PRESS
RELEASE
Christian
Lawyers Endorse Need for and Constitutionality of Religious Liberty Protection
Act
The Christian Legal Society,
a nationwide membership of Christian attorneys and law students, urges
Congress to enact the RLPA this
session. "Its beneficiaries will be millions of Americans whose
religious exercise is otherwise
largely defenseless against government infringement," noted Steven T.
McFarland,
director of the Society's Center For Law And Religious Freedom.
Who needs a federal statute
protecting religious liberty?
Parents who want their children
to be excused from objectionable "safe sex" assemblies; Health
care professionals who have religious objections to performing abortions
or assisting in suicide;
Two million federal civilian employees and a million Americans in uniform,
including their
dependents, around the world;
Every American whose religious exercise is substantially burdened
by
any federal statute, regulation, executive order, or policy; Religious
schools whose accreditation is revoked because they refuse on religious
grounds to teach statemandated curriculum, including evolution and sex
education; Religious employers (whether churches, religious day care centers,
bookstores or others in
the marketplace) who prefer employees on the basis of shared religious
belief;
Synogogues and churches that are zoned out of communities or discriminatorily
relegated to
inappropriate
areas.
What gives the Congress
the power to protect religious exercise this way? "The Constitution
explicitly
empowers the Congress to regulate those activities that cumulatively affect
interstate
commerce
and to stipulate how the states use federal money," explained McFarland.
"And when
Congress finds a national
threat to the exercise of a civil right like this, the 14th Amendment still
authorizes
Congress to pass a law that targets that threat."
Christian
Legal Society is a national membership organization of nearly 4,000
Christian attorneys, judges,
law professors and law students, as well as supportive laypeople. The Center
for Law and Religious
Freedom is CLS' advocacy arm. The Center helped draft RLPA and co-chairs
a national coalition's
campaign to pass similar legislation in key states.
RFRACT
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