RE: Faith tests okayed for campus Christian group at ASU

[Newsom Michael]

Title: Message

I would need some facts to digest because the operative questions, for me, would be factual.  Specifically, it is the conduct of the CLS or its membership – or lone individuals – that would matter.  And the same holds true for gay student groups, SDS, and ACLU Chapters.  Disruption of an institutional or educational community vel non is a question of fact.   There is, however, a legal difference between the disruption caused by those who want to stigmatize and oppress, and those who want to include those who have been stigmatized and oppressed or otherwise marginalized.  I see no moral or legal equality between oppressors and victims, or between those who pursue exclusionary repressive agendas and those who pursue inclusionary agendas and with respect to whom the law should be “neutral.”  “Neutrality” (a term used by many of its advocates as a way of getting around the historical and contextual reality of Equal Protection) is an overused and inappropriate constitutional or legal standard.  I seriously doubt whether one could get agreement even as to the meaning of “neutrality” as Doug Laycock brilliantly demonstrated.  And I don’t think that it is difficult, as a factual matter, to distinguish between oppressors and victims.  (As my latest bit of shameless self-promotion, hopefully a piece that I have written on precisely this point will be out soon.)   I grant that some would argue that the law represses the Religious Right if it does not let the Religious Right oppress gays.  But that argument, frankly, is utterly lacking in merit.  It is akin to saying that by way of the Civil War Amendments, the Thirteenth in particular, the North oppressed Southern slaveholders by denying them the right to own slaves and by not compensating them for their lost, seized or stolen “property.”  I don’t buy that argument, and I don’t buy the argument that keeping somebody from oppressing or marginalizing people is, in and of itself a form of oppression.  But then, I’m not “neutral” on the question of oppression.   So we have to see what these groups and individuals do, and we have to analyze their behavior contextually in arriving at any legal conclusion on the question of the recognition of these groups or the imposition of suitable comparable sanctions on individuals.        From: Gregory S. Baylor [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Tuesday, October 25, 2005 12:03 PM To: 'Law & Religion issues for Law Academics' Subject: RE: Faith tests okayed for campus Christian group at ASU   How would you apply your stated legal rules to CLS chapters at public law schools? Do they "threaten the integrity and the harmony of an institutional community" such that a public law school could legally de-recognize them?   If so, is it also true that individuals threaten the integrity and harmony of the community when they hold and express the view that (1) the claims of theologically conservative Christianity are true; and (2) same-sex sexual intimacy is morally wrong? If so, what actions could public law schools take against such individuals without violating the Constitution?   Did gay student groups, the SDS, and student chapters of the ACLU threaten the integrity and harmony of public educational communities in the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s in a way that justified public universities' treatment of those groups? In other words, were all these courts wrong when they held that public universities violated the student groups' constitutional rights?   Thanks.   Greg Baylor -----Original Message----- From: Newsom Michael [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Tuesday, October 25, 2005 11:40 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]; Law & Religion issues for Law Academics Subject: RE: Faith tests okayed for campus Christian group at ASU I find the CLS Statement of Faith a poor substitute for the Nicene Creed.  It is not acceptable, at least to this Catholic, and I would never sign it, and I would urge Catholics not to sign it.   I think that there is a proper legal basis, rooted in the Religion Clauses, for distinguishing between secular groups and religious groups.  I also think that there is a proper legal basis for debarring groups who threaten the integrity and the harmony of an institutional community.  (Recall that many of us are not comfortable with some of the claims made by some chaplains that military community, discipline, and troop morale are subordinate to the chaplains’ sense of what their religion requires.)  Accordingly, it is altogether possible that some religious groups should be disbarred for breaching conduct restrictions.  Institutional life, civility, comity and harmony have to count for something.    From: Gregory S. Baylor [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Monday, October 24, 2005 7:51 PM To: 'Law & Religion issues for Law Academics' Subject: RE: Faith tests okayed for campus Christian group at ASU   For what it's worth . . .   Those who drafted the CLS statement of faith intended it to be acceptable to people in the Protestant and Roman Catholic traditions.  The current executive director of CLS is a Roman Catholic, and there are a number of Roman Catholics on the CLS board of directors.   Greg Baylor

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