Merritt accuses conservatives of pursuing legislation to solve “nonexistent” problems. But not all problems manifest initially as lawsuits. When the Solicitor General of the United States tells the Supreme Court that tax-exempt status for private religious schools with traditional views about sexuality is “going to be an issue,” it doesn’t seem all that crazy that some of those schools would pursue protective legislation. When a United States congressman tells the president of a Christian college that he is going to do everything in his power to force the college to change its views, the threat does not seem “nonexistent.”
When dozens of public and private colleges and universities expel conservative Christian student groups from their campuses, when national columnists call for the end of tax-exemptions for churches and religious groups, and when California legislators propose a bill to strip funding from most conservative religious colleges and universities, I don’t think conservatives are wrong to be concerned. The bigotry narrative perpetuated by some progressives has a clear message for conservative religious schools, ministry organizations, and social services: Change your views or be shut out of society.
The Left's fight against religious liberty is very real and very dangerous. Religion is a source of authority and power outside the direct control of the State in most western societies, and for the Left, anything outside the direct control of the State is a very bad thing. The Left's hostility to religious liberty is ramping up even further. As a result it is reasonable for religious groups and their allies to pursue protective legislation to defend their rights to association, to worship and to participate in the public square.
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LATE ADD FROM THE NY POST:
No, there's no war on religious liberty. Not compared to the war the left would like to have been waging. And the one that, with Scalia gone, is on the way:
ReplyDeleteHarvard Law Professor Says Treat Conservative Christians Like Nazis
"Now that Obama has reshaped the federal judiciary, liberal causes can win easily in court. And now that Justice Antonin Scalia has passed away, “judges no longer have to be worried about reversal by the Supreme Court if they take aggressively liberal positions.”
....
"Tushnet explains his unwillingness to respect the rights of the “losers”: “Trying to be nice to the losers didn’t work well after the Civil War, nor after Brown. (And taking a hard line seemed to work reasonably well in Germany and Japan after 1945.)”"
http://dailysignal.com/2016/05/09/harvard-law-professor-says-treat-conservative-christians-like-nazis/