Faith-Based Profits
EDITORIAL, NYTimes on
the Web, October 16, 2006
Mary Rosati, a novice training to be
a nun in Toledo, Ohio, says that after she received a diagnosis of breast
cancer, her mother superior dismissed her. If Ms. Rosati had had a
nonreligious job, she might have won a lawsuit against her diocese (which denies
the charge). But a federal judge dismissed her suit under the Americans
With Disabilities Act, declining to second-guess the church’s “ecclesiastical
decision.”
Ms. Rosati’s story is one of many that Diana Henriques told in a recent Times
series examining the fast-changing legal status of churches and
religious-affiliated institutions. The series showed that the wall between
church and state is being replaced by a platform that raises religious
organizations to a higher legal plane than their secular counterparts.
Day care centers with religious affiliations are exempted in some states from
licensing requirements. Churches can expand in ways that would violate
zoning ordinances if a nonreligious builder did the same thing, and they are
permitted, in some localities, to operate lavish facilities, like
state-of-the-art gyms, without paying property taxes.
Some of the most disturbing stories, like Ms. Rosati’s, involve employment
discrimination. Ms. Henriques told of a New Mexico rabbi who was dismissed
after developing Parkinson’s disease and found himself blocked from suing, and
of nurses in a 44,000-employee health care system operated by the Seventh Day
Adventists barred from joining unions.
Religious institutions should be protected from excessive intrusion by
government. Judges should not tell churches who they have to hire as
ministers, or meddle in doctrinal disputes. But under pressure from
politically influential religious groups, Congress, the White House, and federal
and state courts have expanded this principle beyond all reason. It is
increasingly being applied to people, buildings and programs only tangentially
related to religion.
In its expanded form, this principle amounts to an enormous subsidy for
religion, in some cases violating the establishment clause of the First
Amendment. It also undermines core American values, like the right to be
free from job discrimination. It puts secular entrepreneurs at an unfair
competitive disadvantage. And it deprives states and localities of
much-needed tax revenues, putting a heavier burden on ordinary taxpayers.
Like most special-interest handouts, these privileges exist in large part
because the majority is not aware, or is not being heard. With property
taxes growing ever more burdensome, it is likely that localities will start to
give religious exemptions closer scrutiny. People who care about
discrimination-free workplaces, the right to unionize and children’s safety
should also start to push back.
In a few places, at least, that has started. After Texas exempted
religious day care centers and drug-treatment programs from state licensing, a
study found that the “alternatively accredited” facilities had 10 times the rate
of abuse and neglect of the others, and several were investigated. In
2001, the Texas Legislature, no enemy of organized religion, did the right thing
and ended the exemption. (Emphasis Added)
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