Dean Kelley, religious liberty executive for the National Council of Churches for more than three decades, used to say that a cult is what you called the church down the street! My religion is never a cult; it’s a term we use for someone else’s.
To employ the pejorative term “cult,” instead of “religion” or “church,” sets up a false and prejudicial dichotomy between good and bad religion. Indeed, my Baptist forbears — in London, Amsterdam, Boston, and Culpeper, Va. — would have been tagged a “cult” by popular religionists of their day. Heaven forbid we should repeat that error today.
It is true that only beliefs rooted in “religion” are protected by the First Amendment’s religion clauses. Understandably, the U.S. Supreme Court has been reluctant to draw hard and fast lines in defining “religion” — opting instead to include those on the margins and avoid the undesirable entanglement between church and state that inevitably results by too cramped a definition. The Court has been clear that religious beliefs don’t have to be popular, logical, consistent or reasonable to receive First Amendment protection. The only issue for the secular courts is whether religious beliefs are sincerely held.
In trying to trace the contours of “religion,” lower federal courts often have looked to three factors: (1) Does the belief system address fundamental and ultimate questions of life? (2) Is it comprehensive and pervasive in one’s own life? (3) Are there observable, formal and outward signs of a spiritual reality? Although laudable, this attempt to fashion a flexible definition of religion really is not much help. (If you have been to a Bruce Springsteen concert, you’ll know this definition could describe the Church of St. Bruce!) Even a generous attempt to police the boundaries of “religion” makes for dicey decisions.
Moreover, bountiful political pressure militates against a robust and broad application of protections afforded by the Free Exercise Clause. A recent First Amendment Center poll reveals that 28 percent of those surveyed opined that religious freedom was never meant to be enjoyed by groups the “majority of people consider extreme or on the fringe.” A bare majority (only 56 percent) thinks such religious groups should be able to worship as they please.
Judges and other government policymakers have a difficult enough job trying to parse these tough issues and stand up to political pressure that would limit religious freedom. We don’t need to complicate the process and prejudice the outcome ahead of time by using inflammatory language like “cults.”
If it is “religion” — broadly understood and sincerely held — then full-orbed protection under the Free Exercise Clause should be afforded.
And that goes for the church down the street, too.
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