democracy because religion often rejects compromise as a matter of principle while democracy requires compromise to thrive. In this readable, original, and provocative book, Viteritti argues that Americans must guard against debasing politics with either antireligious bigotry or religious zealotry. Drawing on politics, history, and law, he defines a new approach to the church-state question that protects the religious and the secular alike. Challenging much conventional opinion, Viteritti argues that the courts have failed to adequately protect religious minorities, that the rights of the religious are under greater threat than those of the secular, and that democracy exacts greater compromises and sacrifices from the religious than it does from the secular. He takes up a wide range of controversies, including the pledge of allegiance, school prayer, school vouchers, evolution, abortion, stem-cell research, gay marriage, and religious displays on public property. A fresh and surprising approach to the church-state question, The Last Freedom is squarely aimed at the wide center of the public that is frustrated with the extremes of both the Left and the Right.

Winner of the 2019 James Madison Prize for Outstanding Research in First Amendment Studies. What are the arguments for and against government restrictions on religious beliefs and practices? To what extent can or should government support religion? Why is religious liberty important? Now a comprehensive anthology comprising 300 important writings on religious liberty is available to address and examine these questions, and Smith provides the important historical grounding and philosophical positions that guide readers through these significant selections. It will remain a significant reference work to facilitate reasoned discussions of freedom of religion, whether for education or advocacy, in the classroom or the public sphere. This outstanding collection should be in every library and on the desk of anyone seeking to understand or shape public policies affecting religious liberty.

Discusses the importance of observing the Jewish Sabbath as both a practical and spiritual exercise, and provides guidelines for properly incoporating the Sabbath into everyday life.

Over the Wall enters the extensive, and often heated, contemporary debates over both religion and politics and the desired relationship between church and state. Author Frank Guliuzza links the process of "secularization" with the Supreme Court's penchant for "separation," and argues that should policymakers desire to do something about the former, they need to reevaluate the latter. The book supplements the argument that, increasingly, there is evidence to demonstrate that religious people are not taken seriously in the marketplace of political ideas. That does not mean that religious people, particularly evangelical Christians, are not participating actively in politics. On the contrary, while religious believers are becoming ever more active in politics and political debate, they are taken less and less seriously. Guliuzza claims that this reaction to religious-based political expression is evidence of a concerted effort, though one that comes from multiple perspectives, to produce not simply a secular nation, but, rather, a secular society. Guliuzza describes the linkage between those who want to secularize and privatize public space with those who insist that the Constitution's establishment clause requires "separation"—separation of church from state, and separation of religion from that which is not religion. He argues that if one is serious about ending secularization, inasmuch as it impacts upon religious-based political participation, then one must look for a different approach to the establishment clause than that offered by the Supreme Court in Everson v Board of Education (1947) and Lemon v Kurtzman (1971). He considers the alternative approaches proffered in the literature and by those on the Court, and selects one: "authentic neutrality." Guliuzza asserts that by modifying the Court's approach to the establishment clause, there will be a substantial reduction in the negative consequences of secularization and separation.