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Two women sit in front of the Supreme Court of The United States building, comforting each other.. Public Doamin image.
Then and Now: Religious Freedom and Liberty
June 30, 2022
As a conservative Supreme Court majority overturns long-standing precedents, we look at the implications for church and state with an eye on history.
Framk T. Lambert Ph.D. Photograph courtesy Perdue University
“No matter how we pray or where we come... we lament” June 30, 2022
The lamentation took place outside the Supreme Court on June 24, 2022, when the nation’s highest court overturned Roe v. Wade. While some celebrated from pulpits, a group of women religious leaders organized by Faith in Public Life gathered online to share reflections, grieve and bring attention to the group most impacted: women of color and low-income women living in states with no access to abortion care.

This week we reach back into the archives. Purdue University History Professor Frank Lambert joins our fonder, Sr. Maureen Fiedler SL, to talk about the popular myths surrounding the nation’s Founding Fathers when it comes to religion. They dive into the historical events that influenced the founders’ rationale behind creating a system of checks and balances on authority, including a growing public distrust of religious leaders and institutions. From the first Great Awakening to sectarian divisions and conflicts in the early colonies, Lambert suggests the perceptions circulating today are rooted in contemporary “culture wars” rather than history.

Frank T. Lambert Ph.D. Professor of History at Perdue University with special interests in American Colonial and Revolutionary Era history. He is the author of Separation of Church and State: Founding Principle of Religious Liberty among many other titles.

Sr. Maureen Fiedler SL Ph.D. Host of Interfaith Voices until February 2018. Maureen is also the editor of Breaking Through the Stained Glass Ceiling: Women Religious Leaders in Their Own Words and co-editor of Rome Has Spoken: A Guide to Forgotten Papal Statements, and How They Have Changed Through the Centuries. She now lives at the Loretto Motherhouse in Kentucky.

you can view the entirety of Cry Loud: A Multifaith Service of Lament and Action Post Roe v Wade here.
Amanda Tyler. Photograph courtesy BJC
“We Cannot Rely on the United States Supreme Court to Protect Our Rights" June 30, 2022
Baptists are a diverse group and that is in some ways most evident in the advocacy around issues of church and state. While Brent Leatherwood of the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission welcomed the Supreme Court’s decisions on church and state matters, the Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty leader sounded alarms. Sharing a point of view rarely heard in the public conversation, the group’s executive director Amanda Tyler offers context and history for her advocacy and the organization’s reaction to rulings that open the door for greater entanglement between religious groups and government.

Amanda Tyler J.D. Executive director of the Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty. working to promote religious liberty, defending the free exercise of religion, and protecting against its establishment by government.



Our theme Breath Deep is copyright MC Yogi.
 
This week's closing music, New Hope, by Audiobinger, is
used under a Creative Commons By Attribution 4.0 license.

All additional music by Blue Dot Sessions.