Copyright 1998 Newsweek
Newsweek
December 21, 1998, U.S. Edition
SECTION: THE LAST WORD; Pg. 78
LENGTH: 1566 words
HEADLINE: SEASONAL LITIGATION
BYLINE: BY GEORGE F. WILL
HIGHLIGHT:
Is a religious sensibility natural to humanity, or is religion akin to
secondhand smoke?
BODY:
FOR MANY PEOPLE, 'TIS THE SEASON WHEN (IN THE words of the Jesuit poet Gerard
Manley Hopkins)
"the world is charged with the grandeur of God." For the American Civil Liberties Union and similarly militant secularists,
December is charged with menace, in the form of creches and other religious
displays on
public properties. The secularists think such symbols are the thin end of the wedge
of theocracy, harbingers of an unconstitutional
"establishment" of religion.
Jersey City, N.J., is America's most ethnically diverse city, but that is not
why it is ground zero in the creche wars. On the contrary, its diverse
citizens like Mayor Bret Schundler's way of devising diverse rituals to honor
the city's ethnicities. It is the ACLU that wants courts to impose a
monochrome barrenness on the
public square. The ACLU, which has inexhaustible reservoirs of indignation, is
offended by menorahs as well as
nativity scenes.
The ACLU's litigation against Jersey City, now in its fourth year, grinds on
against a background of decades of judicial hairsplitting, the purpose of which
is to prevent
"establishment." For example, courts have held that nativity scenes, to be constitutional, must
be leavened, or diluted, by the inclusion of a quantity of secular symbols --
Frostys and Rudolphs and the like. But the potential for litigation is
limitless.
Attorneys with the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, which is defending Jersey
City pro bono, asked one of the city's tormentors if he would object to the
city's displaying Pakistan's flag, which has a star and crescent.
"I may well," he said, noting darkly that
"Islam" appears in the name of Pakistan's capital.
"This gives rise to certain problems." If so, what of Norway's flag? It contains a cross (as do many other flags,
including Great Britain's, which has three crosses -- those of saints Andrew,
George and Patrick). Israel's flag has the star of David. More menace.
Regarding Christmas, one plaintiff said that a seasonal celebration neutral
enough to be constitutional would observe the winter solstice. Another
plaintiff thought wreaths were constitutional -- until he was told that wreaths
began as reminders of Jesus' crown of thorns. By the way, candy canes
represent shepherds' crooks. The specter of
"establishment" is everywhere.
And not just in Jersey City. In San Diego . . . (Uh-oh. Does even the city's
name -- and the names of St. Louis, San Francisco, St. Petersburg, St.
Augustine and many more cities, including, come to think of it, Los Angeles --
pass constitutional muster? Does a religious name on an American
public place violate the Establishment Clause?)
In San Diego, a religious group bought bus shelter advertisements and
billboard space for pictures of a wrapped present accompanied by messages such
as
"A gift to die for. Jesus did" and
"The gift that keeps on forgiving. Jesus." Transit officials received a few complaints, so the ads were removed. The
company said its policy is neutrality -- not to promote one religion over
another. By being banned, religious messages are treated like political ads,
sexually salacious ads and ads for tobacco, alcohol and guns.
In San Francisco's Sunnydale
public housing complex, residents are allowed to use the community room for many
activities, such as parties and outside speakers (including those from the
Nation of Islam), but not for Bible study. The city's Housing Authority says
the principle of separation of church and state precludes using
"federally funded units to promote interests in the church."
In
Gilbert, Ariz., the ACLU got a court to issue a restraining order to prevent
the mayor from declaring a
"Bible Week." When the mayor criticized this, the ACLU, that self-styled friend of the First
Amendment, criticized her for engaging in government-disapproved speech,
because the order prohibited her from lending any support to
"Bible Week."
In Medford, N.J., a 6-year-old was invited to pick a story to read to his
fellow first graders. He picked two paragraphs from Genesis in his Beginners
Bible. The passage about the reconciliation of the brothers Jacob and Esau
mentions neither God nor miracles. Still, the boy was forbidden to read it.
His mother says the teacher said:
"It's a
public school and the Bible is not allowed."
In Cincinnati a suit is challenging the constitutionality of 5 U.S.C. Section
6103. What does that law do? It recognizes Christmas as
a federal holiday. (After 29 years of hostility, Cuba's Communist Party has
restored Christmas as a holiday.)
So, business is brisk for groups like the Becket Fund. Located in Washington,
the Fund litigates in defense of religious expression. It aims to prevent
religion from being required to render unto Caesar more subservience than is
required by the First Amendment's prohibition of
"establishment" of religion, and to see that Caesar renders unto religion the respect mandated
by the guarantee of the
"free exercise" of religion.
The Fund's president, Kevin Hasson, aims to be as much an affliction to
religion's despisers as the Fund's namesake, Thomas Becket, that famously
turbulent priest, was to Henry II. Hasson believes that supporters of religion
are litigating in self-defense, not to achieve privileges but to avoid
stigmatization, marginalization and other imposed disadvantages. At issue are
two clashing
theories about human nature.
On one side, Hasson says, are those who believe that human beings have a
natural thirst for transcendence, a built-in desire to live in communities
enriched by rituals that express and slake that thirst. In the argot of the
day, human beings are hard-wired with religious sensibilities. On the other
side are those who believe that the religious impulse is a bad habit, a legacy
of less enlightened times, and something that society should outgrow. Religion
is akin to secondhand smoke -- something that thoroughly enlightened, modern
people find obnoxious, and from which the
public must be protected.
The seasonal litigation may sometimes turn on minutiae. But the stake -- our
conception of ourselves -- could not be bigger.
GRAPHIC: Picture, no caption
LANGUAGE: ENGLISH
LOAD-DATE: December 26, 1998
