Denying religious fanatics the ability to impose their religious
doctrines upon others is not religious persecution. It is guaranteeing
others the rights not to live under a theocratic dictatorship.
From The Guardian UK: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/jun/26/catholic-bishops-abuse-religious-freedom?INTCMP=SRCH
The founding fathers saw the state as guarantor of freedom from persecution. Now, the Church is trying to cast it as persecutor
It
is a terrible thing when a once-noble phrase gets beaten to a
meaningless pulp. The time has now come to rescue the phrase "religious
freedom" from its abusers. In the writings and speeches of Catholic
bishops and evangelical leaders in recent months, "religious freedom"
has come to mean something close to its opposite. It now stands for
"religious privilege". It is a coded way for them to state their demand
that religious institutions should be allowed special powers that exempt
them from the laws of the land.
On 22 June, the US Conference of
Catholic Bishops kicked off its "Fortnight for Freedom", a campaign of
complaints about alleged persecution of the largest, most powerful and
politically influential religious denominations in the United States. Religious freedom is "in jeopardy in America", says Archbishop Jose H Gomez in a prominent article in the theological journal First Things. Let's consider some of the alleged assaults.
At
St Xavier University in Chicago, Illinois, the adjunct professors had
not had a raise in five years, according to Tom Suhrbur, an organizer
with the Illinois Education Association. In 2010, in hopes of securing higher pay and benefits, they sought to organize themselves into a union.
The administration of St Xavier, with the backing of many prominent Catholic organizations, opposed the effort on legal grounds.
Why? Because, it claimed, theirs is a religious institution, and the
unionization of its employees would involve a violation of its
"religious freedom". The National Labor Relations Board sided with the adjuncts, pointing out that neither the university, nor its faculty, nor their courses were actually religious in any meaningful sense.
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