April 2, 2015--Religious Freedom Restoration Act

All of a sudden in Indiana they're not talking so much about the Final Four who will square off there this weekend to determine which team will win the NCAA basketball title. This in spite of the fact that institutional prestige is at stake (though why this sort of renown should be for "institutions of higher learning" is beyond me) as are big bucks--win, lose, or draw, all four teams stand to earn up to $10 million dollars each for having clawed their way to Indianapolis. (The unpaid players, by the way, come away with at most a free pair of sneakers.)

What is really at stake Down Home In Indiana is a fight for the soul of the state--whether or not they want to remain a part of the 21st century or begin to impose a theocracy just slightly more tolerant than the Religious Police in Iran would allow.

Of course I am exaggerating. The law recently passed by the state legislature, signed by potential GOP clown car Governor Mike Pence, and almost immediately condemned by various rights organizations and just as quickly endorsed by Ted Cruz, Mark Rubio, and Scott Walker (no surprises there) as well as by Jeb Bush (I guess, sadly, no surprise) would reaffirm that Indiana supports freedom of religion while at the same time wants that freedom to permit Hoosiers by the law to be able to cite religious belief as sufficient reason not to serve, among others, gay people.

Just as one pizzeria did yesterday when it announced that if you're gay there will be no pepperoni pizza for you. Because, as they proudly proclaimed, "We're a Christian establishment."

So in spite of the hemming and hawing that this law in Indiana as well as dozens of others around the country is just a simple assertion of religious liberty, it is more a measure to allow and justify overt forms of discrimination.

Do not most all states' constitutions affirm freedom of religion? Not that they or we really need that--after all, we have a Constitution that in its very First Amendment prohibits the making of any law respecting the establishment of religion or impeding the exercise of religion.

What is interesting is that the establishment of religion was an intense issue during the early years of our Republic because a number of colonies did have state-sanctioned and supported religions--official religions, if you will (as in England), and the Framers wanted to end that practice. Freedom of religious practice, which we focus on today, was in a sense a secondary matter.

Though increasingly politicians pandering to the religious right are not reluctant to assert that, "We are a Christian nation," as if we have an established religion. To me as a Jew/non-beliver this sounds like the beginning of a theocracy or, at the very least, unconstitutional.

Just as we thought the racial and cultural wars were abating (Barack Obama's election and reelection are still the best evidence for that as has been the momentum in support for same-sex marriages), here they are raging again.

In virtually all the states that have been enacting religious freedom restoration acts there has been other legislation to suppress the voting rights of low-income citizens. An unabashed strategy to make it more difficult for people of color to vote. I should say, vote for Democrats.

And just as states such as Indiana have been required by the federal courts to permit same-sex marriages, we have this spate of legislation that allows businesses to refuse service to gays and others Christian pizzerias will refuse to serve. Not that anyone who knows anything about pizza would order one in Indiana.