{"id":24935,"date":"2011-12-30T10:23:57","date_gmt":"2011-12-30T17:23:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2011\/12\/30\/is-discriminating-against-discrimination-discrimination.html"},"modified":"2011-12-30T16:03:20","modified_gmt":"2011-12-30T23:03:20","slug":"is-discriminating-against-discrimination-discrimination","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2011\/12\/30\/is-discriminating-against-discrimination-discrimination.html","title":{"rendered":"Is discriminating against discrimination discrimination?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Not when it's Your Tax Dollars At Work, in my opinion. <\/p>\n

'Anthony R. Picarello Jr., general counsel and associate general secretary of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, disagreed. \u201cIt\u2019s true that the church doesn\u2019t have a First Amendment right to have a government contract,\u201d he said, \u201cbut it does have a First Amendment right not to be excluded from a contract based on its religious beliefs.\u201d'<\/i><\/p>\n

Taken to its conclusion, though, that principle results in no difference between the two clauses. If the state of Illinois said, "We won't allow Catholics to bid on these contracts," that would be clearly illegal religious intolerance. But the restrictions are on actions<\/i> by a contractor that violate state law. If the Church was saying that, based on its religious code, it was only going to adopt kids out to Catholic parents in good standing, or to parents who only voted for certain candidates, or (in the case of other religious denominations) to parents who were white, or not of mixed race, or anyone but Jews, etc., then there'd be no question that the state should be able to reject their bid on that basis, or require them to change their policy as a condition of obtaining public money from all taxpayers.<\/i><\/p>\n

Which, really, is the bottom line here: the issue is not whether Catholics should be able to discriminate however they want as a private adoption agency, but whether they should be able to get government funding (i.e., money from all the taxpayers) to do so, regardless of their practices. If<\/i> the Church thinks its mission to children is that urgent and their moral teachings that inviolable, then they need to do so without asking for state funds.<\/p>\n

All of this is a fine set of arguments in favor of church\/state separation. Because here's a case where the church has become dependent on state financing ("Catholic Charities affiliates received a total of nearly $2.9 billion a year from the government in 2010, about 62 percent of its annual revenue of $4.67 billion"),<\/i> and now it's face with either trying to make the state bend to church teachings ("give us the money, whether or not it would be legal for anyone else to do what we do") or bend church teachings to obey the state. A lose-lose for everyone, it seems to me. #ddtb<\/p>\n

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Embedded Link<\/strong><\/p>\n

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\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tBishops Say Rules on Gay Parents Limit Freedom of Religion<\/a>
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tRoman Catholic bishops see a fight over adoption rules in Illinois as part of an escalating campaign by the government to trample on their religious freedom.\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Not when it's Your Tax Dollars At Work, in my opinion. 'Anthony R. Picarello Jr., general counsel and associate general secretary of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, disagreed. \u201cIt\u2019s true that the church doesn\u2019t have a First Amendment right to have a government contract,\u201d he said, \u201cbut it does have a First Amendment … Continue reading “Is discriminating against discrimination discrimination?”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[106,109],"tags":[107],"class_list":["post-24935","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-plusposts","category-church-state","tag-ddtb"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":27269,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2012\/03\/28\/freedom-of-practice-isnt-freedom-of-receiving-money.html","url_meta":{"origin":24935,"position":0},"title":"Freedom of practice isn't freedom of receiving money","author":"***Dave","date":"Wed 28-Mar-12 11:26pm","format":false,"excerpt":"If the federal government puts forward a contract for providing certain services, and a church that doesn't believe in some of those services bids for and loses the contract because of that, that isn't religious discrimination -- any more than if the Quakers bid on a missile contract but were\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":49318,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2015\/01\/23\/bryan-fischer-is-a-dolt-gay-gestapomafia-edition.html","url_meta":{"origin":24935,"position":1},"title":"Bryan Fischer Is a Dolt (Gay Gestapomafia Edition)","author":"***Dave","date":"Fri 23-Jan-15 7:16am","format":false,"excerpt":"Bryan, it's been -- well, it's been a day or two since you last rose to the level of needing a gentle smackdown for your doltitude. \u00a0What do you have for us today? Protecting your church from the Gay Gestapo? Oh, that should be good. What do you have to\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Church & State"","block_context":{"text":"Church & State","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/politics-law\/church-state"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/Bryan-Fischer-1501.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/Bryan-Fischer-1501.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/Bryan-Fischer-1501.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":26893,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2012\/03\/07\/but-some-religions-are-more-equal-than-others.html","url_meta":{"origin":24935,"position":2},"title":"But some religions are more equal than others","author":"***Dave","date":"Wed 7-Mar-12 6:49pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Shorter version: Focus on the Family wants conservative Christian churches and individuals to be able to do whatever the hell they damn want -- hire, fire, build, tear down, discriminate, slander, isolate, bully, whatever -- and use their \"sincerely held religious belief\" as a shield to be allowed to do\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":27267,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2012\/03\/28\/in-order-to-be-free-people-must-be-able-to-discriminate-against-others.html","url_meta":{"origin":24935,"position":3},"title":"In order to be free, people must be able to discriminate against others","author":"***Dave","date":"Wed 28-Mar-12 10:59pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Or that seems to be the argument here. And, in absolute terms, yes, that seems to be so. And so we see the seeds of the dismemberment of either our current society or of religious freedom.Clearly the racists of the 60s missed a bet. They should have framed racial discrimination\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":13275,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2009\/02\/01\/book_review_founding_fait.html","url_meta":{"origin":24935,"position":4},"title":"Book Review: Founding Faith by Steven Waldman","author":"***Dave","date":"Sun 1-Feb-09 12:32pm","format":false,"excerpt":"\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 Founding Faith: Providence, Politics, and the Birth of Religious Freedom in America by Steven Waldman (2008) Overall Writing Info Re-Readability Audio Waldman studies the issues around...","rel":"","context":"In "Books"","block_context":{"text":"Books","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/media\/media-books"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/images\/stars5.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":26359,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2012\/02\/13\/the-martyrs-who-cried-wolf.html","url_meta":{"origin":24935,"position":5},"title":"The Martyrs Who Cried Wolf","author":"***Dave","date":"Mon 13-Feb-12 1:13am","format":false,"excerpt":"It occurs to me that the folks who are screaming in ever more shrill voices, pounding on tables with their shoes, and otherwise raising a humongous stink about \"religious freedom\" and discrimination, when what they really mean is their freedom to discriminate against people based on their own religious beliefs\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24935","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24935"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24935\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24935"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24935"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24935"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}