Greg S. has just posted our Dean's statement criticizing NPR's simplistic identification of St. Thomas as a "conservative" law school. In response to objections from our faculty -- including politically conservative faculty -- NPR has admitted that they mischaracterized us, has removed St. Thomas from the list on the web page that Michael P. referenced, and will read the Dean's short statement on the air in the next couple of days.
This episode has impressed upon me, and others here, the point that Greg and Chuck Reid make about how difficult it is to avoid being pigeonholed into familiar and simple categories. When NPR was researching this story, I exchanged e-mails with their researcher, emphasizing in my e-mail that "St. Thomas is not a 'conservative Christian' school as such. It is a law school with a serious Catholic Christian identity" -- and I then explained how that led to some stereotypically "liberal" positions being strong here, like opposition to the death penalty and an emphasis on fighting poverty, as well as some stereotypically "conservative" positions like opposition to abortion and euthanasia. I also emphasized diversity of viewpoint on our faculty on these and other issues. NPR totally ignored all the nuances that I described for them when it ran the story. The idea that any seriously religious law school must be turning out nothing but Republican lawyers was too good, and too easy, for NPR to pass up. Discussion in the media of questions about religion and law remains at a depressingly low level.
The objection of so many of us at St. Thomas (from across the political spectrum) to being labeled a "conservative" law school does not arise, for most of us, from any discomfort with those "conservative" ideas that are in harmony with the Christian vision of human dignity. Our objection is that the Christian vision, and the faithful exploration of it at a Catholic law school, is much broader than any such political label and will inevitably cut across such labels. We have also consciously pursued the goal of having differing points of view on many political issues, while also ensuring a strong core committed to the most bedrock affirmations of the Church on matters of human dignity and social relations.
Here is a lengthier statement from our Dean, Tom Mengler, which may appear on the NPR website (they have indicated that they are considering this, but if they don't post it you'll have it here).
Tom Berg
A report on “Morning Edition” was incorrect in implying that the University
of
St. Thomas School of Law
is a “religiously conservative law school.”
St. Thomas
is a Catholic law school, and we take our religious identity seriously. For us, that does not mean pursuing political causes, but instead helping our students to integrate their religious and personal values — whatever those values may be — into their professional identities. We hope that this will lead our students to practice law ethically and use their legal training to serve their fellow human beings — particularly the most needy among us.
There is nothing politically “conservative” about our mission, and the people we have attracted prove this. The vast majority of our faculty and student body are left-of-center politically. Our faculty includes individuals who are openly gay, who support abortion rights, who oppose the death penalty, and who have worked on behalf of other “liberal” causes. We have chapters of the National Lawyers Guild and Out!law on campus, but we do not have a chapter of the American
Center
for Law & Justice. We are one of the few law schools in the country to require all of our students to do public service as a condition of graduation, and the American Bar Association recently singled out for praise the high number of our graduates who have taken Legal Aid and other public service jobs.
Far from being “politically conservative,” St. Thomas
is striving to prove that a law school can take religion seriously without ascribing to any political agenda.
Dean Thomas M. Mengler
Dean and Ryan Chair in Law
Friday, April 29, 2005
The freedom of religion case in which the Supreme Court just granted review -- Gonzalez v. O Centra Espirita Beneficiente Uniao do Vegetal [UDV] -- is an extremely important one for the freedom of all faiths in America. The case concerns the interpretation of the 1993 Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA), in which Congress required that before a law can be applied to "substantially burden" sincere religious conduct, that application must be justified by a "compelling" governmental interest and be the "least restrictive means" of achieving that interest. RFRA was a response to Supreme Court precedent stating that a law that is "neutral and generally applicable" can be applied to suppress religious conduct no matter how serious the burden on religion and how minimal the need for regulation. Under the principle that RFRA reversed, a dry county in Oklahoma could prohibit the mass, no questions asked, and generally applicable sex-discrimination laws could be applied to force the Catholic Church to ordain women as priests. Although RFRA was struck down in 1997 as applied to state and local laws, it remains valid as a limit on federal laws and regulations that restrict religious freedom.
In UDV, the government sought to prohibit the consumption and importation of a tea used in the central ritual act of UDV worship services, on the ground that the tea contained a hallucinogenic substance listed under federal drug laws. The UDV, the tiny American offshoot of an established Brazilian religion, obtained an injunction against the government's actions, based on evidence that the use of the tea would not create dangers of health hazards or drug trafficking, because (among other things) the church insisted that members limit their use to the worship service and because the unpleasant taste of the drug made it unattractive to recreational users. These very same features are true of sacramental use of peyote by Native Americans, which has led numerous states and the federal government to exempt such peyote use from their drug laws. The role of the RFRA statute is to ensure that when a similar claim, such as UDV's, cannot get a legislative hearing because the group is less familar or less adept at lobbying, the courts will declare an equal right to free exercise for that faith. (In sharp contrast is the uncircumscribed use of marijuana, a widely trafficked drug, by other groups claiming religious freedom; these claims always lose, even under the higher standard of RFRA.)
The federal government does not challenge the validity of the RFRA statute; the Bush administration wants to be able to defend religious freedom when it is more popular. Instead, the government offers an interpretation of the statute that would gut its effectiveness. The government argues that the mere listing of a drug on the schedule of controlled substances proves that there is a "compelling" reason to prohibit it in any and all circumstances -- without regard to the kind of evidence described above concerning the limited risks from the UDV's use. Essentially, the government says that the mere existence of a law is proof that it serves a compelling interest in all cases. Although the government tries to limit this argument to drug cases, its implications go much further. As Judge Michael McConnell -- a Bush appointee, and no wild-eyed radical -- argued in the court of appeals decision ruling for UDV:
Congress’s general conclusion that DMT is dangerous in the abstract does not establish that the government has a compelling interest in prohibiting the consumption of
hoasca under the conditions presented in this case. . . .RFRA requires
the government
to "demonstrate[]" that application of a challenged federal law to religious exercise satisfies strict scrutiny under RFRA. 42 U.S.C. § 2000bb-1(b). The term "demonstrates" is defined as "meet[ing] the burdens of going forward with the evidence and of persuasion." Id., § 2000bb-2(3). Obviously, Congress contemplated the introduction of "evidence" pertaining to the justification of "application" of the law in the particular instance. If such a burden of proof could be satisfied by citing congressional finding in the preambles to statutes, without additional evidence, RFRA challenges would rarely succeed; congressional findings invariably tout the importance of the laws to which they are appended.
If the government's position prevails in UDV, then potentially almost any claim of religious freedom as against a generally applicable law would fail. Amish parents were allowed to remove their teenagers from high school in lieu of informal vocational education (Wisconsin v. Yoder, 406 U.S. 205 (1972)) because, even though education in general is an important state interest, a couple extra years of formal education was not shown to be crucial to the development of Amish children. Formal teacher credentials are generally important for the public-school and private-school teachers handling significant numbers of students, but that does not mean they have to be applied rigidly to home-schooling parents who have close relationships with a small number of students, their children. These and numerous other successful religious-freedom claims would fail under the standard that the federal government advocates in UDV. (For input from several Christian organizations that are theologically light years from the UDV but support its right to practice its faith, see this amicus brief.)
This case concerns far more than just a tiny group practicing an unfamilar faith and consuming a hallucinogenic substance. It concerns far more than drugs and the war on them. It will affect the freedom of religions across the spectrum when they come in conflict with the huge range of federal laws and regulations.
Tom Berg
Thursday, April 28, 2005
What is Pope Benedict XVI's attitude toward economic life, and is he "to the left of" his predecessor on such matters? An early search of some statements by then-Cardinal Ratzinger:
From a 2004 interview:
Rome, May. 07, 2004 (CWNews.com) - "The world economy is totally dominated by materialist principles," according to Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger (bio - news).
The prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, in an interview with the Italian Catholic agency SIR, said that world economic affairs are driven by a form of economic liberalism which "specifically excludes the heart." More important, he continued, this outlook also excludes "the highest faculty of human intelligence," which is "the possibility of seeing God, of introducing the light of moral responsibility, love, and justice into the worlds of work, of commerce, and of politics."
Much attention has been given to the 1984 Instruction on Certain Aspects of "Liberation Theology" (available in full here), in which the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, under Ratzinger, criticized many features of liberation theology. A few key passages:
The present Instruction has [as its purpose] to draw the attention of pastors, theologians, and all the faithful to the deviations, and risks of deviation, damaging to the faith and to Christian living, that are brought about by certain forms of liberation theology which use, in an insufficiently critical manner, concepts borrowed from various currents of Marxist thought.
This warning should in no way be interpreted as a disavowal of all those who want to respond generously and with an authentic evangelical spirit to the "preferential option for the poor." It should not at all serve as an excuse for those who maintain the attitude of neutrality and indifference in the face of the tragic and pressing problems of human misery and injustice. It is, on the contrary, dictated by the certitude that the serious ideological deviations which it points out tends inevitably to betray the cause of the poor. More than ever, it is important that numerous Christians, whose faith is clear and who are committed to live the Christian life in its fullness, become involved in the struggle for justice, freedom, and human dignity because of their love for their disinherited, oppressed, and persecuted brothers and sisters. More than ever, the Church intends to condemn abuses, injustices, and attacks against freedom, wherever they occur and whoever commits them. She intends to struggle, by her own means, for the defense and advancement of the rights of mankind, especially of the poor. . . .
The acute need for radical reforms of the structures which conceal poverty and which are themselves forms of violence, should not let us lose sight of the fact that the source of injustice is in the hearts of men. Therefore it is only by making an appeal to the 'moral potential' of the person and to the constant need for interior conversion, that social change will be brought about which will be truly in the service of man. [33] For it will only be in the measure that they collaborate freely in these necessary changes through their own initiative and in solidarity, that people, awakened to a sense of their responsibility, will grow in humanity. The inversion of morality and structures is steeped in a materialist anthropology which is incompatible with the dignity of mankind. . . .
The class struggle as a road toward a classless society is a myth which slows reform and aggravates poverty and injustice. Those who allow themselves to be caught up in fascination with this myth should reflect on the bitter examples history has to offer about where it leads. They would then understand that we are not talking here about abandoning an effective means of struggle on behalf of the poor for an ideal which has no practical effects. On the contrary, we are talking about freeing oneself from a delusion in order to base oneself squarely on the Gospel and its power of realization.
But in addition to this substantially critical letter, the CDF under Ratzinger issued a second document in 1986, the Instruction on Christian Freedom and Liberation, which sets forth a positive vision on, among other things, economic matters. To keep this post from reaching unacceptable length, I'll post passages from that document separately.
Tom Berg
