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The REAL separation of church and state – Part II

1947 was a busy, exhilarating, and optimistic year in America. The final days of World War II ended sixteen months earlier with the defeat of the Japanese Empire. Miracle on 34th Street was playing in the movie houses across the nation, and a solid-state semi-conductor called a transistor was invented in the Bell Laboratories. An unknown object crashed in the desert near Roswell, New Mexico. Thousands of former soldiers and sailors were in their second year of a G.I. Bill-financed college education, and the first Boomer generation children were barely over a year old.

But in 1947, many Americans also sensed an increasing undercurrent of unease and foreboding. The post war euphoria was short-lived as 1947 was the beginning of the four-decade long Cold War with the Soviet Union. The two superpowers were now separated by the “Iron Curtain,” so labeled in March 1946 by Winston Churchill in his famous speech at Westminster College in Fulton, Missouri. The West was being challenged by an aggressive Soviet Union and a monolithic block of “satellite” states under soviet domination, eastern European countries formerly under the control of Nazi Germany. The House Un-American Activities Committee held nine days of hearings into alleged communist influence and propaganda within the Hollywood motion picture industry.

Amidst the tumultuous events of 1947 there was also one little-noticed occurrence—a seemingly insignificant ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court that would eventually have a monumental impact on the course of religious liberty and freedom of speech for almost seven decades lasting to the present day. Known as Everson v. Board of Education, the case revolved around the authorization by the Ewing Township School Board for reimbursement of parents for fares paid for the transportation by public carrier of children attending public and Catholic schools. The school board made the authorization pursuant to a New Jersey statute authorizing district boards of education to make rules and contracts for the transportation of children to and from schools other than private schools operated for profit. Therefore, parents of children attending not-for-profit Catholic schools qualified for reimbursement under the New Jersey statute.[1]

In a 5-4 opinion, Justice Hugo Black spoke for the majority of the Court in their finding that upheld the New Jersey Court of Errors and Appeals’ decision which struck down the New Jersey statute:

No tax in any amount, large or small, can be levied to support any religious activities or institutions, whatever they may be called, or whatever form they may adopt to teach or practice religion. Neither a state nor the Federal Government can, openly or secretly, participate in the affairs of any religious organizations or groups, and vice versa. In the words of Jefferson, the clause against establishment of religion by law was intended to erect “a wall of separation between church and State.” Reynolds v. United States, supra, at 98 U. S. 164.

… The First Amendment has erected a wall between church and state. That wall must be kept high and impregnable. We could not approve the slightest breach. New Jersey has not breached it here.[2] [emphasis added]

The particulars of the case were relatively unimportant except to Plaintiff Everson and the citizens of Ewing Township, New Jersey, but the larger ramifications of the decision would spread into almost every facet of American society by overturning one-hundred fifty years of legal precedent, legislative actions, and its citizens’ quiet enjoyment of their religious liberties. The Court’s decision was contrary to the intent of the Founders with regard to the Establishment Clause and the meaning of Jefferson’s metaphor in his January 1, 1802 letter to the Danbury Baptists.

The Establishment Clause derives its name from the First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States.

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or of the right of people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.[3]

The First Amendment protections for religious liberty were extremely important to the citizens of the newly-formed nation. In England, the established state church had been an onerous foe of those whose religious beliefs differed. Facing religious oppression in Europe, the original colonies were primarily founded by those seeking religious liberty. By the 1760s, the colonists had experienced this freedom of religion for almost one-hundred fifty years, but in those final years before the Revolution, they received a rude reminder of former times of religious oppression by one denomination over another when King George III appointed an Anglican bishopric to oversee the religious affairs of Puritan New England—the very reason the Puritans had left their homeland.[4]

At the time of the writing of the Constitution in 1789, although the states encouraged Christianity, no state allowed an exclusive state-sponsored denomination. A dozen years after the drafting of the Bill of Rights which included the First Amendment, rumors still circulated that the new American government would designate a state-authorized denomination. These rumors were so prevalent that the Danbury Baptist Association wrote to President Jefferson about their concern that a particular denomination would be established as the official denomination. It was in this context that Jefferson wrote to the Baptists at Danbury, Connecticut, to assure them that the rumor had no basis in fact. In an attempt to assuage their fears, he said,

Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between man and his God; that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship; that the legislative powers of the government reach actions only, and not opinions—I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should “make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,” thus building a wall of separation between church and State.[5] [emphasis added]

Jefferson’s belief that the First Amendment had been enacted only to prevent the federal government’s establishment of a national denomination is confirmed by his letter to Dr. Benjamin Rush, a fellow-signor of the Declaration of Independence.

[T]he clause of the Constitution which, while it secured the freedom of the press, covered also the freedom of religion, had given the clergy a very favorite hope of obtaining an establishment of a particular form of Christianity through the United States…especially the Episcopalians and Congregationalists. The returning good sense of our country threatens abortion to their hopes and they believe…any portion of power confided to me will be exerted in opposition to their schemes. And they believe rightly.[6] [emphasis added]

Jefferson’s metaphor of “a wall of separation” meant only the establishment of one particular denomination as the state-authorized denomination. Also, Jefferson’s wall was intended to be a one-way wall to protect the church from the state and not the other way around. But modern court rulings have perverted the original intent of the Establishment Clause to allow, in their own words, the construction of a “high and impregnable” wall between church and state.

The Supreme Court’s Everson decision divorced the First Amendment from its original intent and “…reinterpreted it without regard to either historical context or previous judicial decisions.”[7] In effect, the Supreme Court took eight words from Jefferson’s letter to the Baptists out of context and used them without support of sound judicial precedent to dramatically diminish religious freedom in the United States. Subsequently, the ruling has been used for additional judicial chicanery by the proponents of a humanistic worldview to systematically and completely remove religion and especially Christianity from all spheres of American public life.

Jefferson would have strenuously objected to the 1947 Supreme Court’s departure from original intent with regard to the First Amendment as can be seen in his admonishment to Supreme Court Justice William Johnson.

On every question of construction, carry ourselves back to the time when the Constitution was adopted, recollect the spirit manifested in the debates, and instead of trying what meaning may be squeezed out of the text, or invented against it, conform to the probable one in which it was passed.[8]

James Madison’s regard for the importance of original intent also mirrored Jefferson’s beliefs.

I entirely concur in the propriety of resorting to the sense in which the Constitution was accepted and ratified by the nation. In that sense alone it is the legitimate Constitution. And if that be not the guide in expounding it, there can be no security for a consistent and stable, more than for a faithful, exercise of its powers…What a metamorphosis would be produced in the code of law if all its ancient phraseology were to be taken in its modern sense.[9] [emphasis added]

In 1947, the Supreme Court produced Madison’s dreaded metamorphosis as original intent was dumped for modern invention. As the Establishment Clause has been reconstructed by the Court’s Constitutional revisionists, the illegitimate modern interpretation of Jefferson’s wall of separation produces the same consequences as Churchill’s infamous Iron Curtain—the suppression and ultimate destruction of religious liberty.

Larry G. Johnson

Sources:

[1] The U.S. Supreme Court, Everson v. Board of Education, 330 U.S. 1 (1947). Everson v. Board of Education of Ewing Township, No. 52. Decided February 10, 1947.
https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/330/1/case.html (accessed February 5, 2015).
[2] Ibid.
[3] The Constitution of the United States of America, (Washington, D. C.: National Archives and Records Administration).
[4] M. Stanton Evans, The Theme is Freedom, (Washington, D.C.: Regnery Publishing, Inc., 1994), p. 217.
[5] David Barton, Original Intent – The Courts, the Constitution, & Religion, (Aledo, Texas: Wallbuilder Press, 2008), pp. 51-52.
[6] Ibid., p. 51.
[7] Ibid., p. 27.
[8] Ibid, p. 28.
[9] Ibid., p. 28.

The REAL separation of church and state – Part I

Ask the average American to define the meaning of the oft-repeated phrase of “separation of church and state” and usually you will receive a blank stare. Following a brief pause, they may start giving examples like: “It means we can’t have prayer in schools.” “The government can’t sponsor any event that is connected with a church.” or “The Founders wanted to keep church and faith out of government.” If one follows up with a question as to the origins of “separation of church,” answers will include: “It was invented by Thomas Jefferson.” “It is part of the Declaration of Independence.” “It was established by the Supreme Court.” And a few will identify its source as the U.S. Constitution.

Not only are most Americans substantially ignorant of our nation’s history, they are grossly uninformed about the form and operation of American government. What little understanding of government they have usually originates from listening to the nightly news, political pundits, Hollywood and media celebrities, Internet headlines and sound bites, and an educational system vehemently opposed to the central cultural vision of the Founders. Few concepts within American governance are so important and so misunderstood as that of separation of church and state.

The original Constitution was signed by Congress on September 17, 1787 and subsequently ratified by the states. The Bill of Rights was adopted by Congress on September 26, 1789 and became part of the Constitution when Virginia became the tenth state to ratify the Amendments on December 15, 1791.[1] The First Amendment reads as follows:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or of the right of people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.[2]

The Founders were strong proponents of separation of church and state. But the confusion as to its meaning over the last seventy years derives from the modern revisionists’ misrepresentation of the Establishment Clause as opposed to those who argue for the original intent of the Founders that had been observed by custom and the courts for over 150 years.

It is clear from the words and actions of the Founders that the intent of the Establishment Clause was to prohibit government from establishing one denomination as the official or preferred church. Modernists have reinterpreted the Establishment Clause to be a separation clause that effectively purges any hint of religious activity and influence in the public square which has come to mean any of the spheres of American life.

To understand the concept of separation of church and state and why the Founders so valued it, we must look back in history. The idea that a group of people bound by a religious allegiance with its own history, beliefs, and traditions could exist within a society but remain independent of the governing political entity was a concept unknown to the ancients. This radical concept that a distinction must be made between the roles of church and state arose from Christianity at its very birth.[3] It was evident in Christ’s challenged to the politically-connected religious leaders (Pharisees and Herodians) when they attempted to entrap Him with questions as to man’s loyalty to man or God. “Then he said unto them, ‘Render therefore to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s.’” [Matthew 22:21a. RSV]

For the next three hundred years the church fathers maintained this separation but endured severe persecution as a consequence. In 313 AD, Roman Emperor Constantine legalized Christianity, but he soon began intruding in church affairs. In 353-356, Hosius, bishop of Cordoba, Spain, reprimanded one of Constantine’s three sons (Emperor Constantius II) for intruding in church affairs by attempting to get Western bishops to oppose Athanasius of Alexandria for supporting those who rejected the Arian heresy. Hosius invoked Christ’s words in Matthew 22:21 which were preceded by a warning to the Emperor. “Intrude not yourself into ecclesiastical affairs…God has put into your hands the [secular] kingdom; to us [bishops] He has entrusted the affairs of His church.”[4]

Because of Constantine’s legalization of Christianity and in spite of the church’s early resistance to government interference, the church began a thousand year period in its history when church and state were intertwined to varying degrees. At the beginning of this period, government attempted to interfere with and bend the church to its will. However by the Middle Ages, it was the church who attempted to bend government to the will of the church. This was a corruption of God’s design for each realm.[5]

Out of the mixing of church and state came abuses such as the Crusades and the Inquisition. In spite of their motives to further His kingdom, the church had violated God’s plan because Christianity is not a religion that can coerce faith for it is a matter of the heart.[6] This intermingling of the spiritual and secular realms corrupted the roles of both church and state. A few men such as John Wycliffe and John Huss in the fourteenth and early fifteenth centuries recognized this corruption and called for changes in the church which was in dire need of fundamental reform. They also recognized that such reform would only occur with the recognition that the Bible was the final arbiter of faith and not the church.[7] These early stirrings of reformation exploded in the early sixteenth century when Martin Luther nailed his ninety five theses to the door of the Wittenberg church. The turmoil within the church produced one of the doctrinal pillars of Protestantism–the priesthood of the believer.

Alvin Schmidt presents an excellent summation of Martin Luther’s understanding of the distinct roles of the two realms in the early sixteenth century.

He [Luther] especially criticized the papacy’s role in secular government, seeing it as violating what he called the concept of the two kingdoms (realms). It was the church’s task solely to preach and teach the gospel of Jesus Christ…the government’s task was to keep peace and order in society by restraining and punishing the unlawful. The secular government can only compel people to behave outwardly; it can never make a person’s heart spiritually righteous. Only the preaching of the Gospel (the spiritual realm) can do that. In the spiritual realm the Christian functions as a disciple of Christ; in the secular realm he functions as citizen. Although the two realms are separate, the faithful Christian is active in both because God is active in both. In the spiritual realm he is active in proclaiming the gospel, whereas in the secular kingdom he is active by means of the law and the sword, or government.[8]

The early colonists and their descendants still had fresh memories of the church-state conflagrations that swept Europe in the century prior to their first arrivals on the eastern shore of America. They well understood the need for separation of church and state, but that separation was a freedom of religion and not a freedom from religion as interpreted and imposed by modern Constitutional revisionists. For the colonists and Founders, separation of church and state was an institutional separation and not an influential separation. Institutional separation meant that government has certain roles and duties in which the church must not interfere (keeping peace and order in society by restraining and punishing the unlawful by means of the sword). Yet, the church has every right and duty to influence government. Likewise, the government does not have the right to interfere with the roles and duties of the church (teaching and preaching the gospel and influencing society).

There are numerous documents that attest to the Founders’ sentiments of the right of the church to influence society. Perhaps one of the best examples of the attitude of the Founders was expressed by Supreme Court Justice Joseph Story (appointed by James Madison, the fourth president and delegate to the Constitutional Convention which speaks volumes about Story’s understanding of the Founders’ meaning and intent with regard to the Constitution and its Amendments). Speaking specifically of the Establishment Clause, Story wrote:

…We are not to attribute this prohibition of a national religious establishment to an indifference to religion in general and especially to Christianity which none could hold in more reverence than the framers of the Constitution…Probably at the time of the adoption of the Constitution and of the Amendments to it, the general, if not universal, sentiment in America was that Christianity ought to receive encouragement from the State…An attempt to level all religions, and to make it a matter of state policy to hold all in utter indifference, would have created universal disapprobation (condemnation), if not universal indignation.[9]

To confirm the continuing existence of this strong religious sanction that still held sway over the nation forty years after the Constitutional Convention, we look to the words of Alexis De Tocqueville’s 1835 Democracy in America, one of the most influential political texts ever written about America.

Americans so completely identify the spirit of Christianity with freedom in their minds that it is almost impossible to get them to conceive the one without the other…

In France I had seen the spirit of religion moving in the opposite direction to that of the spirit of freedom. In America, I found them intimately linked together in joint reign over the same land.[10]

Tocqueville went on to say that the peaceful influence exercised by religion over the nation was due to separation of church and state.[11] Unlike the modernists’ separation of church and state, Tocqueville’s separation was a separation of the spheres of power and not a separation of government from ethics and moral guidance supplied by the moral suasion of Christianity and the church.

The Founders did not prohibit but encouraged the church’s influence upon government, and for one hundred fifty years the church played a vital role in helping the state be the state by continually asking if the state’s actions were justified as a legitimate fulfillment of its role. Since 1947, the courts have sided with the modern Constitutional revisionists who deny the church has a right to influence the state and society in the public square. This denial is the subject to be discussed in Part II.

Larry G. Johnson

Sources:

[1] Michael Kammen, ed., The Origins of the American Constitution – A Documentary History, (New York: Penguin Books, 1986), p. xxix.
[2] The Constitution of the United States of America, (Washington, D. C.: National Archives and Records Administration).
[3] Alvin J. Schmidt, How Christianity Changed the World, (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan, 2004), pp. 265-266.
[4] Ibid.
[5] Ibid., p. 266.
[6] David Barton, Original Intent – The Courts, the Constitution, & Religion, (Aledo, Texas: Wallbuilder Press, 2008), p. 86.
[7] B. K. Kuiper, The Church in History, (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1964), pp. 143-145.
[8] Schmidt, p. 266.
[9] David Barton, The Myth of Separation, (Aledo, Texas: Wallbuilder Press, 1989), p. 32.
[10] Alexis De Tocqueville, Democracy in America, Gerald E. Bevan, Trans., (London, England: Penguin Books, 2003), pp. 343, 345.
[11] Ibid, p. 345.

Progressive Protestantism – Declining Faith

The Reverend John M. Buchanan is the editor/publisher of Christian Century, the leading voice of mainline Protestantism and what some call Progressive Protestantism. Buchanan likens the current decline in many Protestant denominations to the equivalent of a rummage sale. “Things that are old and worn out get sold to make room for a new things. Every 500 years there’s a major shift.” He points to the Protestant Reformation of 500 years ago and claims that we’re due for one of those major shifts. “I think we’re in the middle of a rummage sale. We’re trying to figure out what comes next. And I think something new is going to emerge out of this. We don’t know what it is yet.”[1] For a brief overview of Christian Century and Progressive Protestantism, see recently published culturewarrior.net articles: Strange Fire – The American church’s quest for cultural relevance – Part I [2] and Part II [3].

In spite of the decline of Protestant denominations in America and much of Western civilization, Buchanan believes that even though there are large number of those without religious affiliation, he states that people are still spiritual in that “…they believe in God, they pray, they read religious books, and they try to do the right thing with their lives.”[4] But Buchanan’s assumption that man’s seemingly “spiritual” nature is a sign of hope completely misses the fundamental nature of man and his separation from God. It is because man is lost that those spiritual longings rise to the surface in every age and every culture. One hundred eighty years ago, Alexis de Tocqueville described these spiritual longings.

…the imperfect joys of this world will never satisfy his heart. Man alone of all created beings shows a natural disgust for existence and an immense longing to exist; he despises life and fears annihilation. These different feelings constantly drive his soul toward the contemplation of another world and religion it is which directs him there. Religion is thus one particular form of hope as natural to the human heart as hope itself. Men cannot detach themselves from religious beliefs except by some wrong-headed thinking and by a sort of moral violence inflicted upon their true nature; they are drawn back by an irresistible inclination. Unbelief is an accident; faith is the only permanent state of mankind.[5]

Every man is born with an inherent stain of sin that separates him from God. Buchanan’s hope is merely recognition of man’s spiritual condition and his yearning to be reunited with God. Simply stated, religion is man’s search for God, and that search leads many to false religions and gods. Although claiming to represent the one true God, many Protestant denominations have failed to present Him in truth and power to those searchers. This is the reason for the declining number of denominational adherents in the Western world.

What are some of those old and tired things Buchanan believes that need to be thrown out? Although Buchanan says the church hasn’t figured that out yet, it appears that some biblical truths that have directed and sustained the church for two thousand years are among the items to be tossed on the ash heap. On the issue of same-sex marriage, he states that Christian Century “…has gradually come to support a positive position, that it’s a good thing. Let’s get past this and make sure that everyone has the same opportunities to be married.”[6] [emphasis added] Apparently, the Apostle Paul’s condemnation of homosexuality in his letter to the Romans (1:18, 24-27) is one of those things to be consigned to the rummage sale. But, how does one get past a biblical commandment? For God and Paul, eternal truths are never subject to change, even in the midst of contemporary cultural imperatives that change frequently and rapidly.

Buchanan is also greatly concerned with achieving peace among the various religions and agrees with a Catholic theologian who stated that “…there will be no world peace until there is peace among religions, and that will not happen until there is dialogue between religions.”[7] [emphasis added] Apparently, Buchanan believes that dialogue will lead to common ground through discovery of beliefs shared by various religions. As commendable as world peace may be, that is not the mission of the church. Christ came into the world to bear witness to the truth. [John 18:37] Likewise, dialogue to find common ground with false religions was not part of Christ’s commission to His followers. Rather, He commanded them to “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you…” [Matthew 28:19-20a. RSV]

In his book Storm, Jim Cymbala has written an excellent diagnosis of the condition of the American church and the reasons for its decline. Cymbala states that many leaders of the church use “faith talk” or mental positivism (similar to that of Rev. Buchanan) to avoid the reality of a declining church. Many blame the decline on forces outside the church including failed political solutions and a decaying secular culture that is increasing hostile to the message of Christ and His followers.[8] Certainly these are contributing influences, but the Church has survived far worse in its two thousand-year history. Cymbala cuts to the heart of the failure of the modern church.

Yet, we simultaneously mimic the ways of the world in hopes of packaging our faith into “Christianity Lite”—a spiritual candy we can toss at nonbelievers rather than confronting the hostile reactions that can occur when we proclaim the real gospel of Jesus Christ. Pandering to the culture with prepackaged truth nuggets hasn’t made us more effective; it has made us ineffective. Many devoted Christians see the warning signs and recognize our failed attempts to turn back the tide…They are frustrated with church services that are shallow and powerless…While our culture rapidly deteriorates, they aren’t fooled by the hype in some religious quarters, nor the “Don’t worry, God is sovereign!” attitude of others who have their heads in the sand…Most of all, they know it’s impossible for any nation to change unless we Christians and our churches become the spiritual light and salt of which Jesus spoke.[9]

The church must discard its application of spiritual band-aids to a hurting and lost world and recognize the dimensions of the battle. “For we are not contending against flesh and blood, but against the principalities, against the powers, against the world rulers of this present darkness, against the spiritual hosts of wickedness in heavenly places.” [Ephesians 6:12. RSV]

The solutions for reversing the decline of the American church are not new and have served the church well for two thousand years. They brought spiritual renewal to America three times since the arrival of the first Americans on the eastern shore. Renewal begins with desperate, concerted prayer in which we humble ourselves, repent, and call upon God to heal our land and restore our Godly legacy. Preachers must preach the power-packed, unchanged, unadulterated Word of God centered on Jesus Christ, or as Cymbal puts it, “the real gospel of Jesus Christ.” We must seek the manifest presence of the Holy Spirit within our church services. We must die to self as we become the salt and light so needed by a lost and dying world. Lastly, we must love our brothers and sisters in Christ as well as a lost world, be they Muslim, homosexual, atheist, and every other human who in their heart of hearts is seeking to know the one true God. “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.” [John 3:16. RSV]

Larry G. Johnson

Sources:

[1] Bill Sherman, “Christian church seeing ‘major shift’,” Tulsa World, January 24, 2015, A-9.
[2] Larry G. Johnson, “Strange Fire – The American church’s quest for cultural relevance – Part I,” culturewarrior.net, December 12, 2014. https://www.culturewarrior.net/2014/12/12/strange-fire-the-churchs-quest-for-cultural-relevance-part-i/
[3] Larry G. Johnson, “Strange Fire – The American church’s quest for cultural relevance – Part II,” culturewarrior.net, December 26, 2014. https://www.culturewarrior.net/2014/12/26/strange-fire-the-churchs-quest-for-cultural-relevance-part-ii/
[4] Sherman, A-9.
[5] Alexis de Tocqueville, Democracy in America, Trans. Gerald E. Bevan, (New York: Penguin Books, 2003), pp. 346-347.
[6] Sherman, A-9.
[7] Ibid.
[8] Jim Cymbala with Jennifer Schuchmann, Storm – Hearing Jesus for The Times We Live In, (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan, 2014), pp. 14-15.
[9] Ibid., p. 15

Humanism’s equality handcuffs freedom and violates the Constitution

Until recently most Americans had never heard of the highly respected Atlanta Fire Chief Kelvin Cochran. That changed dramatically when Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed fired Cochran because of his religious beliefs. The facts behind the firing are straightforward. Cochran self-published a book in 2013 titled Who Told You That You Were Naked? One paragraph in the book labeled homosexuality as “a perversion.” After the mayor learned of the book, he initially placed Cochran on a thirty-day suspension beginning November 24, 2014.[1] The mayor denied knowing that Cochran had written a book prior to his suspension. However, Cochran stated that he had given the mayor a copy of the book in January 2014, and that the mayor promised to read it on an upcoming trip. Cochran also said the director of Atlanta’s ethics office had given him permission to write the book and to mention in his biography that he was the city’s fire chief.[2]

Following the one-month suspension, the mayor fired Cochran just as he was preparing to return as head of the fire department. Defending his decision to fire Cochran the mayor stated, “This is not about religious freedom. This is not about free speech. Judgment is the basis of the problem.” Prior to Cochran’s firing, the mayor publicly condemned the fire chief on his official Facebook page. “I profoundly disagree with and am deeply disturbed by the sentiments expressed in the paperback regarding the LGBT community. I will not tolerate discrimination of any kind within my administration.” Georgia Equality Executive Director Jeff Graham stated that Cochran’s “anti-gay” views could result in a hostile work environment.[3]

Cochran said that the comments regarding homosexuality were contained in less than one-half page of a 160 page book he wrote for a men’s Bible study group at his Baptist church. He stated that the reference to homosexuality was made in the larger context that sexual activity was designed to be between a man and a woman in holy matrimony. Outside of that, any other sexual activity including homosexuality is sin.[4] Further, Cochran defended his beliefs and his right to express himself.

The LGBT members of our community have a right to be able to express their views and convictions about sexuality and deserve to be respected for their position without hate or discrimination. But Christians also have a right to express our belief regarding our faith and be respected for our position without hate and without discrimination. In the United States, no one should be vilified, hated or discriminated against for expressing their beliefs.[5]

In an Opinion Page piece by The New York Times, it was not a surprise to find that the newspaper supported Cochran’s firing. The Times Editorial Board stated that Cochran’s claim of religious discrimination had it backwards.

It is, as Mr. Reed said at a news conference, about ‘making sure that we have an environment in government where everyone, no matter who they love, can come to work from 8 to 5:30 and do their job and then go home without fear of being discriminated against…It should not matter that the investigation found no evidence that Mr. Cochran had mistreated gays or lesbians. His position as a high-level public servant makes his remarks especially problematic, and requires that he be held to a different standard. The First Amendment already protects religious freedom…Nobody can tell Mr. Cochran what he can or cannot believe. If he wants to work as a public official, however, he may not foist his religious views on other city employees who have the right to a boss who does not speak of them as second-class citizens.[6] [emphasis added]

It appears that the Times Editorial Board subordinates religious freedom and the practice thereof to the whims of a hypersensitive workplace environment and totally extinguishes freedom of religion and speech for high-level public servants and governmental officials.

Should the Times Editorial Board have been present with the patriots at Valley Forge on March 10, 1778, their radical egalitarian sensibilities would have experienced great shock perhaps resulting in terminal apoplexy because of a high governmental official’s supposed flagrant discrimination against one Lieutenant Enslin as a result of his attempt at homosexual actions.

Lieutt. Enslin of Colo. Malcom’s Regiment tried for attempting to commit sodomy, with John Monhort a soldier; Secondly, For Perjury in swearing to false Accounts, found guilty of the charges exhibited against him, being breaches of 5th Article 18th Section of the Articles of War and do sentence him to be dismiss’d the service with Infamy. His Excellency the Commander in Chief [George Washington] approves the sentence and with Abhorrence and Detestation of such Infamous Crimes orders Lieutt. Enslin to be drummed out of Camp tomorrow morning by all the Drummers and Fifers in the Army never to return; The Drummers and Fifers to attend on the Grand parade at Guard mounting for that Purpose.[7]

Should the Editorial Board still be in doubt as to Washington’s Christian beliefs, less than two months after Lieutenant Enslin’s disgrace Washington issued these orders to his troops at Valley Forge.

While we are zealously performing the duties of good citizens and soldiers, we certainly ought not to be inattentive to the higher duties of religion. To the distinguished character of Patriot, it should be our highest Glory to laud the more distinguished Character of Christian.[8]

How did America arrive at such a state of affairs that the extreme egalitarian views of humanistic governmental officials equate one’s Christian beliefs and the sharing of those beliefs with the creation of a hostile work environment? Even though the fire chief was not found guilty of mistreatment of homosexuals in or out of government, Cochran was deemed guilty because of his status as a public official who expressed religious beliefs that were contrary to the beliefs of the homosexual community. It is ludicrous for The New York Times to label Cochran’s firing as anything other than a blatant violation of Cochran’s First Amendment rights which apply to every American including public servants and officials of whatever rank or station.

Equality, rightly applied, is equality before God and the law. However, the humanist understanding of equality is synonymous with a rapacious egalitarianism that imposes regimentation and leveling. This twisted understanding of human equality places special emphasis on social, political, and economic rights and privileges and focuses on the removal of any imagined or invented inequalities among humankind. This focus results in a forced leveling of society which leads to socialism and ultimately loss of freedom.

Driving religious beliefs from the public square does not enhance but destroys religious freedom in order to attain the egalitarian ideal. Because of a growing humanistic worldview among the leadership of the institutions of American life, the nation’s central cultural vision is under assault from humanists’ surgically precise efforts to separate church and state and to sweep away all evidence of our Christian cultural heritage. Even our constitutionally guaranteed freedoms of religion and speech are no longer sacrosanct from such assaults. For humanists, religious freedom means only freedom to spread the humanist orthodoxy and worship their god of equality.

Larry G. Johnson

Sources:

[1] “Atlanta Fire Chief fired over controversial statements,” myfoxatlanta.com, January 6, 2015. http://www.myfoxatlanta.com/story/27772986/mayor-holds-news-conference-on-fire-chiefs-future (accessed January 21, 2015).
[2] Todd Starnes, “Atlanta Fire Chief: I was fired because of my Christian faith,” Fox News, January 7, 2015.
http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2015/01/07/atlanta-fire-chief-was-fired-because-my-christian-faith/ (accessed
January 21, 2015).
[3] Ibid.
[4] Ibid.
[5] Ibid.
[6] The Editorial Board, “God, Gays, and the Atlanta Fire Department,” The New York Times, January 13, 2015.
[7] William J. Federer, America’s God and Country, (Coppell, Texas: FAME Publishing, Inc., 1996), p. 642.
[8] Ibid., pp. 642-643.