Opinion ID: 1324254
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 13

Heading: Misunderstanding of Religious Belief and Practice

Text: In addition to misstating the law under RFRA, the majority misunderstands the nature of religious belief and practice. The majority concludes that spraying up to 1.5 million gallons of treated sewage effluent per day on Humphrey's Peak, the most sacred of the San Francisco Peaks, does not impose a substantial burden on the Indians' exercise of religion. In so concluding, the majority emphasizes the lack of physical harm. According to the majority, [T]here are no plants, springs, natural resources, shrines with religious significance, nor any religious ceremonies that would be physically affected by using treated sewage effluent to make artificial snow. In the majority's view, the sole effect of using treated sewage effluent on Humphrey's Peak is on the Indians' subjective spiritual experience. Maj. op. at 1063. The majority's emphasis on physical harm ignores the nature of religious belief and exercise, as well as the nature of the inquiry mandated by RFRA. The majority characterizes the Indians' religious belief and exercise as merely a subjective spiritual experience. Though I would not choose precisely those words, they come close to describing what the majority thinks it is not describinga genuine religious belief and exercise. Contrary to what the majority writes, and appears to think, religious exercise invariably, and centrally, involves a subjective spiritual experience. Religious belief concerns the human spirit and religious faith, not physical harm and scientific fact. Religious exercise sometimes involves physical things, but the physical or scientific character of these things is secondary to their spiritual and religious meaning. The centerpiece of religious belief and exercise is the subjective and the spiritual. As William James wrote, religion may be defined as the feelings, acts, and experiences of individual men [and women] in their solitude, so far as they apprehend themselves to stand in relation to whatever they may consider the divine. WILLIAM JAMES, THE VARIETIES OF RELIGIOUS EXPERIENCE: A STUDY IN HUMAN NATURE 31-32 (1929). The majority's misunderstanding of the nature of religious belief and exercise as merely subjective is an excuse for refusing to accept the Indians' religion as worthy of protection under RFRA. According to undisputed evidence in the record, and the finding of the district court, the Indians in this case are sincere in their religious beliefs. The record makes clear that their religious beliefs and practice do not merely require the continued existence of certain plants and shrines. They require that these plants and shrines be spiritually pure, undesecrated by treated sewage effluent. Perhaps the strength of the Indians' argument in this case could be seen more easily by the majority if another religion were at issue. For example, I do not think that the majority would accept that the burden on a Christian's exercise of religion would be insubstantial if the government permitted only treated sewage effluent for use as baptismal water, based on an argument that no physical harm would result and any adverse effect would merely be on the Christian's subjective spiritual experience. Nor do I think the majority would accept such an argument for an orthodox Jew if the government permitted only non-Kosher food.