April 24, 2023 • 22 mins
In this episode, we get started on the First Amendment! It "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." So, what does it mean to have freedom of religion? Why was it so important to our founders? Listen to find out!
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Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
Now this is the FCB podcast network. The greed US Soldiery and they thought
so working America. Welcome back tothe Growing Patriot podcast, American History for
(00:30):
Kids. I'm your host, AmeliaHamilton. We've been talking about what the
Bill of Rights means, what itdoes, and why it was created.
But let's get in and talk aboutwhat rights it actually protects. First up,
of course, is the First Amendment. The First Amendment does quite a
few things, but one of thoseis it protects religious expression in America.
(00:53):
What it says is Congress shall makeno law respecting an establishment of religion or
prohibiting the free exercise thereof. Sothe government will not make an official religion
for the country, and it willmake sure that people can exercise their religion
freely. Now let's get some questionsfrom Harper, and then we're having a
great expert on to answer them.Who just happens to be Harper's dad.
(01:17):
I think that's our first father daughterduo that we've had on the show.
It's pretty exciting. First up,here's Harper. Harper, I'm twelve,
I'm in sixth grade. I'm fromChicago and I live in Michigan. I
(01:38):
like Harry Potter and dance. Whatdoes religious freedom mean? Why did the
founders want to protect religious freedom?Why did the Founders not want Congress to
make a law establishing a religion?Why is it important to learn and understand
different religion and their practices, evenif we don't personally follow them. When
(02:00):
you give an example of a timewhen someone's religious freedom was not respected,
are there any limitations to religious freedom? Those are some great questions from Harper.
Now let's get her dad, Ericin here to answer them. My
(02:23):
name's Eric Cohen. I'm the directorof Marketing and Communications at the Acting Institute
for the Study of Religion and Liberty. We're a think tank whose mission is
to promote a free and virtuous societycharacterized by individual liberty and sustained by religious
principles. And that's why you're sucha good guest for today's because we are
talking about that intersection of religion andliberty. So to go into the excellent
(02:47):
questions we got from your daughter,let's just kick off with the big question.
What does religious freedom mean? Inthe United States? It's protected under
the First Amendments of the Constitution,which begins from make no law respecting an
establishment of religion or prohibiting its freeexercise thereof. So this is again one
(03:09):
of the first freedoms that is enshrinedinto the Bill of Rights. So you
get freedom of speech in the firstAmendment, you also get freedom of religion.
The idea being that people who startedcoming to the Americas, going back
as far as the Pilgrims, werepeople who were seeking the freedom to live
(03:31):
out their religious beliefs freely. Manyof them came from countries where there was
an official state religion, and inmany cases that didn't conform with their own
religious beliefs. They were seeking aplace where they could believe what they believe
and act accordingly. So the FirstAmendment of the Constitution enshrines of protection not
(03:54):
only for them to practice their religionas they see fit, but also prohibiting
the federal government from ever establishing astate religion, which against so many of
them were fleeing from that kind ofoppression and what it created in Europe,
if you go study European history,was a lot of wars, a lot
(04:15):
of people who took the ideas ofthe mind and then put them to the
sword. And our founders very muchwanted to get away from that history that
they and their ancestors had experienced andgive people the freedom to operate within their
religious beliefs as they saw fit.Yes, And one thing I love about
(04:36):
how it's worded in the Bill ofRights is that it's not just freedom of
religion, but it's freedom of religiousexpression. You don't have to hide what
you believe, you can you canbe openly religious and express that. So
I always feel like that's and makedecisions and operate in society based on all
of that. I mean, weget a lot of concern now about the
(04:57):
role of religion in the public sphere, and I've always liked William F.
Buckley's phrasing on this is that whenit comes to government politics, those kinds
of things, my faith informs myviews. It doesn't dictate my political outcomes,
but it informs where I'm coming fromand approaching those kinds of questions,
(05:18):
and that is a way of expressingthose beliefs in the public space. Yes.
Absolutely. We talked a little bitabout why the founders wanted to protect
religious freedom and religious freedom of religiousexpression, you know, and that's something
we've talked about on the podcast alot too. That when people came here.
They were fleeing a lot of oppression, and America was somewhere that they
(05:40):
could be free. So why doyou think the Founders put it so high
up on the list for so manypeople who had already come to the Americas,
that was the major reason that theywere leaving where they were leaving.
You can go back as far againas the Pilgrims, Puritans, people who
wanted to find a place where theycould live the way that they wanted to
(06:03):
live, which in most cases wasdictated not by economic interests or secular motivations
as we would understand them today,but by a sincerely held faith and a
desire to live amongst people who werealso practicing that faith and living in accordance
(06:23):
with that faith. So it wasvery much top of mind for the Founders,
which is one of the reasons whyyou see it again the first Amendment
to the Constitution, like this isone of the first things that we want
to get out of the way isa clear understanding of a freedom of speech,
which I think is also clearly tiedtoward to the idea of religious expression.
(06:45):
Right. The reason that you putthe negative limitation on governments, Congress
shall make no law establishing a religionin this country. As well as the
freedom of religious expression, it's tieddirectly to freedom of speech. There's the
ability to be able to say whatyou believe to be true and not have
to censor yourself because the state hasdecided that this religion or that religion is
(07:10):
the official one that everybody must abideby. Absolutely. So, I think
a lot of the misunderstandings that peoplehave about religious freedom or the you know,
when people argue that we shouldn't havequite as much as we do,
is a misunderstanding of different religions.And that's something that Harper kind of touched
on in her question about why isit so important to understand other religions,
(07:33):
even if it's different from them onewe practice or we don't practice any at
all. I think it's important forus to be educated people. So we
live in a pluralist society. Welive in one again that has provided not
just for the freedom of religion forpeople like me who are Catholics or who
(07:53):
are Protestants, but people of allkinds of different religious space and traditions.
The better that we understand those,I think we're better off for seeing things
that, you know, if youput yourself in the mindset, if you
know, if you're not an atheistor an agnostic, and you put yourself
in that mindset for a minute,you know you can understand. As I
(08:16):
mentioned a moment ago, I'm aCatholic, there's a lot of ritual there,
and you can understand how people couldlook at that and go, wow,
that is really weird. Like alot of the things they do seem
very strange. But as I've oftentold people, if you want to understand
why the Catholics do anything that theydo, maybe we wrote it down like
it has been written down over thousandsof years, so there is a way
(08:41):
to understand why is it this way, why is it being done that way?
So I think, on one hand, it does build a better sense
of understanding of what other people practiceand how they practice their faith, how
they live it out in their dailylives. I think we benefit from that.
But I think there's also something tobe said for again allowing the space
(09:03):
for people to live the way thatthey want to live. And if we
don't understand that, that's also okaytoo. We don't have to have a
deep understanding of everybody's seemingly idiosyncratic wayof living their lives. But what we
wanted to promote, and what Ithink the First Amendment and the culture that
(09:24):
exists around the First Amendment wants topromote is the idea of toleration that you
don't have to like, you don'thave to endorse, you don't have to
accept yourself other people's face. Butwe give them the space for them to
be able to live it out inpublic in the way that they see fit.
(09:46):
So in talking about the way thatpeople do see fit, are there
any limitations on the freedom of religiousexpression? There are if you go through
the history of Supreme Court rulings,for sure, there have been a number
of limitations on religious expression, anda lot of these are still in debate.
(10:07):
There are a lot of questions aboutin what ways people who are engaged
in business in the marketplace can havetheir faith represented in the business that they
run. There are a number ofcases in the history of American jurisprudence that
have placed some kinds of limitations onwhat people can do. Their debates still
(10:31):
about the establishment clause, that partof the First Amendment that we talked about
a few minutes ago, that regardingthe establishment of religion. Okay, well,
what does that mean? Does thatmean that if you have any kind
of public organization or public event wherea prayer is offered, is that an
endorsement of that religion? I wouldargue know that it's not. But this
(10:56):
is one of the things that's beenfought over over years and litigated by a
whole lot of different people, oftenrising to the level of Supreme Court.
So I think the way that thisis often misunderstood by people. We often
talk about a freedom of religion,and I think it is misunderstood by some
(11:16):
people in connection with that establishment clausethat Congress shall make no law regarding the
Establishment of Religion. It's heard bythem and felt by them as a freedom
from religion, which I do thinkis a misunderstanding. You there's a lot
of things in this life that we, if we had our druthers, would
(11:37):
want to be entirely free from.That's just not the way that it works.
So this is again coming back tothe point from a moment ago,
why this idea of toleration is soimportant that even if we don't practice and
live certain ways ourselves, we grantthe space for other people in this country
to be able to live and practicethe way that they see fit as long
(11:58):
as they and this is the keypart, not infringing on the rights of
other people. So as long asyou are not pressing your beliefs onto other
people, forcing them to adopt themor act in accordance, if those people
don't have the right, the rightof exit, the ability to get out,
if they don't want to live inthat environment. As long as you're
(12:20):
not doing that, then I thinkyou're living in accordance not only with the
law as set down by the FirstAmendment, but the culture that they sought
to promote with the First Amendment.Yes, and really that's something that with
every amendment, your rights are absolutelyprotected unless you're infringing against someone else's rights.
So that's kind of this as faras it goes. But and another
(12:41):
point I think is important too isto remember that you know in the Bill
of Rights is placing limitations on whatthe government can do. It is we
hear this a lot when it comesto freedom of speech. Just to pick
another part of the First Amendment therethat but will say things are a First
Amendment problem, that are that areculturally freedom of speech problems but they aren't
(13:09):
the government telling you what you canand cannot say. So I think that's
an important part to recognize as wellthat the limitations here in terms of what
cannot be done, are placed inthe Bill of Rights on the government.
So I think we should do wellto recognize that that was done for a
reason. Yeah. What we've saidbefore on the show is that it's not
(13:30):
a permission slip for the people,it's a restraining order for the government.
Absolutely, yes, all right.Harper's last question was a really good one,
and that is, what is anexample of a time when religious expression
was not respected? So an example, and this was recently a case that
was before the Supreme Court, hasto do with a man in Colorado who
(13:52):
owns a bake shop. They makecakes, and somebody came in there wanting
to purchase a cake with a messageon it that went against the owners the
sky, Jack Phillips, his religiousbeliefs, and he didn't want to make
the cake. He was more thanhappy to sell any cake off the shelf
to anybody who wanted to buy it. But this was somebody wanting him to
(14:18):
make a very specific cake with avery specific message that went against his religious
beliefs, and he had to takethat all the way to the Supreme Court
in order to protect his right tobe able to operate his business in accordance
with his religious beliefs. So Ithink here's an example where there were people
(14:41):
who wanted somebody to do something thatthey really didn't want to do and then
sought to have the State of Coloradoforced them to do that in violation of
their sincerely held religious beliefs. Sothat's one example of somebody who has had
to fight to fyndicate their rights underthe First Amendment, and he was successful
(15:05):
in doing that. And I thinkthe important message to take away is,
especially in an incredible country like theUnited States of America, where you know,
I am here in Grand Rapids,Michigan, and there have to be
at least a dozen different places thatI can go to get a cake made,
there are plenty of people that youwill find who are willing to do
(15:30):
probably make whatever product you want themto make, Make a cake with whatever
message you want on it, theidea of protecting religious freedom and people's freedom
to live their life in accordance withtheir religious beliefs. Make sure it makes
sure that you don't force somebody todo something that they think is wrong.
(15:50):
And I think that's the really importantpart here. It protects people from being
forced to violate with they sincerely believe, especially when there are other people out
out there who would be more thanhappy to do what you're asking. And
you know, one thing that wetalked about in our we spoke with Judge
Don Willet when we were talking aboutwhat the judicial branch does, and he
was saying that there are times whenwhat he would prefer is not the way
(16:14):
that the law works, and youhave to go with what the law is.
And so even you know, sometimeswe might not agree with somebody's beliefs,
but it's really important to support theirreligious freedom. And I know that
I recently watched you guys have anew documentary out about a man named Jimmy
Lye in Hong Kong, and Iwanted to ask you just about him because
(16:36):
I think that he is kind ofa story of what happens when you don't
stand up for people's rights. Jimmyis so. Jimmy is a man who
lives in Hong Kong, which isa city that is now part of China.
It used to be a colony ofthe British Empire was handed back to
(16:56):
China in nineteen ninety seven, andthese were people who lived. Jimmy and
other people of Hong Kong lived alife fairly similar to the kinds of lives
that people in the United States lived. They had rights, they had rights
that were protected, and China hasbeen solely taking those rights away from the
(17:18):
people of Hong Kong. Probably themost important one that's the focus of our
film is freedom of the press andfreedom of speech. Jimmy was a newspaper
publisher. He had a paper calledApple Daily that was in favor of freedom
and democracy. The Chinese government didn'tlike that, and they ended up shutting
down his newspaper and arresting him.But religious expression is also a very important
(17:44):
one. There's not a lot ofreligious freedom, if any at all,
in China. There was in HongKong, and it was really one of
the only places in that area whereif you were, like Jimmy, a
practicing athletic, or somebody of anyreligion Buddhism, Hindu, any Protestant form,
(18:07):
if you're Jewish, it didn't matter. You were able to live and
practice your religion in Hong Kong.That is again another freedom that has kind
of been slowly taken away from thepeople of Hong Kong. And we wanted
to draw attention to somebody in Jimmy, who is very, very brave and
at a cost to his own personalfreedom, was willing to stand up and
(18:30):
say this isn't right. People havethese rights innately, as you know,
we say in the United States Constitutionthat you know, we're endowed by our
creator with certain inalienable rights. Itis a similar belief that they had that
these are naturally our rights and thata government like the Chinese government has no
(18:52):
right to take them away. Sowe wanted to tell the story of somebody
who was being incredibly brave and standingup for the rights not only to say
what you believe to be true,to publish the truth in a newspaper or
any other kind of publication, butalso to be able to practice your religion
in the way that you see fit, like we have protected here in the
(19:14):
United States. Yeah, because Jimmyis in prison, now that's correct.
Yeah, So it's you know,I think it's always important to think about
those things so that we know that, you know, something that might seem
kind of small today, it canbe a big deal if you start letting
letting your rights get away from you. So it's it's always important to stand
up for them, absolutely, allright, any final words before we wrap
(19:38):
up today's episode. I go backto the point that I made earlier,
which is I think they are itis popular now to want to dismiss the
importance of religious freedom, to saythat people, you know, in your
own house, inside the walls ofyour own church, you can practice your
religion. But there's a lot ofpeople who I think don't want to exist
(20:00):
in the public square. And Iwould just encourage people to really read and
understand what is in the First Amendmentto the Constitution and the importance the understanding
that our founders had that religion playeda very important role in their lives and
in the view they had of thecountry that they were founding. I believe
(20:22):
it's John Adams who says that theConstitution of this country was written for a
moral and religious people and as whollyinsufficient for any other. They recognized how
important a sense of faith and religiousfreedom was to preserving what's really important about
this country. So I'd encourage peopleto really understand why our founders put that
(20:47):
in the First Amendment to the Constitution. It's because they thought it was so
incredibly important to who we are asa people. Absolutely, and thank you
for helping us understand that today wereally thank you for having me. I
appreciate it. So there you haveit. America does not have a state
(21:12):
religion, and everyone is free tofollow and express their own religion as long
as it doesn't infringe on someone else'sconstitutional rights. And we might not always
like the way that somebody expresses them, but it is so important to protect
those rights because once rights are gone, they're awfully hard to get back.
(21:33):
Thanks for joining us for this episode. Remember you can find us on Facebook,
Twitter, and Instagram at Growing Patriotsor at Growing patriots dot com.
They're greed us solved for Jermany andthey thought so when America. This has
(22:00):
been a presentation of the FCB podcastNetwork, where real talk lifts. Visit
us online at FCB Podcasts dot com.
Now this is the FCB podcast network. The greed US Soldiery and they thought
so working America. Welcome back tothe Growing Patriot podcast, American History for
(00:30):
Kids. I'm your host, AmeliaHamilton. We've been talking about what the
Bill of Rights means, what itdoes, and why it was created.
But let's get in and talk aboutwhat rights it actually protects. First up,
of course, is the First Amendment. The First Amendment does quite a
few things, but one of thoseis it protects religious expression in America.
(00:53):
What it says is Congress shall makeno law respecting an establishment of religion or
prohibiting the free exercise thereof. Sothe government will not make an official religion
for the country, and it willmake sure that people can exercise their religion
freely. Now let's get some questionsfrom Harper, and then we're having a
great expert on to answer them.Who just happens to be Harper's dad.
(01:17):
I think that's our first father daughterduo that we've had on the show.
It's pretty exciting. First up,here's Harper. Harper, I'm twelve,
I'm in sixth grade. I'm fromChicago and I live in Michigan. I
(01:38):
like Harry Potter and dance. Whatdoes religious freedom mean? Why did the
founders want to protect religious freedom?Why did the Founders not want Congress to
make a law establishing a religion?Why is it important to learn and understand
different religion and their practices, evenif we don't personally follow them. When
(02:00):
you give an example of a timewhen someone's religious freedom was not respected,
are there any limitations to religious freedom? Those are some great questions from Harper.
Now let's get her dad, Ericin here to answer them. My
(02:23):
name's Eric Cohen. I'm the directorof Marketing and Communications at the Acting Institute
for the Study of Religion and Liberty. We're a think tank whose mission is
to promote a free and virtuous societycharacterized by individual liberty and sustained by religious
principles. And that's why you're sucha good guest for today's because we are
talking about that intersection of religion andliberty. So to go into the excellent
(02:47):
questions we got from your daughter,let's just kick off with the big question.
What does religious freedom mean? Inthe United States? It's protected under
the First Amendments of the Constitution,which begins from make no law respecting an
establishment of religion or prohibiting its freeexercise thereof. So this is again one
(03:09):
of the first freedoms that is enshrinedinto the Bill of Rights. So you
get freedom of speech in the firstAmendment, you also get freedom of religion.
The idea being that people who startedcoming to the Americas, going back
as far as the Pilgrims, werepeople who were seeking the freedom to live
(03:31):
out their religious beliefs freely. Manyof them came from countries where there was
an official state religion, and inmany cases that didn't conform with their own
religious beliefs. They were seeking aplace where they could believe what they believe
and act accordingly. So the FirstAmendment of the Constitution enshrines of protection not
(03:54):
only for them to practice their religionas they see fit, but also prohibiting
the federal government from ever establishing astate religion, which against so many of
them were fleeing from that kind ofoppression and what it created in Europe,
if you go study European history,was a lot of wars, a lot
(04:15):
of people who took the ideas ofthe mind and then put them to the
sword. And our founders very muchwanted to get away from that history that
they and their ancestors had experienced andgive people the freedom to operate within their
religious beliefs as they saw fit.Yes, And one thing I love about
(04:36):
how it's worded in the Bill ofRights is that it's not just freedom of
religion, but it's freedom of religiousexpression. You don't have to hide what
you believe, you can you canbe openly religious and express that. So
I always feel like that's and makedecisions and operate in society based on all
of that. I mean, weget a lot of concern now about the
(04:57):
role of religion in the public sphere, and I've always liked William F.
Buckley's phrasing on this is that whenit comes to government politics, those kinds
of things, my faith informs myviews. It doesn't dictate my political outcomes,
but it informs where I'm coming fromand approaching those kinds of questions,
(05:18):
and that is a way of expressingthose beliefs in the public space. Yes.
Absolutely. We talked a little bitabout why the founders wanted to protect
religious freedom and religious freedom of religiousexpression, you know, and that's something
we've talked about on the podcast alot too. That when people came here.
They were fleeing a lot of oppression, and America was somewhere that they
(05:40):
could be free. So why doyou think the Founders put it so high
up on the list for so manypeople who had already come to the Americas,
that was the major reason that theywere leaving where they were leaving.
You can go back as far againas the Pilgrims, Puritans, people who
wanted to find a place where theycould live the way that they wanted to
(06:03):
live, which in most cases wasdictated not by economic interests or secular motivations
as we would understand them today,but by a sincerely held faith and a
desire to live amongst people who werealso practicing that faith and living in accordance
(06:23):
with that faith. So it wasvery much top of mind for the Founders,
which is one of the reasons whyyou see it again the first Amendment
to the Constitution, like this isone of the first things that we want
to get out of the way isa clear understanding of a freedom of speech,
which I think is also clearly tiedtoward to the idea of religious expression.
(06:45):
Right. The reason that you putthe negative limitation on governments, Congress
shall make no law establishing a religionin this country. As well as the
freedom of religious expression, it's tieddirectly to freedom of speech. There's the
ability to be able to say whatyou believe to be true and not have
to censor yourself because the state hasdecided that this religion or that religion is
(07:10):
the official one that everybody must abideby. Absolutely. So, I think
a lot of the misunderstandings that peoplehave about religious freedom or the you know,
when people argue that we shouldn't havequite as much as we do,
is a misunderstanding of different religions.And that's something that Harper kind of touched
on in her question about why isit so important to understand other religions,
(07:33):
even if it's different from them onewe practice or we don't practice any at
all. I think it's important forus to be educated people. So we
live in a pluralist society. Welive in one again that has provided not
just for the freedom of religion forpeople like me who are Catholics or who
(07:53):
are Protestants, but people of allkinds of different religious space and traditions.
The better that we understand those,I think we're better off for seeing things
that, you know, if youput yourself in the mindset, if you
know, if you're not an atheistor an agnostic, and you put yourself
in that mindset for a minute,you know you can understand. As I
(08:16):
mentioned a moment ago, I'm aCatholic, there's a lot of ritual there,
and you can understand how people couldlook at that and go, wow,
that is really weird. Like alot of the things they do seem
very strange. But as I've oftentold people, if you want to understand
why the Catholics do anything that theydo, maybe we wrote it down like
it has been written down over thousandsof years, so there is a way
(08:41):
to understand why is it this way, why is it being done that way?
So I think, on one hand, it does build a better sense
of understanding of what other people practiceand how they practice their faith, how
they live it out in their dailylives. I think we benefit from that.
But I think there's also something tobe said for again allowing the space
(09:03):
for people to live the way thatthey want to live. And if we
don't understand that, that's also okaytoo. We don't have to have a
deep understanding of everybody's seemingly idiosyncratic wayof living their lives. But what we
wanted to promote, and what Ithink the First Amendment and the culture that
(09:24):
exists around the First Amendment wants topromote is the idea of toleration that you
don't have to like, you don'thave to endorse, you don't have to
accept yourself other people's face. Butwe give them the space for them to
be able to live it out inpublic in the way that they see fit.
(09:46):
So in talking about the way thatpeople do see fit, are there
any limitations on the freedom of religiousexpression? There are if you go through
the history of Supreme Court rulings,for sure, there have been a number
of limitations on religious expression, anda lot of these are still in debate.
(10:07):
There are a lot of questions aboutin what ways people who are engaged
in business in the marketplace can havetheir faith represented in the business that they
run. There are a number ofcases in the history of American jurisprudence that
have placed some kinds of limitations onwhat people can do. Their debates still
(10:31):
about the establishment clause, that partof the First Amendment that we talked about
a few minutes ago, that regardingthe establishment of religion. Okay, well,
what does that mean? Does thatmean that if you have any kind
of public organization or public event wherea prayer is offered, is that an
endorsement of that religion? I wouldargue know that it's not. But this
(10:56):
is one of the things that's beenfought over over years and litigated by a
whole lot of different people, oftenrising to the level of Supreme Court.
So I think the way that thisis often misunderstood by people. We often
talk about a freedom of religion,and I think it is misunderstood by some
(11:16):
people in connection with that establishment clausethat Congress shall make no law regarding the
Establishment of Religion. It's heard bythem and felt by them as a freedom
from religion, which I do thinkis a misunderstanding. You there's a lot
of things in this life that we, if we had our druthers, would
(11:37):
want to be entirely free from.That's just not the way that it works.
So this is again coming back tothe point from a moment ago,
why this idea of toleration is soimportant that even if we don't practice and
live certain ways ourselves, we grantthe space for other people in this country
to be able to live and practicethe way that they see fit as long
(11:58):
as they and this is the keypart, not infringing on the rights of
other people. So as long asyou are not pressing your beliefs onto other
people, forcing them to adopt themor act in accordance, if those people
don't have the right, the rightof exit, the ability to get out,
if they don't want to live inthat environment. As long as you're
(12:20):
not doing that, then I thinkyou're living in accordance not only with the
law as set down by the FirstAmendment, but the culture that they sought
to promote with the First Amendment.Yes, and really that's something that with
every amendment, your rights are absolutelyprotected unless you're infringing against someone else's rights.
So that's kind of this as faras it goes. But and another
(12:41):
point I think is important too isto remember that you know in the Bill
of Rights is placing limitations on whatthe government can do. It is we
hear this a lot when it comesto freedom of speech. Just to pick
another part of the First Amendment therethat but will say things are a First
Amendment problem, that are that areculturally freedom of speech problems but they aren't
(13:09):
the government telling you what you canand cannot say. So I think that's
an important part to recognize as wellthat the limitations here in terms of what
cannot be done, are placed inthe Bill of Rights on the government.
So I think we should do wellto recognize that that was done for a
reason. Yeah. What we've saidbefore on the show is that it's not
(13:30):
a permission slip for the people,it's a restraining order for the government.
Absolutely, yes, all right.Harper's last question was a really good one,
and that is, what is anexample of a time when religious expression
was not respected? So an example, and this was recently a case that
was before the Supreme Court, hasto do with a man in Colorado who
(13:52):
owns a bake shop. They makecakes, and somebody came in there wanting
to purchase a cake with a messageon it that went against the owners the
sky, Jack Phillips, his religiousbeliefs, and he didn't want to make
the cake. He was more thanhappy to sell any cake off the shelf
to anybody who wanted to buy it. But this was somebody wanting him to
(14:18):
make a very specific cake with avery specific message that went against his religious
beliefs, and he had to takethat all the way to the Supreme Court
in order to protect his right tobe able to operate his business in accordance
with his religious beliefs. So Ithink here's an example where there were people
(14:41):
who wanted somebody to do something thatthey really didn't want to do and then
sought to have the State of Coloradoforced them to do that in violation of
their sincerely held religious beliefs. Sothat's one example of somebody who has had
to fight to fyndicate their rights underthe First Amendment, and he was successful
(15:05):
in doing that. And I thinkthe important message to take away is,
especially in an incredible country like theUnited States of America, where you know,
I am here in Grand Rapids,Michigan, and there have to be
at least a dozen different places thatI can go to get a cake made,
there are plenty of people that youwill find who are willing to do
(15:30):
probably make whatever product you want themto make, Make a cake with whatever
message you want on it, theidea of protecting religious freedom and people's freedom
to live their life in accordance withtheir religious beliefs. Make sure it makes
sure that you don't force somebody todo something that they think is wrong.
(15:50):
And I think that's the really importantpart here. It protects people from being
forced to violate with they sincerely believe, especially when there are other people out
out there who would be more thanhappy to do what you're asking. And
you know, one thing that wetalked about in our we spoke with Judge
Don Willet when we were talking aboutwhat the judicial branch does, and he
was saying that there are times whenwhat he would prefer is not the way
(16:14):
that the law works, and youhave to go with what the law is.
And so even you know, sometimeswe might not agree with somebody's beliefs,
but it's really important to support theirreligious freedom. And I know that
I recently watched you guys have anew documentary out about a man named Jimmy
Lye in Hong Kong, and Iwanted to ask you just about him because
(16:36):
I think that he is kind ofa story of what happens when you don't
stand up for people's rights. Jimmyis so. Jimmy is a man who
lives in Hong Kong, which isa city that is now part of China.
It used to be a colony ofthe British Empire was handed back to
(16:56):
China in nineteen ninety seven, andthese were people who lived. Jimmy and
other people of Hong Kong lived alife fairly similar to the kinds of lives
that people in the United States lived. They had rights, they had rights
that were protected, and China hasbeen solely taking those rights away from the
(17:18):
people of Hong Kong. Probably themost important one that's the focus of our
film is freedom of the press andfreedom of speech. Jimmy was a newspaper
publisher. He had a paper calledApple Daily that was in favor of freedom
and democracy. The Chinese government didn'tlike that, and they ended up shutting
down his newspaper and arresting him.But religious expression is also a very important
(17:44):
one. There's not a lot ofreligious freedom, if any at all,
in China. There was in HongKong, and it was really one of
the only places in that area whereif you were, like Jimmy, a
practicing athletic, or somebody of anyreligion Buddhism, Hindu, any Protestant form,
(18:07):
if you're Jewish, it didn't matter. You were able to live and
practice your religion in Hong Kong.That is again another freedom that has kind
of been slowly taken away from thepeople of Hong Kong. And we wanted
to draw attention to somebody in Jimmy, who is very, very brave and
at a cost to his own personalfreedom, was willing to stand up and
(18:30):
say this isn't right. People havethese rights innately, as you know,
we say in the United States Constitutionthat you know, we're endowed by our
creator with certain inalienable rights. Itis a similar belief that they had that
these are naturally our rights and thata government like the Chinese government has no
(18:52):
right to take them away. Sowe wanted to tell the story of somebody
who was being incredibly brave and standingup for the rights not only to say
what you believe to be true,to publish the truth in a newspaper or
any other kind of publication, butalso to be able to practice your religion
in the way that you see fit, like we have protected here in the
(19:14):
United States. Yeah, because Jimmyis in prison, now that's correct.
Yeah, So it's you know,I think it's always important to think about
those things so that we know that, you know, something that might seem
kind of small today, it canbe a big deal if you start letting
letting your rights get away from you. So it's it's always important to stand
up for them, absolutely, allright, any final words before we wrap
(19:38):
up today's episode. I go backto the point that I made earlier,
which is I think they are itis popular now to want to dismiss the
importance of religious freedom, to saythat people, you know, in your
own house, inside the walls ofyour own church, you can practice your
religion. But there's a lot ofpeople who I think don't want to exist
(20:00):
in the public square. And Iwould just encourage people to really read and
understand what is in the First Amendmentto the Constitution and the importance the understanding
that our founders had that religion playeda very important role in their lives and
in the view they had of thecountry that they were founding. I believe
(20:22):
it's John Adams who says that theConstitution of this country was written for a
moral and religious people and as whollyinsufficient for any other. They recognized how
important a sense of faith and religiousfreedom was to preserving what's really important about
this country. So I'd encourage peopleto really understand why our founders put that
(20:47):
in the First Amendment to the Constitution. It's because they thought it was so
incredibly important to who we are asa people. Absolutely, and thank you
for helping us understand that today wereally thank you for having me. I
appreciate it. So there you haveit. America does not have a state
(21:12):
religion, and everyone is free tofollow and express their own religion as long
as it doesn't infringe on someone else'sconstitutional rights. And we might not always
like the way that somebody expresses them, but it is so important to protect
those rights because once rights are gone, they're awfully hard to get back.
(21:33):
Thanks for joining us for this episode. Remember you can find us on Facebook,
Twitter, and Instagram at Growing Patriotsor at Growing patriots dot com.
They're greed us solved for Jermany andthey thought so when America. This has
(22:00):
been a presentation of the FCB podcastNetwork, where real talk lifts. Visit
us online at FCB Podcasts dot com.
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