Even among folks who take their “separation of church and state” advocacy quite seriously, there are disagreements about how and when to pounce — and, most interestingly, whether certain violations are best left untouched.
As a matter of timing, few groups are more sensitive to the calendar than Jewish civil liberties groups, which often postpone Christmas-related legal challenges to various crèches, Santas and the like, until well after Christmas. The theory is that Christians will feel less, well, Christian, and thus, less militant and offended, if the legal fight comes in, perhaps, in May, than if it came amid fruit cake and Christmas cheer.
There are civil liberties analysts who recommend being very picky about church-state targets, focusing only on the most egregious First Amendment sinners. If the Mighty Hand of Litigation is utilized against modest targets, the church-state separation warriors might be perceived as hostile to religion or more interested in headlines than in all of God’s children just getting along.
There is not always precision in such calculations, of course. Consider the current sniffing around by the American Civil Liberties Union and Americans United for the Separation of Church and State, which are poised to make life miserable for the Enfield public school system for holding high school graduations at First Cathedral, a large, evangelical-flavored church in Bloomfield.
To be sure, the injection of God stuff into public education has been one of the more contentious and prolific of the First Amendment squabbles. There has always been a suspicion that while many students of different faith traditions might come together to pray for success on an algebra test, the hint that one faith has an upper hand might lead to unnecessary angst and potential discrimination.
It was in the 1840s that Stephen Girard left millions of dollars for the establishment of a college in Philadelphia for “poor white orphans.” It wasn’t the exclusion of blacks that created a stir; no, Steve insisted that no missionary and no cleric ever be allowed on campus. “I desire to keep the tender minds of orphans … free of the excitement, which clashing doctrines and sectarian controversy are so apt to produce.” The no-God-stuff provision was challenged, but the U.S. Supreme Court upheld Girard’s right to treat clergy with the kind of suspicion normally reserved for lobbyists or newspaper editors.
As for Enfield and a few other school systems, what is to be made of the decision to cough up graduation certificates in a House of God? The students and parents appear to hold mixed views, with some, if not most, of the opposition stemming from the fact that the ceremony would be held “out of town.” The “other side” suggests that whatever the evangelical fervor that fuels the giant First Cathedral, it has produced a large, comfortable, relatively inexpensive graduation mill of sorts — with crosses and other Christian symbolism covered up as best they can be.
There is a minority view within the church-state advocacy community, fueled in part by atheists within their midst that goes something like this: To hold graduation ceremonies for public schools in church, to decorate pubic space with images in the Baby Jesus competing with Santa and reindeer, doesn’t lead to an “establishment of religion,” but, in fact, diminishes the power of faith and puts in on the level of concert promoter or cultural entrepreneur.
If Enfield officials make the case that First Cathedral is Heaven on Earth (so to speak) for a graduation ceremony, not because of the magic of transcendence, but because of a really great air conditioning system, the church-state litigation fervor might be deflated a bit.
Laurence D. Cohen is a freelance writer.
