Objective coverage of church-state and religious liberty developments, with extensive links to primary sources.
Wednesday, July 08, 2009
California Cities Welcome Sikh Police Officers
Yankees Settle Lawsuit Over Restrictions During Playing of "God Bless America"
Pope Issues Encyclical On Globalization and Econmic Development
In the face of the unrelenting growth of global interdependence, there is a strongly felt need, even in the midst of a global recession, for a reform of the United Nations Organization, and likewise of economic institutions and international finance, so that the concept of the family of nations can acquire real teeth. One also senses the urgent need to find innovative ways of implementing the principle of the responsibility to protect and of giving poorer nations an effective voice in shared decision-making....
To manage the global economy; to revive economies hit by the crisis; to avoid any deterioration of the present crisis and the greater imbalances that would result; to bring about integral and timely disarmament, food security and peace; to guarantee the protection of the environment and to regulate migration: for all this, there is urgent need of a true world political authority....Obviously it would have to have the authority to ensure compliance with its decisions from all parties, and also with the coordinated measures adopted in various international forums. Without this ... international law would risk being conditioned by the balance of power among the strongest nations. The integral development of peoples and international cooperation require the establishment of a greater degree of international ordering.... They also require the construction of a social order that at last conforms to ... the interconnection between moral and social spheres, and to the link between politics and the economic and civil spheres, as envisaged by the Charter of the United Nations.
Tuesday, July 07, 2009
In Louisiana, Catholic Death-Row Inmates Will Have Access To Mass
Turkey's Government Unhappy With Planned Reality TV Show Aimed At Conversion
Malaysian Court Says Art Director Died A Muslim-- No Jurisdiction To Hear Family's Objections
UPDATE: Malaysian Insider reported Tuesday that Mohan Singh's family has filed an appeal with the Court of Appeal in Putrajaya, even though Mohan was buried Monday night in a Muslim cemetery.
Britain's International Development Program Will Double Aid To Faith-Based Groups
IRS Delay In Granting Tax-Exempt Status Questioned
Suit Challenges Ten Commandments On Display In Kentucky Courthouse
UPDATE: The July 11 Louisville Courier-Journal reports in more detail on the displays at issue. Framed copies of the Ten Commandments are posted at both entrances to the courthouse, outside several offices and next to a woman's restroom. Separate from these, and not the object of the ACLU's complaint, a Foundations of American Law and Government display (which includes the 10 Commandments among other historical documents) stands in the rear of the courthouse.
Monday, July 06, 2009
BJC Publishes Analysis of Sotomayor's Religion Decisions
While Sotomayor’s written record raises no red flags, it also fails to provide complete assurance to those who are most concerned about our fragile religious freedom rights. In the free exercise cases, she displays careful attention to protecting religious rights, including in prisons where courts generally give deference to government officials. Likewise, these cases demonstrate an emphasis on the importance of assessing the individual’s specific religious claim. This approach illustrates an expansive view of religious freedom that does not depend on the approval of the majority. Her religious display cases demonstrate the fact-sensitive nature of such disputes, but tell us little about where she would draw the line between permissible acknowledgements of religion and unconstitutional displays that send a message of endorsement of religion by the government. Beyond those cases, her record gives little indication of her views of the Supreme Court’s various Establishment Clause standards or how she is likely to decide such cases.[Thanks to Don Byrd for the lead.]
Sotomayor’s writings include few if any statements articulating how the First Amendment protects religious liberty, promotes the voluntary nature of religion, prevents governmental interference in religion and tends to reduce conflict among religions. Still, her record offers positive signs that she will be a thoughtful, fair-minded jurist in protecting religious freedom.
Air Force Rejects Flyover Request For Rally Sponsored By Christian Group
Daily Kos yesterday, reporting on developments, quotes Military Religious Freedom Foundation president Mikey Weinstein's strong support of the Air Force's decision. Weinstein, in his typically blunt fashion, said: "To those in the fundamentalist Christian cabal who vigorously oppose this long sought, terrific decision by the U.S. Air Force, may I suggest that they consider holding their event next year in Kim Jung Il's North Korea or the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia as neither of those countries have a separation of Church and State as we do in beautiful America."
Israel's President Addresses Interfaith Conference In Kazakhstan
While the monotheistic and humanistic believers, Christians, Muslims and Jews, used to believe that there was just one God for all, compassionate, merciful and righteous, there are nowadays others, luckily a minority, that sanctify a different God, a God that permits massacres, forgives cruelty, and calls upon his believers to destroy, kill, lie and ruin. This distorted stream constitutes a defamation of the Lord. It is not a religion, it is a crime, a crime against God and man. We must separate religion from terror. This should be a common effort by all believers, regardless of faith, creed or gender....
Cultivating interfaith ties of understanding and friendship is vital, not only in interfaith relations, but in the religions' perception of God. The first question is always whether God created man in His image, or whether man is trying to create God in his compromised image. Whether we should adopt God's moral code, or whether we should refer our personal desires to God.... Only God who created man has the right to determine life.... God had no partners in the creation of the world, so there is nobody that can declare war against.
Group Sues To Get Kentucky "In God We Trust" License Plate
Upgrade of Russia-Vatican Relationships Is In the Works
Recent Articles and Forthcoming Books of Interest
- Suzie Chiodo, Big M, Little Freedom: Accommodating Religion in a Secular Society, (June 22, 2009).
- Sadiq Reza, Islam’s Fourth Amendment: Search and Seizure in Islamic Doctrine and Muslim Practice, (Georgetown Journal of International Law, Vol. 40, No. 3, 2009).
- Patrick McKinley Brennan, Self-Love and Forgiveness: A Holy Alliance?, (in Forgiveness, Darlene Weaver, ed., Forthcoming).
- Mano Singham, God vs. Darwin: The War between Evolution and Creationism in the Classroom, (Rowan & Littlefield, Oct. 2009).
- Sean Oliver-Dee, The Caliphate Question: The British Government and Pan-Islamic Governance, (Lexington Books, Aug. 2009).
- Frederick M. Shepherd, Christianity and Human Rights: Christians and the Struggle for Global Justice, (Lexington Books, July 2009).
Sunday, July 05, 2009
British Chief Rabbi Criticizes Court's Decision On Admission To Jewish Schools
[I]f Jewish schools are compelled by English law to impose a test of religious practice instead of the existing test of membership of the Jewish faith, they will no longer be able to teach the Jewish faith to those who have little or no experience of practising it.... The implications of this ruling are vast and affect us all. To be told now that Judaism is racist, when Jews have been in the forefront of the fight against racism in this country, is distressing. To confuse religion and race is a mistake.
Court Orders Sikh Temple Directors To Disclose Contact Information
Recent Prisoner Free Exercise and Establishment Clause Cases
In Strope v. McKune, 2009 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 55179 (D KA, June 30, 2009), a Kansas federal district court rejected an inmate's complaint that claims the prison's kosher menu lacked variety, that he was given insufficient time to eat and that on two separate dates he was deprived of a kosher meal on two dates.
Jacobs v. Ohio Department of Rehabilitation & Corrections, 2009 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 55662 (SD OH, June 30, 2009), was a RICO lawsuit filed by a number of prisoners against various state officials. Among the claims was a contention by one of the plaintiffs that his religious materials, including his copy of the Qu'ran, were vandalized by the "Men in Black" during a "shakedown." An Ohio federal magistrate judge recommended that the claim be rejected because none of the named defendants were alleged to have been involved in the incident.
In Pittman v. Broadus, 2009 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 55350 (SD MS, June 15, 2009), plaintiff alleged some 18 different violations of his civil rights by jail officials. One of the claims that a Mississippi federal magistrate judge permitted to move ahead was plaintiff's claim that his free exercise rights were violated by the jail's failure to provide Islamic religious services or alternatively allow inmate-led services. However the court rejected the claim insofar as it alleged that the failure to provide services prevented non-Muslim inmates an opportunity to learn about Islam.
In Bey v. Douglas County Correctional Facility, 2009 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 55748 (D KA, Jan. 27, 2009), a Kansas federal district court held that a delay in responding to an inmate's request for a kosher diet did not violate his free exercise rights under the 1st Amendment or RLUIPA. The inmate was a member of the Moorish Scientific Temple of America. At least the initial part of the delay resulted from officials researching the legitimacy of plaintiff's request. Subsequently the parties disagreed for a period of time over whether the meals met the proper standards for kosher food.
In Castle v. Schriro, 2009 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 55843 (D AZ, June 30, 2009), an Arizona federal district court accepted a federal magistrate's recommendations and rejected a habeas corpus petition by a prisoner who challenged his sentence on Establishment Clause grounds, among others. In considering the aggravating factors at the sentencing hearing, the state trial court had mentioned the fact that the defendant used his purported Christan beliefs to deceive victims in his real estate fraud.