Taking Religious Freedom Seriously

I'm struck by a couple of the eloquent passages in Kagan's dissent in Town of Greece:

The not-so-implicit message of the majority’s opinion—“What’s the big deal, anyway?”—is mistaken. The content of Greece’s prayers is a big deal, to Christians and non-Christians alike. A person’s response to the doctrine, language, and imagery contained in those invocations reveals a core aspect of identity—who that person is and how she faces the world ....

I would treat more seriously the multiplicity of Americans’ religious commitments, along with the challenge they can pose to the project—the distinctively American project—of creating one from the many, and governing all as united.

In Hobby Lobby, and in other cases about free exercise rights, we hear people on the left arguing "What's the big deal, anyway?"  Nobody--so the argument goes--is forcing Hobby Lobby's owners to use  contraceptives/potential-abortifacients, or administer them, or endorse their use, and including them in an insurance policy is not much different than paying a salary to an employee who will use it for contraception; likewise, nobody is forcing Catholic institutions to host or perform same-sex marriages, or to say they are good, so what's the real impact on religious commitments?  And also, "What's so special about religion?  People have lots of objections to government policies and don't get to claim an exemption."

Kagan's identification of religious belief as a "core aspect of identity" helps answer why it's a big deal, and why religious objections to majoritarian policies are distinctive.  The depth and comprehensive nature of a religious belief, for someone who believes it strongly enough to stand up for it, means that the person suffers a serious burden to his/her integrity when pressured to act in ways inconsistent with the belief.  I wish the majority had give more weight to this in today's case where the objection was to the government's implementation of a policy concerning religious acts (prayers).  And I hope that it presages that in Hobby Lobby, Kagan will take the business owners' objections to a secular government policy seriously and at least vote to require a strong reason to override them.