I touched on this the other day in my post about Dallin Oaks’ comments but I want to expand on it.

Oaks argued that respect for religion has declined in our society, there has been a corresponding increase in the number of people who are nonbelievers and an increase in criticism of religious belief all of which added up (to him) to a threat to religious freedom.

During my lifetime I have seen a significant deterioration in the respect accorded to religion in our public life, and I believe that the vitality of religious freedom is in danger of being weakened accordingly.

Using the model of framing favored by Jeffrey Feldman, here’s what Oaks is saying [loss of respect] = [loss of freedom] – or [respect] = [freedom]. It’s an interesting argument, but what does it mean? Oaks went on to explain.

The greatest infringements of religious freedom occur when the exercise of religion collides with other powerful forces in society. Among the most threatening collisions in the United States today are (1) the rising strength of those who seek to silence religious voices in public debates, and (2) perceived conflicts between religious freedom and the popular appeal of newly alleged civil rights.

In this short passage, we say frame upon frame layered on each other; the framing has nothing to do with what actual atheists, nonbelievers and civil rights proponents are saying; the frames being invoked in this passage are entirely about the perspective of a religiously conservative white man deeply steeped in an authoritarian religious model.

FIrst: [religious freedom] requires [absence of powerful forces]. Second: [freedom] = [having a public voice]. Third [Religion] = [real freedom] and [gay rights] = [false freedom] and fourth [religious freedom] = [unpopular].

Paul Rosenberg, who posts at Open Left, has written about such arguments as sequential reasoning – in essence packing so much argument into as few words as possible that that it becomes difficult to analyze – that it defies analytical thinking. The listener is literally overwhelmed by numerous arguments and swallows the argument whole. In some sense, the experience for the listener is the same as a parent besieged by a three year old’s requests for treats in the store – eventually the listener just gives in. But, it’s fair to ask if the argument being made here actually makes sense.

Oaks was careful in his speech to not define religious freedom beyond very basic – freedom to believe and freedom to practice (”The guarantee of the free exercise of religion, which I will call religious freedom”). So, if there is a threat to religious freedom, it must by definition attack those two things, right? Here’s how the argument was constructed:

The tide of public opinion in favor of religion is receding, and this probably portends public pressures for laws that will impinge on religious freedom.

Atheism has always been hostile to religion, such as in its arguments that freedom of or for religion should include freedom from religion. Atheism’s threat rises as its proponents grow in numbers and aggressiveness. “By some counts,” a recent article in The Economist declares, “there are at least 500 [million] declared non-believers in the world — enough to make atheism the fourth-biggest religion.”[viii] And atheism’s spokesmen are aggressive, as recent publications show.[ix] As noted by John A. Howard of the Howard Center for Family, Religion, and Society, these voices “have developed great skills in demonizing those who disagree with them, turning their opponents into objects of fear, hatred and scorn.”

Such forces — atheists and others — would intimidate persons with religious-based points of view from influencing or making the laws of their state or nation.

This passage is another example of sequential arguments. First he asserts that public opinion toward religion is not as favorable as it was, that atheists are hostile to religion, there are lots of atheists therefore religious freedom is in danger. But in this passage, he’s also changed his definition of religious freedom from freedom to practice one’s faith to the right to have laws which reflect one’s religious views. Not to put too fine a point on it, the argument here is simply that unless one can enforce one’s religious views on others through the laws, one is not free to practice one’s religion. Again, this isn’t an argument about what actual atheists and nonbelievers are saying; it’s an argument about what religious conservatives believe – namely that public debate is a zero sum game; if nonbelievers are speaking and taken seriously then religious persons are being silenced and vice versa. The model of thinking being invoked here is dualistic – us versus them, good versus bad, religion versus secularism.

I know it’s not central to my argument but I want to pause here and refute Oaks on a very specific point. Freedom of religion does mean freedom from religion. The right of nonbelievers to not believe is every bit as crucial as the right of believers to believe. Freedom from religion is a necessary ingredient of a civil, peaceful, pluralistic society – especially where government practice is concerned. Opening official government meetings with prayer, having teachers lead classrooms of students in prayer, using government facilities for worship all these things amount to establishment of religion in the most basic sense. I’ve cited it several times now, but one of the most contentious school prayer cases actually involved a Mormon family in the deep South. The family objected to their children being forced to participate daily in prayers at school lead by baptist ministers, teachers and so on. The family prevailed ultimately but the case ended up revealing massive previously hidden strains and divisions within the community. Advocates for school prayer often seem to argue that they prefer the illusion of cohesiveness created by enforced practice to the honesty and messiness of diversity and pluralism.

The aggressiveness of the “New Atheists” – people like Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, Christopher Hitchens and Victor Stenger – is a threat to religion only in so far as their arguments are persuasive. Of course they are persuasive. And the aggressiveness of the New Atheists is nothing compared to a church that sends out thousands of missionaries. I’m not going to delve into the exact numbers here – other writers have done so with far more detail than I have space for here – but it’s important to understand the huge gap between official membership numbers and actual attendance and activity in churches. While some 85% of Americans claim to belong to some faith, actual attendance on the average sunday morning is in the 25-30% range. Even in faithful Utah, there is a huge gap between official membership numbers and actual numbers of active members. That gap has only grown in recent decades.

The gap between membership and active members is relevant. I happen to agree with Dallin Oaks’ that respect for the church (not just a specific denomination but the “church” as social institution) has greatly declined; unlike him, I am inclined to think that is a good thing. The reasons for that are many and varied and most certainly must include the problem that the church has done a very poor job of being relevant for millions of people’s lives – what our churches are teaching and preaching just isn’t relevant or meaningful for millions of Americans. That many denominations have become increasingly authoritarian and conservative (the Southern Baptists and Mormons included) has become a self-reinforcing cycle – the freethinkers and dissenters have found the church is not amendable to them, they leave, leaving behind those who are more conservative and authoritarian, which results in a greater and greater gap between those who are regular church goers and those who aren’t. Nonbelief starts to look like a threat because the church seems increasingly unable to reach the unchurched and institutional processes keep the church from delving deeply into their internal issues that are causing the problem.

The idea that civil rights for glbt persons are antithetical to religious freedom has practically become an article of faith among religious conservatives. Back to Oaks:

A second threat to religious freedom is from those who perceive it to be in conflict with the newly alleged “civil right” of same-gender couples to enjoy the privileges of marriage . . .

We have endured a wave of media-reported charges that the Mormons are trying to “deny” people or “strip” people of their “rights.” [snip] In fact, the Proposition 8 battle was not about civil rights, but about what equal rights demand and what religious rights protect . . .

Take a minute and let this passage sink in. The argument for gay marriage has always been very simple – gay couples are not treated equally by the law. Oaks implicitly accepts this argument (”what equal rights demand”) but then insists that if equal rights and his model of religious freedom conflict, religious freedom should be granted preference.

Early in his speech, Dallin Oaks offered this frame: [respect] = [freedom] – here he invokes its inverse [disrespect] = [lack of freedom]. The ability of religious persons to enact their morality through the law is a sign of respect and freedom; if that ability is limited, then religious freedom is limited.

That’s a lot of exploration without addressing the question: Is religious freedom endangered?

To answer that question, it’s important to look at the frames within which is rests. The ultimate question was posed by Oaks: Are the demands of legal equality at odds with the principles of religious freedom?

If religious freedom is nothing more than the right to believe and practice one’s faith, the answer, obviously, is no. Same sex marriage has been legal in Massachusetts for years. Civil Unions have been legal in Vermont for almost a decade (and recently became the right to marry). Other states have legalized same sex unions. These are living, real world experiments. We can judge for ourselves – has religious freedom been abridged in those states? The answer is no. In some cases, some churches have had to make tough decisions – for instance some churches own reception centers that are separate from their actual church building and have had to choose between their desire to make a buck by renting the space and their desire to refuse to recognize same sex marriages. The real question is analogous to asking if the freedom of religion for Catholics is being abridged by the right of people to get divorced and remarried.

However, if religious freedom is – as Oaks framed it – the right to influence and pass laws which accord with one’s faith practices, then the answer might be yes. But that frame is flawed. Legalizing same sex may not be in accord with the tenets of certain faiths; but the freedom of those faiths and their adherents to believe as they wish is not being legally challenged. Nor in fact is the right of those churches to refuse to perform same sex marriages. If religious freedom requires giving legal preference to conservative religious beliefs, then laws – for instance legalizing abortion, contraception, same sex marriage, and doing business on Sundays – are all limits on religious freedom. Oaks’ argument is about the weakness of faith and the necessity of having laws reinforce religious practice.

I have a cousin who is a deeply faithful Mormon. She once told me that in her house, they don’t go shopping or spend money or clean house or do “work” on Sunday (although I should note that the ban on work didn’t extend to preparing, serving or cleaning up after meals). By seeing other people going shopping, cleaning house and doing work on sunday, she is being “intimidated.” By being open on Sundays, stores are creating pressure on believers to shop and spend money and violate their beliefs. What Oaks is mourning is not just the influence of religion but the appearance of religious unanimity among Americans. The decline in “respect” for the church and religion in American society is not a sign of a turn toward immorality or a loss of religious freedom, it is a loss of power for the church.

If religious freedom depends on the absence of nonbelievers or the denial of civil rights for gays and lesbians, then it is not only possible, it is desirable, to limit religious freedom. If however, religious freedom is about the right to believe and practice one’s faith, then religious freedom is not in any danger. The frame which opposes Oaks is [religious freedom] is enhanced by [greater equality], gay rights are human rights and expanding human rights for some expands them for all.