To conduct prayers during their tour inside the Capitol building is to engage in a demonstration of the group's views about prayer. Thus, Capitol police argued that these visible public prayers were actually divisive demonstrations in favor of believers having the right to offer visible public prayers - which is a hot political issue. It was a Catch-22. Even though he won this time, Bynum expects more skirmishes. It's hard to venture inside the Capitol without overhearing lectures by opponents in the culture wars over abortion, sex outside of marriage, Darwinian philosophy and prayer in public schools.
Religious freedom is messy.
It's clear which way the trends are going. It's tough to crack that mindset. He writes this column for the Scripps Howard News Service. E.W. Scripps Publications , All Rights Reserved. Site users are subject to our User Agreement .