Elder Oaks and Preserving Religious Freedom

There is considerable discussion out there about Elder Oak's talk given at Chapman University about religious freedom.  It is the sort of message that leaves me torn and restless.  As a deeply religious person I agree completely with the general sentiment expressed in his conclusion:

We must never see the day when the public square is not open to religious ideas and religious persons. The religious community must unite to be sure we are not coerced or deterred into silence by the kinds of intimidation or threatening rhetoric that are being experienced. Whether or not such actions are anti-religious, they are surely anti-democratic and should be condemned by all who are interested in democratic government. There should be room for all good-faith views in the public square, be they secular, religious, or a mixture of the two. When expressed sincerely and without sanctimoniousness, the religious voice adds much to the text and tenor of public debate.

No one should ever feel embarrassed or intimidated for expressing strong religious beliefs in the public square, and I agree that religions have much good to offer public policy on a more abstract level.  But at the same time, I disagree with Elder Oaks that religious expression should be given a special, elevated status in such discussions:

Another important current debate over religious freedom concerns whether the guarantee of free exercise of religion gives one who acts on religious grounds greater protection against government prohibitions than are already guaranteed to everyone by other provisions of the constitution, like freedom of speech. I, of course, maintain that unless religious freedom has a unique position we erase the significance of this separate provision in the First Amendment. Treating actions based on religious belief the same as actions based on other systems of belief is not enough to satisfy the special guarantee of religious freedom in the United States Constitution. Religion must preserve its preferred status in our pluralistic society in order to make its unique contribution—its recognition and commitment to values that transcend the secular world.

This seems to me to go a step too far.  In a democracy all voices and viewpoints should be weighted equally, with none given a preferred status, just as each person's vote is given equal weight and none are given special status (unless you are on the Supreme Court, of course).  Giving preference to religious expression seems to contain a couple major problems.

First, religions simply do not agree with one another on most important issues.  There is not a monolithic religious point of view.  Some religions support gay marriage, some don't.  Some religions are overtly political, some aren't.  Some religions are incredibly strict and didactic about public laws and discourse, others are more lenient and hands-off.  To say that religious expression should be preferred is to throw open the doors to a cacophonous mess.

Which leads to the second point, which is that religions are notoriously antagonistic towards one another and I don't think Mormons, in particular, would be too pleased with where that might end up.  For doctrinal and evangelical reasons (meaning we are both idiosyncratic in our beliefs and aggressive in proselytizing them), we aren't exactly the most highly-regarded amongst the Protestant religions that dominate the country.  Giving preferred status to these may lead to more stringent restrictions to our religious freedom than any perceived restrictions some may feel now.

Finally, unless our government is established based on facts and reason, the wanton baseless emotions of a few could easily overrun the system.  Public officials have to be accountable and grounded to objective standards.  Religion can be beautiful and a force for good, but it is based on belief and faith and other deeply personal spiritual experiences that cannot be extrapolated to the many for purposes of establishing public policy.  Furthermore, as noted above, there are so many different flavors of religion that seeking to find some universal kernel on which to base public policy would be near impossible.

Now, I agree with Elder Oaks that our society is becoming more and more comfortable with moral relativism, and that this is a bad thing:

The preservation of religious freedom in our nation depends on the value we attach to the teachings of right and wrong in our churches, synagogues and mosques. It is faith in God—however defined—that translates these religious teachings into the moral behavior that benefits the nation. As fewer and fewer citizens believe in God and in the existence of the moral absolutes taught by religious leaders, the importance of religious freedom to the totality of our citizens is diminished.  We stand to lose that freedom if many believe that religious leaders, who preach right and wrong, make no unique contribution to society and therefore should have no special legal protection.

I disagree with the conclusion, however, that the remedy is found in a preferred position in the public square.  If religion is losing its influence in society, perhaps it is as much or more because we are doing a poor job defining what good we have to offer society than of being squeezed out by the forces of a some soft conspiracy.  We should focus more on humbly serving individuals and selling our message through personal testimony, than acting as a perceived victim on the public stage.

As to whether there really is a substantial erosion of our right to practice religion, as opposed to an erosion of our reputations as religious, I don't know.  Elder Oaks offers some examples that I plan on looking into, but I confess to having no reason to believe that my right to practice my religion is diminishing or will diminish in the near future.  I feel no threat to my First Amendment rights, and any threat to my standing in the public eye I will accept as my own failing and try to do better in the future.  To the extent that there is an erosion of my First Amendment rights, I stand with Elder Oaks in fighting against it.

Progressive Taxation

A recent poll showed that over 60 percent of Americans think that the government should tax the rich in an effort to reduce the budget deficit.  Polls also consistently found that a majority of Americans wanted the Bush-era tax cuts for the wealthy to expire.  Conservatives, inexplicably, won that battle in their larger war against progressive taxation.

So with all the recent talk about taxes, I wanted to try to explain why liberals, and a majority of Americans generally, support a progressive tax scheme.  A progressive tax is one where the tax rate increases with taxable income.  So a person making a smaller salary pays a smaller percentage in taxes than a person making a larger salary.  Currently in the US, we have a progressive federal income tax that ranges from 10% for the lowest income earners to 35% for the highest marginal rates.

Mainstream conservatives typically oppose a progressive tax for moral reasons.  They argue that it is unfair to tax the wealthy at higher rates just because they have a lot of money, that it is a form of class welfare, that the poor are getting off easy, and that it disincentivizes hard work.  These arguments miss the point.
As a starting point, let's look at tithing, which is a conservative's dream flat rate of 10% for all.  Tithing is nothing like taxation, of course, and an analogy between the two is fundamentally flawed for that reason.  Tithing is a spiritual commandment, and is a matter of faith, unlike taxes which are a matter of public policy.  But it provides a nice, simple example of what I want to talk about.

Lets say there are two people, Person X makes $1,000 per month and Person Y makes $10,000 per month.  If they both pay 10% tithing, X pays $100 and Y pays $1,000.  It is tempting to say that since X and Y pay the same rate it is equally difficult or easy for them to pay, that their burden is equal.  That, however, would be wrong.  X makes very little money and thus a higher percentage, probably approaching 100%, of her income goes towards needs like rent, food, clothing, utilities, etc.  X's tithing check comes at the expense of items she needs, but will sacrifice nonetheless.  Y's 10%, on the other hand, will come almost exclusively from money she was going to use for savings, luxuries, and non-necessities.  It is much harder for X to pay 10% than for Y.

Tithing, then, in my opinion, is disproportionally more beneficial to the poor who gain greater blessings because it is a greater sacrifice.  The wealthy, again in my opinion, had better seriously step up in fast offerings if they want similar blessings, because the more wealthy a person is the easier the law of tithing becomes to keep.  There are plenty of scriptures that warn the wealthy that their wealth is a hindrance to their righteousness, and I think tithing was specifically set up to test how generous the wealthy will be with their money beyond the strict minimum required by tithing.

So for taxation, you can see why a progressive scheme is favored by liberals.  For another example, say that the we all agree that a nation of three people, for simplicity, needs $10,000 for its government to function properly.  Three people, A, B, and C, make $10,000, $30,000, and $60,000 per month respectively.  How should the tax burden be divided?  If there was a flat rate of 10%, A would pay $1,000, B $3,000, and C $6,000 and they'd get there.  But, again, this is actually a disproportionate burden on A who makes less and has a much more difficult time making ends meet under this scheme than B or, especially, C.  In this situation A actually has a higher tax burden.  A progressive tax of 5%, 10%, and 11% evens out those burdens.  You'll see that A had her tax burden cut in half and to make up for it C only had an increase of one percent.  This is more fair to everyone.

There are, of course, other reasons to support a progressive tax system.  The wealthy have increased access to influence and power, and thus more ability to shape public policy to their benefit at the expense of the poor.  Progressive taxation can even out that inequality.  There is also a persuasive argument that the wealthy receive greater benefits from the government, such as the protection of property rights, defense and security, infrastructure, and market regulation, than the poor and thus should shoulder a greater tax burden to support societal order.  Wikipedia has a nice rundown of the pro and con arguments.

What is overstated is the amount of animosity and hatred felt towards the wealthy, and the use of progressive taxation to punish them.  Some people no doubt feel this way, but the best and most useful arguments for progressive taxation do not rely on emotions or retribution.  Progressive taxation is a sound rational policy.

In fact, despite all of the hand-wringing about raising rates on the wealthy and the detrimental effect it will have on the economy, this is the least progressive tax system we've had since the Great Depression.  Throughout the steady economic growth of the 40s, 50s, 60s, 70s, and 80s the marginal tax rates were typically in the 70-90% range, instead of the 35% we have now.  During the Reagan era the top marginal rates were around 50%.  Here's a chart I think I've probably posted before from that link above.

Pres. Obama and Congress were wrong, from a public policy standpoint, to extend the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy.  In two years the best thing to do for the country would be to let them expire and properly redistribute the tax burden.  The tax system in America needs to be vastly simplified and more progressive.  I don't want to necessarily go back to a 90% marginal rate, but we've certainly gone too far in the other direction.

Merry Christmas and/or Happy Holidays

Americans love war analogies.  It probably stems from our love of actual war, which I think is an actual collective sin we are committing.  So analogies between war and other non-war things are pretty unsettling and off-putting for me.  In the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, for instance, there are over 100,000 dead civilians, tens of thousands of dead combat troops, and millions of wounded.  So when we use frequent war allusions in sports and politics and the like I think we're being rather callous and glib.  If we paid more attention to our language and how we use it we might end up making different and better political choices in America.

That was all a slight tangent I started pondering as I considered this most special time of year when we can come together and debate whether or not there is a War on Christmas.  The weapons in this war are not missiles, bombs, drone attacks, and machine guns, but phrases like "Happy Holidays," the removal of nativity scenes from government-owned public places, and "X-mas."  The casualties are not human lives lost or permanent physical or psychological injuries and disfigurement, but . . . what?  I'm not sure.  Hurt pride, I guess.

What we have are some very conservative Christians who object to the de-Christianizing of Christmas.  Which makes some intuitive sense, I guess.  After all, this is a celebration of the birth of Jesus Christ.  Put aside for a moment that the holiday was started in part as a way to co-opt pre-Christian winter festivals, and that even before the supposed "War on Christmas" was launched by supposed atheists and statists we Christians did a pretty great job mucking it up on our own with our Santa Clauses and elves and red-nosed reindeers and general commercialism that has wrung any meaningful Christ-centered moisture from the public face of the Christmas cloth.  Put that aside and I can at least see a glimmer of what these staunchly pro-Christ-in-Christmas conservative Christians are getting at.

But as I've alluded to a couple of times so far I think this is a matter of public v. private observance, and I think the Defenders in the War on Christmas are on the wrong side of this one.  We live in a country that is multi-cultural, multi-religious, multi-ethnic, multi-everything.  We Americans aspire to the ideal of tolerance and civility.  We have created this pretty rare country where ethnic and religious tensions have been historically pretty low key.  Only we're moving away from that recently.  There is a very vocal contingent of Americans that are creating tension with Hispanics.  The Christian right is continuing to gain power to push its anti-differences agenda and have swept Mormons into their net.  Muslims are have seen a steady deterioration in their public standing culminating in the embarrassingly bigoted "Ground Zero Mosque" fiasco.  And the list could continue.

The backdrop of all this, of course, is that we live in an increasingly heterogeneous society, so there is more and more bumping into each other causing the inevitable building of friction.  Whereas before you could walk down the streets of most small- to mid-sized towns in America and feel pretty certain that you were only going to pass by other white Protestants, now you're bound to encounter more diversity.  Whereas before any small- to mid-sized town in America could safely put up a nativity scene on the grounds of county courthouse because everyone that would see it was Christian and no one would care or complain, now you've got many more people of different faiths and backgrounds that might not share those Christian sensitivities.

The Constitution reads, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof."  There are two different things there.  The second part, known as the Free Exercise Clause, is not really at issue here.  Having public displays of Christianity on government property doesn't prohibit anyone from exercising their own religion differently.  It is that first part, known as the Establishment Clause, is a little more tricky.  Does having a nativity, something overtly Christian, on government property constitute an establishment of Christianity as the de facto government-sanctioned official religion?  Would we allow overtly Muslim scenes during Ramadan?  Jewish scenes for Passover?  Hindu, Sikh, atheist, Buddhist, Zoroastrian, Scientologist, etc. scenes at other times?  Should the government be in the business of doing anything overtly religious at all?

These are difficult legal issues that are being sorted out constantly in the courts.  But if we remove for a moment the legal issues and just focus on the human side, I think the ideas get more clear.  Christmas is a great time of year.  More volunteerism occurs, more charitable donations, more goodwill.  For Christians there is (hopefully) more of a focus on Christ, which is excellent, but for people of all faiths Christmas is becoming a time to focus on family and giving and, yes, presents and decorations and everything else.  Why would we choose to be less inclusive?  Why would we try to force only the extreme Christian view on others instead of something many more people can embrace?  What could we possibly gain by pressuring businesses and public entities to say "Merry Christmas" instead of "Happy Holidays" or something that more people can identify with?

I just don't understand when people want to force their religion on others and into the public square.  This isn't missionary work and glorifying Christ and expressing our faith, those sorts of things are done in humility and personally and one-on-one, this is about xenophobia and pride.  I think it does absolutely no good to worry about some nebulous "war" on Christmas, but it does all the good in the world to celebrate Christmas privately as a religious holiday and publicly as an all-inclusively holiday.  So, Merry Christmas and/or Happy Holidays, whichever suits you best.

The Law of Consecration and Stewardship

I am currently reading the excellent book Building the City of God, which is a study of early communitarian efforts by the saints.  Though I'm obviously no historian, I thought it might be interesting to write a few posts about what I'm reading as I go along.  I just finished the section on the Law of Consecration and Stewardship, which was Joseph's early attempts in Kirtland and Missouri to get the saints to live a more perfect economic system.

The basic gist of the plan went something like this:  First, all members deeded their real and personal property to Edward Partridge, the presiding bishop.  In the earliest iterations of the Law the person would completely forfeit all property if they left the church, i.e. the church had full rights to the property.  Later, when civil courts eroded that away, the person could get real property back, but not personal property and not any of the yearly consecrations.  Second, Partridge would lease and loan back those respective properties to the individual, depending on their needs.  Third, the individual, though a steward over the land, would have the control to do with the property whatever he or she desired.  Finally, at the end of the year the individual would consecrate to Partridge any excess gains above what they needed.

The Law of Consecration and Stewardship struck a balance between individualism and communalism by giving each individual the choice of what to do with his or her property and encouragement to be creative and industrious, while also requiring the pooling of resources above any person's needs for the benefit of the poor.  This was different than "common stock" communities like the Shakers where literally all possessions were owned by everyone, including clothing and household items, which led to a certain anarchist free-for-all in practice.

The authors gave five reasons why the Law of Consecration and Stewardship didn't last, and they contend that number five is overemphasized at the expense of numbers one through four:

1) Most of the converts to the early church were poor and had nothing to consecrate. Yet inheritances had to be provided for them.  2) Most of the consecrations that were made were in kind, while most of the church's investments (in real estate and so on to provide stewardships for those who needed them) required liquid resources. Conversion of the former into the latter was difficult on the Missouri frontier.  3) Constant persecution made property accumulation almost impossible.  4) The opposition of the courts to the Mormons, and to cooperative (and communal) ventures generally, made it easy for apostates who had made gifts to the church to disrupt the financial affairs of the system by demanding and securing the return of all their consecrated properties.  5) The converts were not faithful in making their initial and annual consecrations.

Those first four factors are no longer true, so the question I have is, could this system work today?  If President Monson announced in General Conference that the church was reinstating the Law of Consecration and Stewardship as revealed to Joseph Smith would it 1) work and 2) be embraced?

I think it would have to look something like this:  Every member would deed over all their real and personal property to the church.  The church would then lease and loan back that property according to needs and the individual or family would be a steward over those properties.  Each member would be expected to continue to work and be productive.  At the end of the year all income above what was strictly needed would be consecrated back to the church for the support of the poor and the building of the kingdom.

In practice it would mean that members living in huge homes and driving expensive cars, and the like, that exceed their needs would probably have to sell them and find more modest accommodations and consecrate the excess to the church.  How many members would be willing to do that?  I live in a stake that is probably 80% super rich and I wonder how many would support a modern Law of Consecration and Stewardship with a full heart, without reservations, knowing that they would have to move out of their McMansions or legitimate mansions, sell their Porches and yachts, and give away the rest.

But it isn't just the rich that would have to make uncomfortable decisions.  Would each of us be willing to forfeit, at the end of each year, any assets that otherwise would have been accumulated in savings accounts, retirement accounts, educational accounts, and investments acting on faith that those things would be taken care of by the church?  It would take real faith to not save for the future believing that the church would take care of you in your old age or in emergencies.  It would take real faith to not save for your children's college believing that the church would pay for that in the future.

The argument against such an economic system is that it stifles the drive to be successful and innovative.  If you never tasted the fruits of you hard work (to put it more starkly: if you never got to enjoy all the money you would earn from being successful), why would you even try?  Why would a person go through all that work and school to become a doctor if they didn't get paid like a doctor?  Why would a person put so much blood and sweat into an innovative and successful business if they didn't have the chance to earn that huge return on investment in the end?  Why should we work hard and then just give our money away to the poor?

The answer is faith, I think.  Such a system could only work if the saints had faith enough to become successful and industrious and then consecrate the excess to the church to support the poor and build up the kingdom.  It cannot work if greed is the only motivator, it could work if faith replaced that greed.  Should we not expect that of ourselves as members of the true church?  Thoughts?

Cancer, Healing, and the Meaning (Or Lack Thereof) of This Life

"Cancer" is one of the five worst words in the English language.  It sounds ugly.  It has ugly, death-ish connotations.  It evokes images of some alien life taking over one's body.  It has two c's that make different sounds, which is lame and annoying.  And when you learn that a young, healthy loved one has cancer it is so devastating.  You find yourself doing verbal somersaults to avoid saying the word out loud, as if by saying it you will make it worse.

So I recently had the occasion to give a loved one a priesthood blessing related to a cancer diagnosis, and as I've contemplated mortality and healing I've started having a lot of questions which I've never thought about before.  After that blessing I went and read Elder Oaks' talk from the most recent conference called "Healing the Sick".  The takeaway point, I think, is the following:

From all of this we learn that even the servants of the Lord, exercising His divine power in a circumstance where there is sufficient faith to be healed, cannot give a priesthood blessing that will cause a person to be healed if that healing is not the will of the Lord.

This has left me somewhat puzzled.  Elder Oaks is saying that the will of the Lord always trumps everything else, including priesthood blessings and faith of the person that is sick.  I don't think anyone would argue with this.  So what, then, is the role of faith and priesthood blessings?  If they can never change the will of the Lord, why bother?  This leads, I think, to a sort of Calvinistic determinism that is incompatible with our faith.  If nothing we do will ever change the already-determined future that the Lord has created for us, it renders moot our most important heavenly endowment, free agency.

The only way for me to reconcile all of this is, and maybe this is common knowledge and I'm a little slow, is if there are situations, and presumably fairly common situations since we are encouraged to have constant faith and exercise our priesthood often, where the Lord has no particular will one way or the other concerning whether a person will live or die, be healed or not be healed -- if there are situations where the Lord essentially challenges us to persuade him.

If this is the case it opens up a whole mess of possibilities.  If we have the power, even the duty, to persuade the Lord one way or the other, we can do some pretty serious miracles and good works.  I've always known all of this, I think, but I've never given it much thought and I've never really internalized it.  It is also a very liberating idea.  To know that our future is really and truly not already mapped out for us, that the Lord knows our capabilities and potential but that our choices are still ours, that we have absolute power over our choices, frees us to act more boldly and with less fear.

But I've also encountered another puzzle in all of this, one I don't think I understand.  When you encounter the mortality of a young and otherwise healthy person, it is natural to wonder what the point of this whole life is, anyway.  It is such an infinitesimally small slice of our eternal existence, and good and bad opportunities are so unevenly allotted, it is getting harder and harder for me to ascribe too much meaning to it.  I've started really considering and accepting the idea of progression between kingdoms and strong universalism.

That's not to say that my loved one with cancer is in danger of not making the celestial kingdom if that person should die today (very unlikely, we have a pretty fortunate cancer diagnosis), so I'm not just trying to justify a bad or lukewarm life about to be extinguished.  My loved one would assuredly be a shoe-in for a pretty sweet afterlife and anyway has a long time to live yet.  But as I've considered how short life can be, and how seemingly random and unfair it can be, I just can't bring myself to believe that any person can make or break the entire rest of eternity in this short mortal existence.

I guess what I'm saying is, I've got a lot to think about.