Princeton scholar Robert George told a Religious Liberty Institute assembly, “We are doing all we can, within reason, to enable men and women of intelligent will, of any and all religions, cultures, and beliefs, to pursue secular non-pursuit and honor their consciences. . . »
Editor’s Note: The Religious Liberty Institute revered Professor Robert George of Princeton University with the 2023 Religious Freedom Advocate Award on Nov. 2. Below are their comments in full, with their permission.
Dear friends, Comrades Warriors for Religious Freedom:
Let me begin by thanking Eric, Tom Farr, and the entire team at the Religious Liberty Institute, not only for this wonderful honor, which I deeply appreciate, but also, and most importantly, for their courageous and tireless labors on behalf of devout freedom, and on those, at home and abroad, whose religious freedom is violated or threatened.
It has been for me the privilege and joy of working with you, arm in arm, when the winds were favorable and when they were decidedly unfavorable, to protect the dignity of a member of the human circle as a precious child of God, called through Him. Seek the fact of the things of the spirit and order your life according to the most productive judgments of your conscience. We are certainly warriors for this cause, but we are the happiest of satisfied warriors, serene in the knowledge that we are fighting for the good of the spirit. the highest and most productive of causes, exactly because we are fighting for the dignity and fulfillment of our brothers and sisters from all walks of life. Faith and shadow of belief.
We come from many traditions. We are Christians, Jews, Muslims, and other people of other faiths. We are united in the popularity of the importance, even the centrality, of religious considerations and of the spiritual life, and in the popularity which the flourishing of an original religion demands. for devout freedom.
And we are very united in the understanding that a person’s faith encompasses the whole of his life, it is not something contained in a separate or discrete segment of his life. That is why we affirm, and even insist on, a broad and solid vision of devout freedom: not the mere right to worship, as if faith were a purely personal matter limited to the home, church, synagogue, or mosque, but the right to a flexible exercise of faith, adding the right to make explicit our devoutly promoted ideals. in the public square to serve those who need our support, care and assistance and to protect the reasons we are.
We insist on the right to shape and manage our establishments (whether schools, hospitals, food pantries, shelters, adoption agencies, rehabilitation centers, or others) according to the principles of our faith, and we insist even more on our right. equivalent citizens, to have interaction in defense of equivalence with our fellow citizens in formal and informal forums of deliberative democracy. The rights we claim for ourselves, we also protect and protect for others. We are asking for any special treatment, only equivalence to the law and respect for the rights enshrined in our Constitution and our laws.
No one here tonight wants me to tell you that we are in a difficult time for our nation. . . for the world. . . and for the cause of religious freedom. The October 7 terrorist attack in Israel against innocent men, women and children, the elderly and babies, shocked and dismayed us all. Questions about a valid reaction to the attack divide others. No one in our coalition – no, we are not simply a coalition, our unity at the innermost point of ethical principles makes us a kind of circle of relatives – no one in our circle of relatives supports terrorism. All of us, regardless of our opinions on Middle East politics and our ideals about what would be a just solution to the confrontation between Israelis and Palestinians, condemn what was done to other innocent people on October 7. All of that, in responding to such atrocities, the just war principles of non-combatant immunity, discrimination and proportionality must be strictly respected. We all condemn anti-Jewish hatred in all its forms. We all similarly condemn anti-Muslim prejudice, the blaming of Muslims as an organization and, indeed, the smear that Islam is inherently anti-Semitic or terrorist.
Our movement has been one in which Christians, Jews, and Muslims, as well as others belonging to the wonderful Eastern religious traditions, are partners and, indeed, equivalent partners. We will have to maintain our unity. We will not agree on a political question of one, one, one and both, adding the politics of the Middle East, but our deep questions of ethical agreement – the issues I have just discussed – will have to be the glue that binds us together in solidarity with both. each other despite our disagreements. When we differ, we will have to interact with each other in a spirit of openness, willing to pay attention attentively and not just between the two of us. However passionate we may be in our advocacy, we will have to tame and maintain a spirit of humility and avoid dogmatism. We must not doubt the other’s goodwill or question the other’s motivations. The enemies of devout freedom would like nothing more than political strife to shatter our unity, undermining our work, at home and abroad, to protect devout freedom for all. Let’s make sure their desires are thwarted.
The pluralism of our faith is a source of our strength, not only expanding our numbers but also giving us multiple traditions of wisdom from which we can draw. Another strong point of our motion is that we do not require (and have never required) that anyone who adheres to a specific theory of devout liberty be a member in good standing. However, I think it is fair to say that the overwhelming majority of members of our motion reject the concept that the basic foundation for respect for devout freedom will have to be discovered in a modus vivendi or in some kind of social contract or mutual renunciation . . -Pact of aggression, in which we all agree not to coerce others in matters of faith in exchange for others promising not to coerce us. This thin theory of the ethical discoveries of devout liberty has a notable pedigree among liberal political philosophers, but it fails to capture the basic considerations and motivating spirit of those associated with the Religious Liberty Institute and others, like our friends at Becket Law . , the Alliance Defending Freedom, the Ethics and Public Policy Center, the American Center for Law and Justice, First Liberty, the Coalition for Virtue, Heritage, and Covenant Law, and the Jewish Coalition for Religion LibertyArray, who are at the forefront of protecting and promote devout freedom today.
For us, the dignity of the human person, the importance of religious pursuit, and the price of religious life are at the basis of our reflection in religious freedom. We protect the right not to, or simply, to maintain social peace, but for other people, in accordance with their dignity and obligations as rational creatures, to seek truth in religious matters and to lead an original and just life, in accordance with their most productive judgment on those matters.
That is why we fight for the rights of Uyghur Muslims, Falun Gong and Tibetan Buddhists persecuted by the communist regime in China; Rohinga Muslims in Myanmar; Ahmadiyya Muslims in Pakistan and Saudi Arabia; Christians in many other countries; The Jews; the Baha’is; Zoroastrians; the Yazidis; even atheists. We stand up for other people who are persecuted because of their devout beliefs, regardless of the content of those beliefs. We oppose all coercion in religious matters, because God wants to be worshipped freely; Authentic religion cannot be forced or falsified; and the dignity of the human user demands that he have complete freedom to approve or withhold his consent in matters of religion and the practice of religion in accordance with his own just judgments.
And here at home we protect the rights of the evangelical Christian baker or wedding planner threatened with legal sanctions for honoring his conscientious trust in marriage as a marital union between husband and wife; by the Catholic foster care or adoption ministry threatened with exclusion for honoring their conscientious trust that children be placed in homes with a mother and father; by the synagogue that only wishes to be treated in a non-discriminatory manner in the application of COVID policies; for devout women who, altruistically wearing out their compassionate works of mercy, wish to avoid complicity in abortion; for the Muslim policeman and the Sikh army officer who only desire, in accordance with his devout duties, to wear a short, well-trimmed beard; and for the Native American tribe whose cemeteries or other sacred sites are bulldozed for purposes such as creating a turn lane on a highway. We do everything within our power, within reason, to enable men and women of intelligent will, of all religious traditions and shades of trust, to pursue spiritual quest and honor their conscience, so long as their practices meet the basic needs of public order and respect the rights of others.
Someone might ask: But can’t we protect religious liberty without getting bogged down in “culture war” issues like abortion or marriage? The answer, to be frank, is no. We can not. We do not. We do not seek such conflicts, but we will have to defend what we believe, whether on the merits of those issues or in defense of the freedom of those whose rights others would trample in pursuit of their culture. . war objectives. We will not play for applause, nor will we make it easy, defending only reasons that do not offend the ideological sensibilities of those who control the levers of cultural power, whether government, law, journalism, education, the arts, philanthropy or business. We will fight for the Sikh army officer AND the Christian baker; We will protect the consolidated indigenous tribes of Grand Ronde AND the Little Sisters of the Poor. Our adversaries will possibly denounce us, defame us, insult us, but we will not give up and we will not give in. “With firmness in the right as God provides us to see the good,” “we will try to finish the work. ” . ” we are in it” – no matter how complicated it is; no matter what sacrifices we are asked to make, no matter how long it takes.
And with God’s help, we will overcome it.
Robert P. George Robert P. George is the McCormick Professor of Jurisprudence and director of the James Madison Program on American Ideals and Institutions at Princeton University.
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