Expanding The Bounds Of Ridiculousness

I don’t know if ridiculousness is a word, but in this case it surely applies. Last Monday, Breitbart.com reported that George Washington University Law School Professor John Banzhaf has filed a complaint with the Washington, D.C. Office of Human Rights against Catholic University. The Professor is charging the University with  creating an “offensive” environment in which Muslims are intimidated out of proper reverence for their own religion because of the large amount of Catholic imagery draping the halls. Dude, it’s Catholic University. What did you expect–statues of Buddha?

The article reports:

It’s hard to keep a straight face while reading all that, but rest assured the rusty gears and chains of the bureaucracy began clanking as soon as Banzhaf’s thick complaint was dumped into the hopper of the anti-discrimination machine. “A spokesperson for the human rights office said they are investigating Banzhaf’s complaint — and the inquiry could take as long as six months,” writes BeliefNet.

“I don’t know what the attorney wants them to do – if he wants them to actually move the Basilica or if the Muslim students can find someplace where they don’t have to look at it,” an incredulous Patrick Reilly of the Cardinal Newman Society told Fox News. “One wouldn’t expect a Jewish institution to be responsible for providing liturgical opportunities for other faiths and I wouldn’t expect a Catholic institution to do that.”

“This attorney is really turning civil rights on its head,” Reilly continued. “He’s using the law for his own discrimination against the Catholic institution and essentially saying Catholic University cannot operate according to Catholic principles.”

…This is all part of the effort to create a legal and super-legal regulatory environment in which maintaining faith-based institutions is nearly impossible… or, at least, so difficult that these institutions will be forever subdued beneath the heel of the almighty State. Just wait until churches lose their tax-exempt status for refusing to comply with Big Government decrees about same-sex marriage, and you’ll see how that works.

Religious freedom is under attack in America. It won’t be long before the tax-exempt status of churches will be under fire. If Americans value the right to freedom of religion, they need to begin to stand up now. One of the things to note is a subtle changing of the First Amendment. We are hearing people speak about ‘freedom of worship‘ rather than ‘freedom of religion.’ It’s a subtle difference, but the word change is an effort to keep religious people out of the public forum. Freedom of worship keeps God in the church. Freedom of religion allows God in the public square.