Religious "Free"dom In The United States Of America REL200

Live as free people, but do not use your freedom as a cover-up for evil; live as God’s slaves. - Peter 2:16 To you be your religion, and to me be mine. Quran (109:6)

OK America, so you want to talk about religious freedom.

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It's something we take pretty seriously here in America.

I mean, it is part of our FIRST AMENDMENT!

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Congress shall make NO law respecting an ESTABLISHMENT of RELIGION, or PROHIBITING the FREE EXERCISE thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances. It's also mentioned in Article VI, that no religious test shall be administered.

So if the Constitution says we have universal religious freedom then what's all the fuss about right?

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Actually, religious freedom isn't as cut and dry as the constitution might make it seem - so let's start by defining religious freedom, shall we?

In theory, Religious Freedom is the freedom for one to hold personal religious beliefs without infringement upon by another.

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Total homie/ professor Elizabeth Shakman Hurd defines religious freedom as the "freedom to believe (or not)," AKA, religious freedom is not "religion-specific" and ideally protects the beliefs (or lack thereof) of all Americans. Baddie Winnifred Sullivan points out that, "You cannot both celebrate religious freedom and deny it to those whose religion you don’t like," which is a MAJOR criticism of the way that arguments for religious freedom work today. You'll see what I mean.

Historically, religious freedoms were *shockingly* not created equal for all religions.

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This all started most notably with Reynolds v. United States in 1878. Check out the facts HERE:

Bottom line is, the Supreme Court ruled that crime is still punishable regardless of religious belief.

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So basically, free exercise, or the ability to have freedom of religion, only applies to BELIEF completely (how it applies to Bieber, I am unsure), whereas it only applies to PRACTICE in cases of LEGAL practices of religion.

So if religious freedom doesn't apply to all religions equally, then who gets left out?

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Lots of people. In 1989, in Employment v. Smith, the Supreme Court ruled that the use of Peyote, a psychedelic drug used sacredly as part of Native American religions, was illegal, regardless of the religious basis for its use. Check out the facts HERE: And so stands another example of a minority religion being ruled against by the US Supreme Court. This example specifically illustrates a religion of non-whites falling target to religious discrimination by the US political system, even though we're supposed to have DISESTABLISHMENT.

Despite this, MAJORITY religions, aka major sects of Christianity such as Protestantism, reap the benefits of the current system's religious freedom legislation.

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In 2013, the Supreme Court ruled in Burwell v. Hobby Lobby, that it was within a corporations religious freedom rights to deny employees contraception mandated by law within the Affordable Care Act. Read About the case HERE: Where we have seen rulings condemning minority religions in terms of practices that may be illegal, we are now seeing an example of a majority religion breaking the law in the name of religious freedom and getting away with it.

What did we learn from this?

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Sarah Imhoff believes this case unveiled some truths about the US Supreme Court and their dealings with religion. "religion has an identifiable core and essence, and

second, that the core and essence of religion is belief. Basically, the Supreme Court's decision puts belief, and ultimately practice over the law, despite previous court decisions that have ruled against the practices of minority decisions.

So who do we think is running the show here then?

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White Christians in politics.

Granted, it has been like this for a long time. So why is any of this significant? You know, besides the blatant discrimination???

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Well the legislature regarding this topic/influencing this topic is major. The Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA), states that the government shall not burden a person's religious freedom UNLESS, it is of compelling government interest or is the least restrictive means of furthering the compelling government interest. If you want to understand more about why this is the way it is, check out the Sherbert Test HERE: This was ultimately used as a part of the decision in Burwell v. Hobby Lobby that I'm sure you looked into above.

TF does that mean?

Basically it means that the government gets to decide which religions fall into the categories that would lead to a government interest, likely those breaking federal law such as the religion in question in Employment v. Smith, rather than those that just contradict federal insurance mandates.

These implications don't stop at major court decisions, only affecting those willing to take their fight that far

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Sarah Posner wrote an article critiquing how the RFRA, and the Burwell decision in that faith-based organizations continue to be able to discriminate in hiring as a part of their "closely-held" religious beliefs. This also means that sexual orientation could be used against potential employees or current employees and ultimately could result in firing.

The list goes on

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Louise Melling wrote an opinion piece outlining that while many religious freedoms are upheld within the United States, the RFRA continues to be used to aid majority religious groups while discriminating others. For example, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops gets taxpayer funding to assist immigrant minors, though in cases of rape those minors are denied abortion services because their care is coming from Catholics.

In case you haven't been keeping up with the news,

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This stuff is still going on as we speak, because the protests in North Dakota against the Dakota Access Pipeline are the result of the fact that the pipeline would desecrate the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe's sacred ground. While the Obama Administration denied a permit for the last leg of the pipeline to be completed, the imminent doom of Donald Trump's presidency come January will likely result in the completion of the pipeline.

This isn't new

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In 1973, Vine DeLoria JR was making arguments that until we stop seeing religion and Christianity as white, we will be unable to make changes in the way religion affects us all. Native American religions should not be seen as exotic, but just as real and relevant as any major sect of Christianity. God ought to stand with the oppressed, for that is where god is needed, and by that logic, in cases of religious discrimination against indigenous people, god is by that very logic, red.

So what's this got to do with religion?

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Because the ground in question is sacred to the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, the fact that the United States government has shown a lack of respect towards the religious freedom of the tribe, indicates a continuation of a lack of religious freedom for minority and indigenous religions at the hands of those in power. We saw this before in both Reynolds v. United States & Employment v. Smith.

The bottom line here is,

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The arguments for religious freedom today benefit the majority religion of Christianity at the expense of minority religions and indigenous religions. The legislation in place with the RFRA and the use of the Sherbert Test in decisions regarding religious freedom do not allow for religious freedom to exist equally for all religions. The only way to change this is to get new legislation in place that changes the current system, and to do that people need to vote with this in mind, so we can work together to get religious freedom that doesn't discriminate, for all.