“ Religion is the effort of individuals and communities to understand, to express, and to seek harmony with a transcendent reality of such importance that they feel compelled to organize their lives around their understanding of it…” Most people by their nature seek answers to questions that seem to be in our DNA. Religion is, first and foremost, the human search for a greater-than-human source of being and ultimate meaning. In other words, it demands nothing short of the recovery and realization of free exercise equality, a core feature of the American constitutional settlement. This dangerous view, which continues to spread, is highly destructive of the American commitment to freedom and equality and demands a sustained effort to recover the true meaning and value of religious freedom. ![]() Commission on Civil Rights, created by Congress to protect the civil rights of all Americans, issued the following statement : “he phrases ‘religious liberty’ and ‘religious freedom’ code words for discrimination, intolerance, racism, sexism, homophobia, Islamophobia, Christian supremacy….” With the Founders, they believed it to be a building block for all other fundamental freedoms, indispensable to the common good, and a source of protection for everyone. Americans would sometimes disagree over how to apply religious freedom in particular cases, but they generally understood it to be our first freedom. During the 1990s both passed with overwhelming, bipartisan support in Congress and were signed by President Clinton. Consider, for example, the Religious Freedom Restoration Act and International Religious Freedom Act. Until a few years ago, the vast majority of Americans supported the Founders’ understanding of religious liberty. Their view might be accurately called free exercise equality. They were convinced religious freedom was necessary for the well-being of citizens, for the common good, and for public virtue without which they believed the new Republic would fail. That’s why they styled religious freedom – that is, the freedom of all to exercise religion – as the first freedom. The American Founders understood the importance of religion for human, social, and political flourishing. Religious freedom is therefore the right of all persons to believe, speak, and act – individually and in community with others, in private and in public – in accord with their understanding of ultimate truth. If we are not free to pursue those answers, and to live according to the truths we discover, we cannot live a fully human life. Our nature impels us to seek answers to profound questions about ultimate things. Why? Because religion is important for everyone, everywhere. One of the main ways the government interacts with schools is through funding.Religious freedom is important for everyone, everywhere. Many Supreme Court cases have focused on whether various religious practices unconstitutionally break the law. We can find religious freedom in the Bill of Rights, specifically in the First Amendment! Below is the text: The Bill of Rights (made up of the first ten amendments to the Constitution) would include a list of rights that the government couldn't violate. ![]() However, when the Constitution went to the states for ratification, some of them said they would only agree to ratify if a Bill of Rights was added. When Congress came together in 1787 for the Constitutional Convention, they mostly focused on creating the framework for the government. The first draft of the Constitution didn't include any individual rights, including freedom of religion. ![]()
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