Brent Walker Responds to USAToday Column
Earlier, I posted about the disappointing opinion piece by Stephen Mansfield that ran as USAToday's On Religion column Monday. Baptist Joint Committee Director Brent Walker has responded to that piece. His letter could just as easily be a response to my post from earlier today:
Religious liberty has never been more robust and healthy in America than it is today. The Pentagon has agreed to add minority religious symbols to the resting places of fallen soldiers; religious groups have equal access to public meeting space thanks to a Supreme Court decision; a federal law strengthens the hand of churches in zoning skirmishes with local governments; and surely we have never seen so many politicians discussing their faith, or religious leaders discussing their politics than we see today. So, I was astonished to read Stephen Mansfield's peculiar polemic Monday in which he claims that exactly the opposite is taking place.
The institutional separation of church and state - which is the real object of his ominous warning - has served this country well for more than 200 years. It ensures religious liberty for all Americans, recognizing that if any one of us has our religious freedom denied, the freedom of all is endangered. Yes, maintaining that freedom requires that we refrain from mixing our tax dollars and official government business with the mission of the church. But that's basic golden rule stuff: If I don't want government promoting other faiths with which I disagree, I can't ask it to advance my own. And if I don't want the state inhibiting my faith, I shouldn't allow it to disable the faith of another.
The threat of dismantling the wall of separation is at least as great a hazard to our democracy as any effort, real or imagined, to scour religion from the public square. Both are wrong-headed.