There is a saying that going to church doesn’t make you a Christian anymore than standing in a garage makes you a car. Apparently, the good folks of Freedom From Religion Foundation and the 7th US District Court aren’t clear on this…and they are making a federal case of it.

According to Robert P. George in The Washington Times, the Freedom From Religion Foundation can’t bear the thought of a public high school graduation being held in a church, even though the only reason it’s being held there is for convenience sake:

The case began in 2009, when a secularist organization sued the Elmbrook School District in Wisconsin for its decade long practice of renting a church auditorium for graduation. The district chose the church auditorium at the request of its students, who complained that the prior venue the school gymnasium was cramped and uncomfortable, and lacked adequate parking, air conditioning and seating. It is undisputed that the district selected the auditorium for purely secular reasons namely, the convenient location, ample seating, free parking, air conditioning and low cost and that the graduation events were devoid of prayer or any other religious references.

Read more on Common Sense and Religious Hostility…

“What right do they have to do this, to take away our freedoms?” Mary Anne Yep, co-founder and vice president of Triune Health Group in Chicago, recently asked of the  Obama administration regarding the HHS Mandate. On Monday when the official comment period closed, thousands of individuals swamped the Department of Health and Human Services with concerns about the HHS Mandate and the effect it would have on religious liberty in the United States. The Heritage Foundation recently posted an update about HHS and the people against it:

After more than a year of public outrage, over 50 lawsuits against the anti-conscience mandate, and a federal judge’s demand that HHS fix its coercive mandate, the Administration published a “notice of proposed rule making” (NPRM) on February 6. That proposed rule neither changes the underlying mandate finalized in law and currently in effect nor provides any workable or adequate solutions to the mandate’s trampling on religious liberty.

Several organizations have published statements on the NPRM and HHS Mandate in general.  Archbishop William Lori of Baltimore, chairman of the Catholic bishops’ Ad Hoc Committee for Religious Liberty released a statement on Monday regarding the mandate: Read more on The Continued Fight Against the HHS Mandate…

“Is there a religious way to pump gas, sell groceries, or advertise for a craft store?”

In a new paper, “God and the Profits: Is There Religious Liberty for Money-Makers?,” Mark Rienzi asks the question. (HT)

Read more on For God and For Profit: Do Money-Makers Have Religious Liberty?…

In his 1984 book The Naked Public Square, Richard John Neuhaus explained how a strict separationist reading of the First Amendment which forbids all religious speech leaves the public square “naked.” Neuhaus described the “naked public square” as “the result of political doctrine and practice that would exclude religion and religiously grounded values from the conduct of public business.”

Read more on The Naked Private Square…

What happens if a Catholic college doesn’t require students to attend Mass, doesn’t engage in “indoctrination” or “proselytizing”, and hires non-Catholic faculty? As John Garvey, president of the Catholic University of America, says, the government will likely determine the school is not “Catholic” enough for religious liberty protections:

Read more on When is a Catholic College Not Catholic Enough for the Government?…

The New York Times’ “Room for Debate” feature highlights religious freedom this week by asking the question: “Should Churches Get Tax Breaks?”

The contributors, who span the continuum of opinions on the issue, include Susan Jacoby, Christopher L. Eisgruber and Lawrence Sager, Winnie Varghese, Dan Barker, and Mark Rienzi.

Jacoby, who recently debated the merits of Christianity in American politics and Grand Rapids’ Fountain Street Church, is an advocate for secularism and author of The Age of American Unreason. Jacoby argues that if a church wants federal help, it must play by the government’s rules:

 In cases involving freedom of conscience, government policy—like the Bill of Rights—should always be on the side of the individual. If churches don’t like the strings attached to public money, they are free to refuse taxpayer subsidies. The First Amendment was not written for an America in which religion claimed the right to have it both ways.

Eisgruber and Sager, coauthors of Religious Freedom and the Constitution, argue for “exemptions for noble work, but no extra exemptions just because it was done in the name of God,” saying: Read more on Should Churches Get Tax Breaks?…

Susan Jacoby and Dinesh D’Souza met here in Grand Rapids at Fountain Street Church on Thursday, April 26, to debate the merits of religion in public discourse. The debate, co-sponsored by The Intercollegiate Studies Institute and the Hauenstein Center for Presidential Studies, was titled, “Is Christianity Good for American Politics?”

Read more on Jacoby, D’Souza debate Religion in the Public Square…

Is it unconstitutional for laws to be based on their supporters’ religiously founded moral beliefs? While most of us—at least most readers of this blog—would consider such a question to be absurd, some people apparently think it should be answered in the affirmative.
Read more on It is Unconstitutional for Laws to be Based on Religiously Influenced Moral Reasons?…

(HT: Catholic Culture) Note: One in six patients receives care in a Catholic hospital in the United States.

February 26, 2012

What are you going to give up this Lent?

By Francis Cardinal George, O.M.I.

Read more on Cardinal George: No Catholic hospitals in two years unless HHS mandate rescinded…

A quick news and analysis digest here on the Hosanna-Tabor Evangelical Lutheran Church and School v. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission ruling by the Supreme Court yesterday. Congratulations and thank you to the Becket Fund. To watch a two-hour Federalist Society panel discussion recorded in November on what is informally known as the Ministerial Exception case, visit YouTube.

Read more on Roundup: Supreme Court Rules on the Ministerial Exception Case…