Posted on by Marc O. DeGirolami · 1 Comment

Burt, “In the Whirlwind”

Here is a book which might be described as comparative political theory, and will certainly interest those readers who are looking for a treatment of the law and justice of religious traditions: In the Whirlwind: God and Humanity in Conflict (HUP 2012) by the distinguished constitutionalist Robert A. Burt (Yale).  The publisher’s description follows.

God deserves obedience simply because he’s God—or does he? Inspired by a passion for biblical as well as constitutional scholarship, in this bold exploration Yale Law Professor Robert A. Burt conceptualizes the political theory of the Hebrew and Christian Bibles. God’s authority as expressed in these accounts is not a given. It is no less inherently problematic and in need of justification than the legitimacy of secular government.

In recounting the rich narratives of key biblical figures—from Adam and Eve to Noah, Cain, Abraham, Moses, Job, and Jesus—In the Whirlwind paints a surprising picture of the ambivalent, mutually dependent relationship between God and his peoples. Taking the Hebrew and Christian Bibles as a unified whole, Burt traces God’s relationship with humanity as it evolves from complete harmony at the outset to continual struggle. In almost every case, God insists on unconditional obedience, while humanity withholds submission and holds God accountable for his promises.

Contemporary political theory aims for perfect justice. The Bible, Burt shows, does not make this assumption. Justice in the biblical account is an imperfect process grounded in human—and divine—limitation. Burt suggests that we consider the lessons of this tension as we try to negotiate the power struggles within secular governments, and also the conflicts roiling our public and private lives.

Posted on by Mark Movsesian

Protecting Believers, Not Beliefs

Some news out of the UN this week. For the first time since 1998, the General Assembly’s annual resolution against religious intolerance has dropped the call for banning “defamation of religions.” Muslim nations typically have supported the ban, but Western countries like the US have opposed it as a violation of freedom of speech. This year, Western and Muslim countries were able to agree to remove the reference to defamation in favor of a new approach that calls for ending discrimination against people on the basis of religion, an approach that Reuters describes as “protecting believers” rather than “beliefs.”  The deletion of the reference to defamation must be accounted a diplomatic victory for the US and other Western countries, but the new resolution also calls on nations to end “incitement to religious hatred.” I suppose some countries might interpret “incitement” to cover defamation as well, since defaming a religion could incite violence against its followers. So the defamation concept might still be lurking out there. The resolution is non-binding, in any case.

Posted on by Mark Movsesian

Controversy About Secularism Class at Georgetown

A fight is developing between First Things blogger Matthew Cantirino and Georgetown Professor Jacques Berlinerblau over a description of Berlinerblau’s new class on secularism. Last Friday, the Washington Post profiled Berlinerblau’s class, which the Post described as an engaging, fair, but perhaps tendentious freshman seminar that had as its central theme the need for separating religion and public life. The Post used the class as an example of the burgeoning field of Secular Studies  in American universities, a development some liken to the creation of Women’s Studies departments a couple of generations ago. Yesterday, Cantirino discussed the Post article, including  its suggestion that courses like Berlinerblau’s might be an occasion for “academic indoctrination” (Cantirino’s words). This morning, on the Chronicle of Higher Education’s website, Berlinerblau demanded an apology. I’ll let Cantirino respond for himself, but maybe Berlinerblau should demand an apology from the Post reporter, since the article Cantirino was discussing says that over the course of the semester Berlinerblau had “managed to change the minds of most of his students,” including at least one who came into the class suspicious of secularism. That’s not indicative of indoctrination, of course, but it does suggest that Berlinerblau was trying to convince students of a particular point of view, and that seems to be the sense in which Cantirino was using the phrase. Read the exchange for yourself.

Posted on by Marc O. DeGirolami

Sidhu on Religious Liberty and Prison Grooming Requirements

A very interesting paper by Dawinder S. Sidhu (New Mexico), Religious Freedom and Inmate Grooming Standards, about the appropriate standard for claims for exemption under the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUIPA) and the First Amendment.  The abstract follows.

This Article explores the Eleventh Circuit’s repeated rejection of challenges, under the First Amendment’s Free Exercise Clause and the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (“RLUIPA”), to “restrictive” inmate grooming policies (that require inmates to shave or cut their hair) in suits brought by plaintiffs who subscribe to a religion that mandates the growing of facial hair or long hair. It suggests, based on an analysis of case law, states’ policies, and recent legal developments, that the Eleventh Circuit’s approach in upholding these policies is no longer sustainable.

Today, thirty-nine states, the Federal Bureau of Prisons, and D.C., do not have restrictive grooming policies or expressly grant religious exemptions to such policies, leaving only eleven states — including the three states within the Eleventh Circuit — that enforce restrictive grooming policies without the availability of a religious exemption. Also of note is the fact that the Department of Justice has intervened recently in two RLUIPA cases on behalf of inmates, arguing that the restrictive grooming policies of California and Alabama must be invalidated unless the state can present evidence that the “specific plaintiffs” in the suit have given rise to a penological concern that justifies the policies. California settled its case and agreed to eliminate its restrictive grooming policy. Against this backdrop, the Eleventh Circuit’s routine defense of restrictive grooming policies seems out of step and at least worthy of scrutiny.

Accordingly, I propose the following:

Read more

Posted on by Mark Movsesian

Pew Report on Global Christianity

Yesterday, the Pew Forum released a fascinating demographic study of Christianity around the world. Christians make up the largest religious group in the world today, about two billion people, roughly one-third of the world’s population. By comparison, Muslims, the next largest group, make up less than a quarter. Geographically, Christians are quite dispersed. Although 100 years ago the vast majority lived in Europe, today only 26% of Christians are there. Roughly 37% live in the Americas, 13% in Asia and the Pacific, and 24% in sub-Saharan Africa. These numbers reflect the much-noted shift of Christianity to the “Global South” over the last century. With regard to church traditions, the study finds that roughly half of the world’s Christians are Catholic, about 40% Protestant, about 12% Orthodox, and about one percent members of new traditions like the Jehovah’s Witnesses and Mormons. The report contains helpful interactive maps that illustrate the global distribution of Christians.

Posted on by Mark Movsesian

11th Circuit Rules Against Christian Student in Religious Discrimination Case

Last Friday, the 11th Circuit dismissed a lawsuit a graduate student had brought against Augusta State University in Georgia, arguing her expulsion from the university’s school-counseling program violated her constitutional rights. The student, a Christian, had expressed skeptical views about homosexual identity and conduct, and the university required her to participate in a “remediation plan” to make sure that her views did not affect the counseling she would provide clients in the program’s clinical practicum, particularly clients from the “gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender and queer/questioning (GLBTQ) populations.” When she refused to do so, the university expelled her. The 11th Circuit ruled that her expulsion violated neither her free speech nor free exercise rights. Briefly, with respect to the former, the court noted that the student would be advising clients in a university-sponsored clinic; the university thus could require her to conduct herself in accordance with the American Counseling Association’s code of ethics, which forbids counselors from imposing moral views on clients. The university was not disciplining the student for her religious views, in other words, but for failing to agree to put them aside in accordance with her professional responsibilities. With respect to the student’s free exercise claims, the court held that school’s requirement that students abide by the ACA code, notwithstanding their own religious convictions, was neutral and generally applicable, and rationally related to the university’s legitimate interest in maintaining its accreditation. The case is Keeton v. Anderson-Wiley (Dec. 16, 2011).

Posted on by Marc O. DeGirolami

Butler, Habermas, Taylor & West, “The Power of Religion in the Public Sphere”

Those wishing for quite an eclectic range of views on this subject by a suite of famous philosophers and public intellectuals will enjoy The Power of Religion in the Public Sphere (Columbia University Press 2011), edited by Eduardo Mendieta and Jonathan VanAntwerpen, and with contributions by Judith Butler, Jürgen Habermas, Charles Taylor, and Cornel West.  The publisher’s description follows.

The Power of Religion in the Public Sphere represents a rare opportunity to experience a diverse group of preeminent philosophers confronting one pervasive contemporary concern: what role does—or should—religion play in our public lives? Reflecting on her recent work concerning state violence in Israel-Palestine, Judith Butler explores the potential of religious perspectives for renewing cultural and political criticism, while Jürgen Habermas, best known for his seminal conception of the public sphere, thinks through the ambiguous legacy of the concept of “the political” in contemporary theory. Charles Taylor argues for a radical redefinition of secularism, and Cornel West defends civil disobedience and emancipatory theology. Eduardo Mendieta and Jonathan VanAntwerpen detail the immense contribution of these philosophers to contemporary social and political theory, and an afterword by Craig Calhoun places these attempts to reconceive the significance of both religion and the secular in the context of contemporary national and international politics.

Posted on by Marc O. DeGirolami

Threats of Impeachment and Signaling

The rather impetuous comments of Newt Gingrich over the weekend on Face the Nation have received some warranted scrutiny, including over at Prawfsblawg by my friend Paul Horwitz.  In response to some questions by the host about his view of the Supreme Court and of courts in general, Gingrich said a few things about the secularism in evidence in the Mt. Soledad Cross case out of the Ninth Circuit as well as the “under God” Pledge of Allegiance case decided by the Ninth.  Early in the interview, he also said this:

I think part of the advantage I have is that I’m not a lawyer. And so as historian, I look at the context of the judiciary and the constitution in terms of American history. The fact is, I’ll just give you two examples — Judge Biery’s ruling on June 1st that he would jail the superintendent if anybody at the high school graduation used the word benediction, used the word invocation, asked for a moment of silence, asked the audience to stand, or mentioned God, he would jail the superintendent was such an anti-American dictatorship of speech that there’s no reason the American people need to tolerate a federal judge who is that out of sync with an entire culture. So I have to ask the question, is there an alternative? What’s the recourse? Well, one recourse is impeachment.

One interesting feature of the discussion is the move to threaten impeachment.  This is, of course, nothing new.  One of the first articles I wrote (and which has all the marks of an early piece) had to do with congressional threats of impeachment against federal judges; the practice is very old, indeed, in no small measure because it is so difficult to actually impeach a judge (or anybody else for that matter) — I document the context of successful and threatened judicial impeachments in the piece.

Threats of removal against the judiciary, whether by Congress or the executive, can also, in appropriate cases, serve a kind of signaling function.

Read more

Posted on by Mark Movsesian

The Passing of Vaclav Havel

Vaclav Havel, the Czech dissident, playwright, and president, died this weekend at the age of 75. His 1978 essay, “The Power of the Powerless,” which critiqued Communism as a morally bankrupt system based on lies, is a classic of human-rights literature. Havel personally experienced totalitarianism from the inside of a prison; his bravery and decency gave him a legitimacy that few politicians in Europe, or anywhere, can claim. Here is a tribute by Czech academic Jiri Pehe, who served as Havel’s political adviser from 1997 to 1999.

Posted on by Mark Movsesian

Why Presidents Can’t Belong to a Church

In Time, Amy Sullivan (liberal Evangelical and author of a widely-noted book on the “God gap” in American politics) observes that American Presidents can no longer maintain church membership. It’s not because of any constitutional strictures. Rather, the intense public attention that surrounds anything a President does nowadays makes church membership a practical impossibility. Any church that a President regularly attended would find itself deluged with Secret Service and members of the media, to say nothing of spectators who would crowd the church for a peek at POTUS. Sullivan regrets this situation:

It’s hard to imagine any future President being able to attend church–much less teach Sunday School [as Jimmy Carter did]–without an attendant hullabaloo. And that’s too bad. The men and women we put in that office will confront serious questions on life-and-death issues and find themselves under enormous amounts of stress. For those for whom religion has been important, it could be helpful to have the outlet of a congregation where they could reflect and be renewed. The individuals who serve as President give up many personal freedoms in order to do so. A community of worship shouldn’t have to be one of them.