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anthony022071
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miamiarch.org/CatholicDiocese.php?op=Article_142981588628570
…Even in our Western liberal democracies, discrimination against religion in general and Catholic Christianity in particular is growing – albeit in perhaps more sophisticated and less violent ways. Political analysts and human rights advocates do include religion on their agenda. But, most emphasize “tolerance” as if religion were only a source of conflict. Or, they speak about religion in terms of “individual choices” as if religion were merely the concern of an individual’s conviction and were devoid of any social consequences. And so in our country as in other Western countries, we see a tendency to relegate religion to the private sphere. And, in these countries, we see the courts chipping away at the original understanding of religious freedom. In order to fit new political agendas, religious freedom is being reinterpreted narrowly to mean merely “freedom to worship” but excluding the freedom to serve and/or the freedom to witness. The Catholic Church in this country is currently battling in legislatures and in courts against this tendency. And it is not clear that we will prevail. Education, family law, healthcare are just some of the areas in which narrow readings of religious freedom are paving the way for antireligious policies… >
< …But even as de Tocqueville pointed out almost 200 years ago, despotism comes in both soft and hard forms. Your patron, St. Thomas More, beheaded for refusing to consent to King Henry VIII’s takeover of the Church, fell victim to a hard despotism. This type of hard despotism is decimating the Christian populations of the Middle East. But, in this country and other liberal democracies, people of faith are being increasingly subject to a soft despotism in which ridicule, ostracism, and denial of employment opportunities of advancement are being used to marginalize us. We see this when butchers, and bakers and candlestick makers are being put into the legal dock for refusing to renounce their religious beliefs. A new religious intolerance has established itself in our country – and it is being propagated by those who claimed to have been victims of previous instances of intolerance. Christian pastors are stalked and threatened for being “Christian” pastors, social scientists are expelled from universities for having turned up “politically incorrect” facts, charitable organizations and confessional schools are harassed if they take seriously their faith’s moral precepts and required their employees to support their missions.
…Even in our Western liberal democracies, discrimination against religion in general and Catholic Christianity in particular is growing – albeit in perhaps more sophisticated and less violent ways. Political analysts and human rights advocates do include religion on their agenda. But, most emphasize “tolerance” as if religion were only a source of conflict. Or, they speak about religion in terms of “individual choices” as if religion were merely the concern of an individual’s conviction and were devoid of any social consequences. And so in our country as in other Western countries, we see a tendency to relegate religion to the private sphere. And, in these countries, we see the courts chipping away at the original understanding of religious freedom. In order to fit new political agendas, religious freedom is being reinterpreted narrowly to mean merely “freedom to worship” but excluding the freedom to serve and/or the freedom to witness. The Catholic Church in this country is currently battling in legislatures and in courts against this tendency. And it is not clear that we will prevail. Education, family law, healthcare are just some of the areas in which narrow readings of religious freedom are paving the way for antireligious policies… >
< …But even as de Tocqueville pointed out almost 200 years ago, despotism comes in both soft and hard forms. Your patron, St. Thomas More, beheaded for refusing to consent to King Henry VIII’s takeover of the Church, fell victim to a hard despotism. This type of hard despotism is decimating the Christian populations of the Middle East. But, in this country and other liberal democracies, people of faith are being increasingly subject to a soft despotism in which ridicule, ostracism, and denial of employment opportunities of advancement are being used to marginalize us. We see this when butchers, and bakers and candlestick makers are being put into the legal dock for refusing to renounce their religious beliefs. A new religious intolerance has established itself in our country – and it is being propagated by those who claimed to have been victims of previous instances of intolerance. Christian pastors are stalked and threatened for being “Christian” pastors, social scientists are expelled from universities for having turned up “politically incorrect” facts, charitable organizations and confessional schools are harassed if they take seriously their faith’s moral precepts and required their employees to support their missions.