Monday, February 06, 2012

"Equality" threatening religious freedom, says philosopher

Religious freedom is being trumped by an over-emphasis on equality in British courts, according to a leading philosopher.

Professor Roger Trigg of Kellogg College, Oxford, said that increasingly, judges “curtail” the religious views of people in favour of other “social priorities.”  

Professor Trigg spoke at a conference on religious freedom organised by The Iona Institute in 2010.

After studying a series of judgments throughout Britain, Europe and North America, he concluded there was a “clear trend” of judges favouring equality and non-discrimination over religious freedom.  

His remarks come amid a series of cases in which religious freedom has come under threat.

Earlier this month, the US Supreme Court ruled that churches and other religious groups had the right to hire and fire their own ministers without State interference.  

But just last week, a court in the US state of New Jersey held that a Methodist organisation breached equality law by refusing to allow its premises to be used for a post same-sex civil union reception.

Professor Trigg, a member of the university’s faculties of theology and philosophy, argued that religion was coming under threat from the judiciary as part of a “hierarchy of rights.”

Professor Trigg, the founding President of the British Society for the Philosophy of Religion, said that as a result of such cases, the courts were “limiting human freedom itself.”

“Religious freedom and the right to manifest religious belief is a central part of every charter of human rights,” he said on the eve of the launch of his book on Wednesday. But in recent years there has been a clear trend for courts in Europe and North America to prioritise equality and non-discrimination above religion, placing the right to religious freedom in danger."

“There should not be a hierarchy of rights, but it should be possible to take account of all of them in some way.”

He added, "No State can be a functioning democracy unless it allows its citizens to manifest their beliefs about what is most important in life."

In a new book, titled Equality, Freedom and Religion, he warned of a, “worrying” trend of the courts placing their own definitions of what is “core to a religion’s belief system.”  

He called for the rights to be “balanced” and that “reasonable accommodation” should become a standard thought by judges.

Professor Trigg, highlighted a case that had come before the European Court of Human Rights. In that case, a civil registrar from Islington had refused to conduct civil partnership ceremonies because of her religious beliefs.

He added, “It should have been easy to find a solution here … but the need to respect the right to equality trumped the freedom of religious convictions in this instance. The courts seem to have taken it upon themselves to decide what is and isn’t core to belief in a particular religion.”