Depolarizing religious liberty

On July 11, 2024, Bishop Kevin C. Rhoades of Fort Wayne-South Bend, chair of the Committee for Religious Liberty of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, gave the following address on religious liberty at the Notre Dame Religious Liberty Summit. The speech in its entirety is as follows.

I am very grateful to Deacon Marcus Cole for his leadership in founding the Religious Liberty Initiative here at Notre Dame Law School and to the Director of this important initiative, Stephanie Barclay.

Thank you both for the invitation to deliver this keynote address. It is humbling to be here with such excellent scholars, teachers and legal experts who are committed to the defense of the fundamental right of religious liberty for all people.

My reflections are meant to offer some guideposts. My basic argument is this: as we seek to depolarize religious liberty, the search for truth should be our reference point.

When Pope Benedict XVI addressed the Bundestag in Berlin, he said, "Politics must be a striving for justice, and hence it has to establish the fundamental preconditions for peace." And he goes on:

"How do we recognize what is right [that is, just]? In history, systems of law have almost always been based on religion: decisions regarding what was to be lawful among men were taken with reference to the divinity. Unlike other great religions, Christianity has never proposed a revealed law to the State and to society, that is to say a juridical order derived from revelation. Instead, it has pointed to nature and reason as the true sources of law -- and to the harmony of objective and subjective reason, which naturally presupposes that both spheres are rooted in the creative reason of God."

My proposal, then, is that debates about religious liberty become polarized to the extent that our political discourse is a post-truth politics.

In my work with the USCCB Committee for Religious Liberty, we regularly reflect on the problem of polarization and religious freedom in our country. Just as we are doing at this conference, we want to show that religious freedom is for all. Three years ago, my predecessor spoke here about correcting a narrative that religious liberty is a right-wing cause. It is not. Yet it is certainly a challenge to show that we are not simply using religious freedom as a proxy for other issues.

Religious liberty itself should not be polarizing. Indeed, Americans seem to be in agreement that religious freedom is important. According to both the Becket Fund's Religious Freedom Index and a recent Pew report, a majority of Americans think religion is good for public life. The idea that people should be free to practice their religion seems to be thoroughly ingrained in the American imagination. So, what's the problem?

It seems to me that many of our disagreements have to do with where the limits on religious liberty ought to be. Most people will say that religious freedom matters. And most people have long recognized that religious liberty comes with limits and conditions. 

For example, in his book, "Our Dear-Bought Liberty," Michael Breidenbach describes how in early America, civic loyalty was a prerequisite to constitutional religious liberty protections, and so Maryland Catholics were able to support the American idea of religious freedom, because their theology did not view the pope's authority as touching the duties of Catholics to their own civil authorities. These types of concerns are part and parcel of the discourse surrounding the right to religious liberty. It is not an unconditional right.

In a similar vein, the Church's declaration on religious liberty, "Dignitatis humanae,” qualifies the right to religious liberty with variations of the phrase, "provided just public order is observed." One cannot claim a religious liberty right to commit an injustice or to cause harm to the common welfare. "Dignitatis humanae" also envisions religious freedom as a right that corresponds to an obligation, and thus it implies that religious freedom is not simply a trump card that someone can pull out to protect any activity. In that sense, there is a kind of limit to religious freedom based on what the right is for.

Many people who wish to unduly restrict religious liberty seem to understand themselves as simply putting reasonable restrictions on religious practice. Yes, some say, you have a right to refuse participation in the provision of contraceptives, but when you enter the secular sphere of the marketplace, you cannot impose your religious ideas on others. Sure, you can serve people in need on the border, but you cannot help to perpetuate a system that erodes our national sovereignty. You are free to bake any cake you want, but refusing to serve same-sex couples harms the dignity of those who are seeking your services. This seems to be where disputes about religious liberty live. They are about religious liberty, to be sure, but they are about limits and conditions.

It's important to keep this in mind, so that we can be honest about the challenges we face. Authoritarian regimes in other countries may oppose religious liberty in principle. In this country, where the idea of religious liberty is popular, the concerns are more subtle. Pope Francis refers to it as "polite persecution."

Secondly, our disputes concern human dignity. Indeed, in the Catholic tradition, the right to religious liberty is based on human dignity. As "Dignitatis humanae" teaches: "It is in accordance with their dignity as persons -- that is, beings endowed with reason and free will and therefore privileged to bear personal responsibility -- that all men should be at once impelled by nature and also bound by a moral obligation to seek the truth, especially religious truth. . . . However, men cannot discharge these obligations in a manner in keeping with their own nature unless they enjoy immunity from external coercion as well as psychological freedom. Therefore, the right to religious freedom has its foundation not in the subjective disposition of the person, but in his very nature."

But same-sex couples feel that failure to be recognized as a married couple constitutes an affront to their dignity. Failure to be recognized as the gender one asserts oneself to have is perceived as an affront to dignity.

At the same time, being forced to speak untruthfully is also an affront to human dignity. The person who acts against his conscience also experiences a dignitary harm.

So, while SOGI [Sexual orientation and gender identity] activists have appealed to the concept of dignitary harm, it is not obvious that such an appeal should always work in their favor. All of us who are party to these disputes are working with understandings of human dignity.

These issues are enough to elicit deep disagreement. But it seems that we could have those disagreements without becoming polarized. In fact, I think it is important that we distinguish between deep disagreement and polarization. We can depolarize religious liberty, but in our pluralistic society, we should expect deep disagreement to endure.

So, what is polarization, and why is it a problem?

All of us are aware that our political culture in the United States has become polarized. The growing body of literature on polarization shows that it is not simply a matter of the positions we hold on potentially divisive topics. Americans are separated by culture as much as by politics. For many of us, we can construct a whole narrative about a person if her social media profile picture includes a large family and an American flag. Most congressional districts are considered landslide districts because they are dominated by a single party. Many Americans not only have different beliefs, but they choose to live and work in places and institutions where they will be surrounded by people just like them.

In a polarized America, we don't just disagree about matters of public policy. We live different kinds of lives. And very often, we do not encounter the other Americans in any other place but social media.

We are not divided only, or even primarily, by our political differences. We have sorted ourselves into warring tribes. The term "polarization" indicates something more than deep disagreement. As my brother bishop, Daniel Flores, pointed out at a conference here in 2015, the term is borrowed from the natural sciences to refer to something like "natural repulsion," as in the case with "magnetic polar behavior." That is, we are talking about the fact that we tend to define ourselves in opposition to the other tribe.

This dynamic means that sometimes the issues themselves don't matter so much as who stands to benefit or suffer.

For example, consider an analysis of the case of Tanzin v. Tanvir, which involved a Muslim man who said he was placed on the no-fly list for refusing to be an informant for the FBI. The Supreme Court considered whether the plaintiff could sue the federal officials responsible for what happened to him. A columnist for a liberal magazine, though, was concerned that this Muslim man would win his case because Christians would also benefit from it. The columnist thought it obvious the Muslim should win, but he still found it to be a difficult case because of what it would mean for Christians. In other words, the principle of religious freedom for all is not what matters. Rather, there should be one set of rules for my friends and another for my enemies.

These kinds of examples could be multiplied. We all see them. But we need to go a little deeper to consider why this is such a problem.

Deep disagreement is a problem for civic peace. It can lead to a kind of discord, in which bonds of charity are stretched. But polarization is different. It goes beyond disagreement. Deep disagreement means that different persons and communities have different understandings of the good. It means that we are rejecting certain claims. With polarization, we are rejecting persons. Polarization means that politics is a matter of friends and enemies rather than the search for the true and good. 

Polarization is not some impersonal phenomenon that just happens. People become polarized. When I am polarized, I take the side of my tribe, regardless of the truthfulness of its claims. I seek to hurt the other side, regardless of the truthfulness of their claim.

How does this work in real life? Consider the situation at the border. Some organizations that are otherwise friendly to religious liberty have sought to restrict the ability of Catholic organizations to serve immigrants, using spurious claims and exaggerated rhetoric to inflame the emotions of their political tribe. Would shutting down a ministry help secure the border? Are ministries really bringing people across the border? Does it even matter? To suggest the truth matters here almost seems quaint.

If we simply had deep disagreement, we could have an argument over this difficult issue. The argument might be contentious, but there could at least be some truths that everyone acknowledges. Not so when we are polarized. When we are polarized, the only thing that matters is getting the best of our enemies. 

In this sense, then, rather than a domain in which we seek the truth, even in an antagonistic way, politics is an arena in which power and will are the only things that matter. Thus, polarization names a post-truth politics -- a politics of will to power rather than reason seeking the common good.

Religion can get drawn into this kind of politics. People of faith may see a political faction as being more apt to advance issues of importance to their religion. To some extent, this makes sense when we decide whom to vote for. To exercise faithful citizenship, we have to make hard decisions about who we want to hold particular offices. But, again, polarization is different. If I am a Catholic who has become polarized, I see the other side as an enemy, even if that other side makes points that resonate with my faith. And when my political friends put forward claims that are inimical to my faith, I cheer my political friends.

For the polarized person, the victory of my faction over the enemy is all that matters. The polarized person of faith may even begin to attach the symbols and language of his religion to a political party. When I become polarized, the transcendent horizon that faith ought to present to my vision is eclipsed by the idol of polarized politics. 

In short, depolarization does not mean the end of deep disagreements. If we are to depolarize, we must see politics as a space in which we seek the truth of what is good for the political community to which we belong. It does not mean a kind of pragmatism in which we abandon our claims to truth. But it does mean that we approach those we are debating and arguing over the merits of the truth claims themselves.

Let me conclude this section by noting that I recognize this is a challenge. As many have noted, the language in which we argue political truths is embedded in narratives, but our political community lacks a common narrative. I don't pretend to be able to resolve that difficult issue here. But I do know that if we are to depolarize our political discourse, we must see politics as a sphere of reason rather than an arena of combat between friends and enemies.

The question of truth haunts not only the problems surrounding polarization. When we think about religion and what religious freedom aims to protect and promote, we are also talking about the question of truth. 

There are basic questions that come naturally to people, as individuals and as members of communities. What is the cause of all that exists? What is God like? Why is there evil in the world? How should I live my life, particularly in view of what God (or nature) expects of me? Even the person who rejects religion is acting as a religious person when he lives as if there were no God. The questions are generally unavoidable.

According to "Dignitatis humanae," all persons have not only a right, but indeed an obligation to seek out the truth in religious matters. As John Paul II famously put it, "Every generation of Americans needs to know that freedom consists not in doing what we like, but in having the right to do what we ought." In other words, religious freedom is not a pretext for the individual to engage in any activity he or she wishes. The idea is that when we seek religious truth and then come to believe we have found it, an obligation imposes itself on us to follow through on this search and conduct ourselves in light of the truth as we understand it.

Notice how we are speaking about religion here. It is something that comes from outside of myself. It is not something I invent. Rather, first and foremost, religion is about truths that are discovered. 

I think it's important to dwell on this point for a bit. When Christians build hospitals and schools, they do it because the God whom they have come to know in Jesus Christ has commanded them to. We can say similar things of followers of other faith traditions. When Muslims, Jews, and other people of faith carry out their faith traditions, they do so out of obedience to what they understand to be required of them by their religion, which they regard as true. Religion is fundamentally a matter of truths that make certain claims on our lives, claims that are more important than the claims of any earthly government.

If religion, in all its permutations, involves truth that is discovered, not made, then religious freedom is a matter of allowing people room to seek and find.

In a post-truth political culture, though, that space shrinks -- or, alternatively, the enterprise of seeking truth is regarded as a fool's errand.

If truth is at the center of our considerations, we will accept that even if we depolarize religious liberty, we will still have deep disagreements. While we Catholics who seek to defend religious liberty might work to ensure that all people, including those who identify as LGBT, do not face unjust discrimination, we cannot be expected to affirm ideas about marriage and sex that we understand to be untrue. Perhaps we can have that discussion on the basis of human dignity and what dignity entails.

However we proceed, depolarization, in the sense of refusing to see political adversaries as enemies, does not necessarily entail the end of deep disagreement. At a minimum, depolarization should entail the end of using power to coerce people of faith into participating in actions that they understand to be fundamentally unjust and violations of human dignity.

And if we depolarize, can we resolve these disagreements? I must confess that I don't see how it is possible without a common reference point, without a common understanding of fundamental truths. A Christian understanding of where truth is found -- that is, outside ourselves -- starkly contrasts with the modern impulse to view truth as a matter of personal invention. This impulse is partially the product of centuries of bad philosophy and will take generations, at least, to unseat.

Yet, the lack of that common understanding should not prevent us from doing our best to testify to the truth with love and respect. This is what we mean by civility.

Let me close by reflecting on the work of the USCCB.

The church works for the legal protection of all human life, because we know from both reason and faith that all persons, including the unborn, are human persons with infinite dignity. Yet, in our culture, the denial of the dignity of the unborn is asserted as a right based on reproductive freedom. This assertion, though flawed, is widely accepted by many. In many states, not only is abortion legal, but others may be forced to cooperate. So while we continue to fight for laws to protect the unborn, we must also fight for our freedom not to be coerced to cooperate in abortion.

Similarly with marriage. The church works to uphold the meaning of marriage, because we know from both reason and faith that marriage by nature is the lifelong union of one man and one woman, a good for society and for children conceived through that union. Our convictions on this are now a minority position in our country. So while we continue to teach the truth about marriage, we must also fight to preserve our freedom not to cooperate in, recognize, or support the redefinition of marriage.

I think we have tried to depolarize religious liberty by refusing to be polarized ourselves. This January, we published our first-ever annual report, in which we identified five threats we saw as preeminent. Attacks on houses of worship tops the list, and we noted that, even though Catholic churches have indeed been attacked, this is a bigger problem for Jews and Muslims than for Catholics. We identified the political attacks on Catholic services to immigrants as refugees as another threat, while regulations from the Biden administration constitute another set of threats.

In identifying these threats, we aim to focus on principle. While it may be the case that one political party has tended to be more helpful on issues related to abortion, we cannot look the other way when that political party attacks religious institutions in a different way. We must be faithful witnesses to the truth.

Have we succeeded? If one of our goals is to bear witness to the truth, then yes, I think we have succeeded. I encourage anyone to look at our record and see that we have advocated for principles that transcend the divide between left and right. 

These are difficult issues to work through. In our country, we should be grateful that we are currently debating complex issues rather than fending off deadly attacks or authoritarian persecution. As we navigate these turbulent times, I encourage you to make truth your guide star. As Pope Benedict taught in "Caritas in Veritate," "fidelity to man requires fidelity to the truth, which alone is the guarantee of freedom."