Religious Freedom Only If Big Government Does Not Disagree

by Daniel Greenfield: The issue is about the reframing of religious freedom to mean any religious practice that the government does not explicitly oppose.

And that's not religious freedom. If religious freedom means anything that the government does not oppose, then religious freedom does not exist. Just as freedom of speech does not mean speech that the government approves of, it means speech the government disapproves of, religious freedom means religious practices that the government disapproves of.

And when we forget that, this is what happens.DOES THIS LAW APPLY TO CHURCHES? Sometimes. Iowa law provides that these protections do not apply to religious institutions with respect to any religion-based qualifications when such qualifications are related to a bona fide religious purpose. Where qualifications are not related to a bona fide religious purpose, churches are still subject to the law’s provisions. (e.g. a child care facility operated at a church or a church service open to the public).The law in this case involves the contention that men are allowed to use the Ladies Room.

The interesting thing is the rather peculiar claim that church services open to the public do not serve a religious purpose. It's bad enough that public accommodation laws have been so far stretched beyond any reasonable interpretation that we are even having this conversation, but this is a horse of another color, breed and dimension.

If religious institutions that are open to the public must now be treated by that standard, then what's next? Religious institutions going underground? Censored sermons.Paul Gowder, a law professor at the University of Iowa Law School and an expert in constitutional law, said it would be "blatantly unconstitutional" for state officials to try to regulate the content of church sermons.

"The notion that the Civil Rights Commission can prohibit a church from sermonizing in whatever hateful or discriminatory way they want is absurd on its face," he said.

Drake University law professor Maura Strassberg, an expert on sexuality law, sees the matter as more clear-cut...

Strassberg said sermons that stick to human sexuality matters pertaining to theology would be constitutionally protected. But she suggested situations could arise where a preacher's remarks could cross over the line into harassment.

"There is a line: You can go from, 'This is what God believes' … to 'You are bad, so we don't want you here,'" Strassberg said.This is where we are indeed headed. It's also a reminder that the Bill of Rights exists to protect unpopular speech, not popular speech.
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Daniel Greenfield is Shillman Journalism Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center and a New York writer focusing on radical Islam. David Horowitz is a Contributing Author of the ARRA News Service

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