In his speech Thursday addressing global terrorism and the Iraq war, President Bush warned Americans that Islamic radicals are trying to establish a "radical Islamic empire that spans from Spain to Indonesia." While this statement clearly describes a real threat of insurgency, it also suggests that beyond Iraq and Afghanistan, the global context of this conflict has become an epic struggle between radical theocratic ideology and free democratic society.
The purpose of current foreign commitments in the Middle East can thus be viewed in this context as a preventative measure against an excessive entanglement between religion and government.
Yet, while American foreign policy is now dominated by the goal of curtailing this extreme political ideology, in many ways, a burgeoning entanglement between religion and government is slowly beginning to grip our own government. Religion has been subtly infiltrating our society in myriad ways, and a major societal change could be in order if we do not recognize the harmful consequences of these occurrences.
The principal example of this growing influence is the case of Kitzmiller et al. v. Dover Area School District. This case involves the Dover Area School District's decision to implement the teaching of intelligent design alongside evolution as a competing theory of human development.
In October of 2004, the DASD added this sentence to its science curriculum: "Students will be made aware of gaps/problems in Darwin's Theory and of other theories of evolution including, but not limited to, intelligent design." A group of parents subsequently brought suit in Federal District Court on the grounds that this policy created an unconstitutional infringement of First Amendment rights. The Pennsylvania ACLU and Americans United are representing the parents pro bono, and are claiming that the policy has both the purpose and effect of establishing religion.
To some, this policy may appear to be innocuous, but its repercussions on education would be nothing short of enormous. Science curricula influenced by intelligent design would not only undermine empirically established scientific doctrine, but would introduce religious ideology into the classroom. Rather than a dispassionate search for truth, education would be shifted to a search for reasons to support previously held religious beliefs.
Furthermore, this is a policy that is not just being instituted in one small town in Pennsylvania, but actually gaining support. Currently, 14 other states have introduced legislation that would promote the teaching of theories that contradict the basic premises of evolution.
At this point, there are several questions to be asked. Why should this be a concern? Is involving religion in public life such an insidious threat to the health of the democracy? What does this have to do with an organized theocracy in the United States?
What this case represents in the larger context is a step towards institutionalized religion. There is not going to be a theocratic revolution in the near future, where fervent believers overthrow the elected government of the United States and unite all Americans under a banner of heaven.
Kitzmiller is part of a process, and this process is neither immediately apparent nor shocking when each part is taken individually. But when the pieces of the process are put together — like the case in Kentucky about the Ten Commandments or required Bible classes in Texas public schools — a case in small-town Pennsylvania about intelligent design begins to paint a different picture.
Once religion has support on the municipal and state level, the transfer to the national establishment of laws based on religion and theocracy is not far behind. Involving religion in public life is harmful because it creates a division between those who practice religion and those who do not. Furthermore, it creates a paradox between presenting information that either contradicts religious tenets or supports religious belief.
What is the solution to this problem? If the United States is to remain a free democratic society where people are governed by the rule of law, where people are free to practice the religion of their choice and are able to speak their mind with impunity, then it is imperative to recognize policies that subtly erode those freedoms. Theocracy will not begin with an uprising. It begins with the sentence "Students will be made aware of gaps/problems in Darwin's Theory and of other theories of evolution including, but not limited to, intelligent design."
Mike Skelly ([email protected]) is a senior majoring in finance and political science.
