Azusa Pacific University, a Christian college in Azusa, CaliforniaHere is the statement, in full:
The California Assembly has proposed legislation that is harmful to the free exercise of religion in higher education. In particular, the legislation disadvantages low-income minority students who want an education at private religious colleges. Though it purports to eliminate discrimination, Senate Bill 1146 results in its own form of discrimination by stigmatizing and coercively punishing religious beliefs that disagree on contested matters related to human sexuality. If SB 1146 were to pass, it would deny students’ ability to participate in state grant programs—programs that exist to help low-income students, and which are overwhelmingly used by racial minorities—at schools that are found in violation of the bill. Moreover, it would severely restrict the ability of religious education institutions to set expectations of belief and conduct that align with the institution’s religious tenets.
While we do not all agree on religious matters, we all agree that the government has no place in discriminating against poor religious minorities or in pitting a religious education institution’s faith-based identity against its American identity. This legislation puts into principle that majoritarian beliefs are more deserving of legal protection, and that minority viewpoints are deserving of government harassment. Legislation of this nature threatens the integrity not only of religious institutions, but of any viewpoint wishing to exercise basic American freedoms, not least of which is the freedom of conscience.
We, the undersigned, do not necessarily agree with one another’s religious views, but we agree on the necessity of the liberty to exercise these views. At the root of the American experiment is the idea that conscience and religious conviction come before the demands of the state. Some of us disagree with the sexual ethics of orthodox Jews, Christians, and Muslims giving rise to this legislation, but we are unified in our resistance to the government setting up its own system of orthodoxy. As the American founding father Benjamin Franklin once said, “We must all hang together, or assuredly we shall all hang separately.” No less is this true than on matters of religious liberty. Where the state can encroach on one religion’s free exercise, it can just as easily trample on any other religion’s free exercise. We therefore join in solidarity across religious lines to speak against Senate Bill 1146.
We call on the California Assembly to abandon Senate Bill 1146. To ensure the future of the free exercise of religion in higher education in California and across America, we respectfully call on the supporters of Senate Bill 1146 to immediately withdraw their support of this bill, with the commitment to disavow similar intrusions in the future. Opposition to this bill is not grounded in the protection of religious liberty only, nor for the special pleading of one religion in particular, but for the protection of American society and American democracy. Such protection requires a civil society welcoming of religious diversity.
The future of a free America requires the full participation of religion in public life. Religious higher education cultivates both the mind and the soul. Senate Bill 1146 endangers the integrity of religious education institutions and discourages them from acting according to their conscience for fear of government retribution. As Americans with a rich legacy of freedoms afforded to us by the laws of nature and of nature’s God, and enshrined in the Constitution, we can do better. As we renew our commitment to religious pluralism in the public square, we should embrace debate, welcome dissent, and encourage civility as we work together for the sake of the common good and of a country we are all unreservedly blessed to call our home.
The bill is signed by many prominent religious leaders and thinkers. Names that might be familiar to readers of The Way of Improvement Leads Home include Russell Moore, Rick Warren, Robert George, John Inazu, Ron Sider, Samuel Rodriguez, Michael Cromartie, Timothy George, Thomas Kidd, Richard Land, Gerald McDermott, Richard Mouw, Marvin Olasky, Paige Patterson, Ramesh Ponnuru, Karen Swallow Prior, and R.R. Reno.
Frankly, I am disappointed that the list of signers is not more politically and theologically diverse. Why are there so few liberals (political and theological), mainline Protestant thinkers, or Catholics endorsing this? Did the authors of the statement reach out to people who are not part of either mainstream evangelical or conservative intellectual circles?
Having said that, I wholeheartedly affirm this statement.
As my readers know, I am no fan of the idea that America is a Christian nation. So I would not put myself in the camp of people who suddenly jumped on the “religious liberty” bandwagon because Christian attempts to reclaim the nation have failed in the wake of the Obergfell decision.
I do, however, believe in religious liberty and religious pluralism. There seems to be some legitimate models out there for living together with our deepest differences. They include George Marsden’s idea of “principled pluralism” as set forth in his book The Twilight of the American Enlightenment: The 1950s and the Crisis of Liberal Belief and John Inazu’s idea of “confident pluralism” as set forth in his book Confident Pluralism: Surviving and Thriving Through Our Deepest Differences.
This piece is starting to make the rounds, and was sent to me by a friend today. SB 1146 is part of a very long march to the sea. Sherman had nothing on these guys.
http://mosaicmagazine.com/essay/2016/08/whos-afraid-of-religious-liberty/
I suspect that the number of signatories is small because the effort is led by those who have spent much of the past few decades seeking to establish something akin to a Christian America.
I agree that the notion of pluralism is preferable to what we’re seeing here. Inazu’s book is excellent. That said, the folks at ERLC haven’t ever shown much of an interest in pluralism, at least in places where white evangelicals still make up a majority.
Pluralism has to be a two-way street. When evangelicals are willing to confer onto others the benefits of pluralism in places where they make up a majority, they can expect the same in return in places where they make up a minority. But that’s not generally been the position taken by the movement. Instead, evangelicals tend to favor majoritarian rule when they make up a majority, and only advocate for minority rights in places where they make up a minority. The culture has rightly judged that approach as disingenuous.