A War On Christians

In the United States of America there is no War against Christianity. However, if you google the phrase "War on Christianity" you will see hundreds of news articles saying the exact opposite. I would like to express my opinion that this country still strongly favors Christianity, and that losing some previously held privileges does not amount to discrimination.

First, let's start off with some background information. According to a 2014 study done by the Pew Research Center, 70.6% of people in the U.S. identified as christian. Of that 70.6%, 25% identified as evangelical protestant, 20.8% identified as catholic, and 14.7% identified as mainline protestant. The next largest group are classified as "nones" which include atheists, agnostics, and unaffiliated which comes in at 22%. So we see that in the U.S., Christians hold close to a 50% majority over the next largest "religious" group.

If it weren't enough to have a huge population majority, the constitutional protections for the freedom to practice your religion are iron clad in the Constitution. In fact, it is the first amendment to the constitution and is one of the founding values of this country. Why did the Pilgrims leave England? To avoid religious persecution.

So, why would a group that makes up an exceptionally large majority of our countries' population feel discriminated against?

At the very core of the issue is the perceived loss of rights, which are actually just privileges that were granted by denying basic equality to other demographics of the population.

One argument you see often in the news is that Christians are being discriminated against by being forced to performs services in connection with LGBTQ events like marriages, or for reproductive health issues like providing birth control to employees. Let us look at two fairly recent examples to examine whose rights are being violated by whom.

The two cases I would like to use are the LGBTQ Community v Kim Davis, and Hobby Lobby v Birth Control. In Kim Davis' case, the LGBTQ community in her county of Kentucky couldn't get a marriage license because Davis felt it would go against her religion to grant a marriage license to a same-sex couple. Here we see Davis expecting a privilege by denying basic equality to the LGBTQ community. In the case of Hobby Lobby, the Christian owners believed that providing birth control through health care plans to employees went against their beliefs, so they denied access to birth control to women employees to uphold their religious ideals.

Martin Luther King Jr., in his Letter from a Birmingham Jail, said "An unjust law is a code that a numerical or power majority group compels a minority group to obey but does not make binding on itself".

I opine that Christianity in this country is both a numerical and a power majority that has until very recently held certain demographics to codes that it would itself not follow. Moreover, when those laws are thrown down and over turned, whether in court cases or by the elected legislature, it does not constitute discrimination against the majority, but a correction of the scales, bringing them back into the balance of equality.

In the same Letter from a Birmingham Jail, Dr. King goes on to say "freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor, it must be demanded by the oppressed." I do not believe that demanding equality is discrimination, and therefore this "War on Christianity" is but a facade for those not yet willing to give up their prejudices and accept that we should all be given equal rights under the law.