The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty is pleased to announce Eric Marrapodi, Senior Producer at CNN, as the recipient of the first annual Vine and Fig Tree Award for excellence in reporting on religious liberty issues.

Eric will be presented with the award on September 19, 2013, 6:00pm, at the Four Seasons Hotel in Washington, D.C.

George Washington used the vine and fig tree reference to illustrate the importance of religious liberty for all. In his famous letter to the Newport Hebrew Congregation, Washington writes:

 “Every one shall sit in safety under his own vine and fig tree, and there shall be none to make him afraid….For happily the Government of the United States gives to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance, requires only that they who live under its protection should demean themselves as good citizens, in giving it on all occasions their effectual support.” 

Eric Marrapodi is manager of CNN’s Belief Blog.  No one could be more deserving of our first annual Vine and Fig Tree Award.

Additional details to follow.

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This article features Odyssey Networks’ video of our 2013 Canterbury Medal Dinner.

The post Religious Liberty for the Rest of Us appeared first on Becket Fund.

By Kyle Duncan

Two weeks ago, the EEOC sued a Peoria trucking company for violating the religious liberty of two of its Muslim drivers when it fired them after they asked not to haul alcohol in their trucks. The EEOC found the trucking company “could have readily avoided assigning these employees to alcohol delivery” but instead “chose to force the issue” and fire them. However the case comes out, the EEOC is right about one thing: the Muslim drivers have a genuine objection to being forced to transport alcohol, because it is an act forbidden by their faith. It is beside the point that the drivers are not being made, say, to drink alcohol themselves or to hand out drinks at a party. As the EEOC correctly recognizes, transporting alcohol is also a practice the drivers’ religion forbids, every bit as much as taking a drink themselves.

Meanwhile, 600 miles away in Oklahoma City, another federal agency, HHS, has taken a narrower view of religious faith. HHS is arguing that a devout Christian family, the Greens, must use their family business, Hobby Lobby, to deliver a different product—emergency contraceptives—or face draconian fines. HHS fails to recognize that the Greens object, not only to using the drugs themselves, but also to providing them to employees through their health plan. The district court agreed with HHS, however: it found that the Greens’ real objection was merely to contributing funds that “might, after a series of independent decisions by health care providers and patients covered by [Hobby Lobby’s] plan, subsidize someone else’s participation in an activity that is condemned by plaintiff’s religion.” Hobby Lobby Stores, Inc. v. Sebelius, 870 F. Supp. 2d 1278, 1294 (W.D. Okla. 2012). That decision is now before the en banc Tenth Circuit.

Imagine if the EEOC had taken the HHS approach to the Muslim truck drivers. Instead of accepting their beliefs at face value, the EEOC could have said the drivers’ real objection was merely to furnishing transportation services that “might, after a series of independent decisions” result in “someone else’s participation in an activity that is condemned by [their] religion.” EEOC didn’t take that position, of course, because it would have rewritten the drivers’ beliefs. They object to their own coerced participation in delivering alcohol, not to whether other people drink it. They are simply saying, “Leave us and our trucks out of this.”

The Green family is saying the same thing. They object to the government forcing them and their businesses to deliver a specific product against their consciences. They are not trying to limit anyone else’s freedom to use emergency contraceptives; they are simply saying, “Leave us and our business out of this.” Not a difficult concept to grasp. What is puzzling is why the EEOC gets it, but HHS doesn’t.

Kyle Duncan is General Counsel for The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty.

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Religious people can and do disagree over whether pastors, priests, or rabbis should preach about the political issues of the day. That is their right. But surely all Americans can agree — especially after the abuses that have come to light in the past week–that the time for the tax man to censor sermons must come to an end.

The post Blomberg & Rassbach: IRS targeting goes back decades, houses of worship have been main targets appeared first on Becket Fund.

Click here to watch Odyssey Networks’ video on our 2013 Canterbury Medal Dinner.

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If a city includes a nativity scene in its holiday display, must it also include a sign mocking the Christmas story as a toxic myth? If the scene has an angel, must it have a devil, too?

The post Crucified ‘Skeleton Santa’ and ‘Flying Spaghetti Monster’ vs. Christianity appeared first on Becket Fund.

By John Ehrett

Over the last several years, repeated challenges have been leveled at one of America’s most revered bastions of patriotism: the Pledge of Allegiance. Lawsuits seeking to strip two simple words – “under God” – from the Pledge have arisen in state and federal courts alike. Those opposed to the Pledge’s current text have continued to press for change, despite losses in the the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals (2010) and the 1st Circuit (2010). This persistence may be due to the fact that the Supreme Court has only obliquely weighed in on the issue: in 2002 the Court ruled that Michael Newdow, the atheist minister responsible for many of the challenges, lacked proper standing to proceed with his suit, but issued no majority opinion regarding the Pledge’s constitutional permissibility.

There is no broad political groundswell seeking to toss out “under God”; nearly 90% of Americans favor retaining the phrase. Unfortunately, their views run directly counter to the radical secularism currently seeking to eradicate religion from the public square…even when such “religion” isn’t even rooted in a specific ideology.

Contrary to what many in the secularist camp have asserted, the Pledge of Allegiance is neither a prayer nor a declaration of metaphysical dogma. As historians have noted, the phrase was originally introduced in the 1950s as a political counterweight to the anti-religious antagonism of the Soviet Union. The clause “under God” simply recognizes that individual persons are uniquely valuable, invested with natural rights that transcend their roles as cogs in a social machine; furthermore, by referring to “God,” the government is forced to acknowledge that its authority over citizens is in fact limited. Irrespective of any religious context, those are positive and humanistic ideas – around which both people of faith and nonbelievers can unite.

When Americans unite to speak the words of the Pledge of Allegiance, they are collectively reaffirming their belief in these human rights, whether or not they personally choose to revere a deity. The power of the Pledge is its implicit assumption that human beings are more than means to a given political or economic end; by virtue of their humanity alone, they possess a certain inherent worth that no government may legitimately infringe.

In keeping with this sentiment, the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty is committed to upholding the intrinsic dignity of all people. Foundational to that dignity, in turn is a recognition of individuals’ right to freely exercise their religious beliefs, in both public and private spheres.

This Flag Day, let’s collectively pause to remember the sacrifices behind the freedoms we take for granted…including religious freedom. Our society, founded on such liberties within a system of democratic pluralism, has dynamically impacted the course of human history. And if a deep-rooted respect for fundamental beliefs – worldview systems that both unite and divide us – is sacrificed on the altar of anti-religious fear, our nation loses one of its most valuable assets.

Americans may not agree about much else, but we should be able to agree on that.

John Ehrett, a senior at Patrick Henry College, is the communications intern at the Becket Fund.

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From August 7 to August 10, 2013, the American Academy of FertilityCare Professionals will hold their 32nd Annual Meeting in New Orleans. Becket Fund General Counsel Kyle Duncan will lead two breakout sessions on religious liberty.

Dates: August 7-10, 2013

Location: Hotel Monteleone, New Orleans, LA

For more information and the full agenda, click here.

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All eyes are on the Hobby Lobby case, just argued by the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty before the Tenth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

The post This Won’t Turn Out Well appeared first on Becket Fund.

Are President Obama and his lawyers on the same page when it comes to religious liberty? A lawyer for the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty doesn’t think so.

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