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  • The American Government vs. Religion?0

    A professor of religion at Texas Christian University, Ronald Flowers wrote in his book That Godless Court (Westminster/John Knox) how "In 1962 and 1963, as a reaction to its decision banning school-sponsored prayer in the public schools, the Supreme Court was frequently called 'godless.' Is that a fair representation of the High Court? Or is

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  • Religious Rights for All0

    Sergeant Patrick Stewart, a 34-year-old decorated American soldier and follower of Wicca, was killed in Afghanistan on September 25, 2005, along with four other soldiers, when a rocket-propelled grenade struck his helicopter. For bravery in the line of fire, all five soldiers were posthumously awarded a Bronze Star and a Purple Heart. Yet while the

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  • Freedom Wings0

    Benjamin Franklin knew a lot about kites and electricity. And he wrote enough pithy sayings to forever confuse them in the mind of the Biblical speed reader with Solomon's opus. But he has come to occupy the comedian's end of the Audubon spectrum for his promotion of the Turkey for National Bird. I still remember

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  • Avoiding Misguided Metaphors0

    Even when the U.S. Supreme Court reaches the right result in a matter involving church-state relations, the justices too often do so for the wrong reasons. Cutter v. Wilkinson is illustrative. Handed down in May of 2005, Cutter reversed a lower court that had struck down as unconstitutional the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons

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  • A State of Exception0

    The Guantánamo Bay detention centre, set up in January of 2002 at the U.S. naval base in southeast Cuba, has recently seen its fifth anniversary. Established by the U.S. government as an urgent response to terrorism, the detention centre has given rise to allegations of indecent treatment of inmates, religious discrimination, and indeed, torture.  Common

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  • Revisiting Everson: My Country – Sweet Land0

    A presenter at a conference on religious liberty recently told a story about a woman from east central Texas he met on an airplane. The woman was complaining loudly about the Supreme Court decision prohibiting prayer over the public address systems at Texas public high school football games. He explained to her that he had

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