Controversy over the establishment and free exercise clauses of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution has just escalated, due to proposed legislation and legal challenges in Texas and Pennsylvania.
In case some have forgotten, the First Amendment to the United States Constitution reads as follows:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or of the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances [1].
Rethinking the Separation of Church and State
Four bills in Texas—one already enacted and three others making their way through the legislature—directly impact the first two clauses of the above Amendment in America’s second largest state. The first of these, SB 797, was enacted in 2021 and requires schools—public and otherwise—to display “In God We Trust” signs [2]. Another, SB 1515, requires schools to display the Ten Commandments in a “conspicuous place” in classrooms [3]. Still another, SB 1396, would permit public schools to set aside time each day for either students or staff members to read the Bible and/or other religious texts [4]. The last of these, SB 1556, would give school employees the right to engage in religious speech while on the job [5].
The last three of these four bills have already been passed by the Texas State Senate, and are now on their way to the Texas House for consideration [6].
Please understand—the first two of the above proposed laws would require public, taxpayer-funded schools to display statements affirming trust in God and commanding obedience to His will. This is not a matter of seeking permission to engage in religious expression on state property. Rather, it is a requirement that this be done.
Quite accurately, it is being observed that those writing these laws believe “that they can rethink the separation of church and state” [7]. Describing the impact of the law that would, if passed, require the posting of the Ten Commandments in public schools, one commentator writes:
It’s not that surprising in the wake of the Supreme Court’s blockbuster June 2022 decision, Kennedy v. Bremerton, which overturned all existing jurisprudence about the separation of church and state.
Before that ruling, the Texas bill would’ve been an obviously unconstitutional establishment of religion, something prohibited by the First Amendment of the Constitution. Now, however, it comes under the disturbing category of “Who knows?”
The Texas Senate certainly is trying to establish religion under any ordinary-language use of the term. But because the Supreme Court announced a vague new “history and tradition” test to replace the last 50 years of establishment clause law, a court could conceivably conclude that mandating the Ten Commandments is just fine — a result that would invite a raft of new religious establishment legislation across the country [8].
By way of review, the Kennedy v. Bremerton case permitted a public school football coach to pray on the field following each game [9], on the assumption that the government “may not suppress an individual from engaging in personal religious observance” [10]. Whether the social pressure likely to attend such a gesture is compatible with the First Amendment’s Establishment Clause in the setting of activities within a taxpayer-funded institutions, is certainly arguable. But to compare the granting of permission to a public school coach to offer prayer in such a context, to a law requiring public schools to conspicuously post a document that is plainly religious in nature, is to compare apples with oranges.
The commentator quoted earlier rightly noted that prior to the afore-cited Supreme Court ruling, “a law needed a primarily secular purpose so as not to violate the establishment clause. There is certainly no primarily secular purpose to the Ten Commandments, which start with the proposition, ‘I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. You shall have no other gods before me’” [11].
A member of the Texas House of Representatives, himself a Christian, objects to this law as follows:
Every time, on this committee, we try to teach basic sex education, but we can’t because we're told that's the parents’ role. Now, you're putting literal commandments — religious commandments — in our classrooms, and we're told that’s the state's role [12].
But the lieutenant governor of the state of Texas defends the proposed law, insisting:
I believe that you cannot change the culture of the country until you change the culture of mankind. Bringing the Ten Commandments and prayer back to our public schools will enable our students to become better Texans [13].
Quite obviously, we are no longer arguing about whether civil government has the right simply to enforce obedience to the last six of the Ten Commandments (which encompass humanity’s duty to itself), as distinct from the first four Commandments (which concern humanity’s relationship with God). To legally require the posting of a document which commands the reader to worship no other gods but the One issuing the commands in question, is a blatant, unqualified act of religious, theocratic legislation.
Which Version?
There doesn’t appear to be any clarity in this proposed Texas law regarding which version of the Ten Commandments will be mandated should this law be enacted. Some years ago, when the posting of the Ten Commandments on public property was being debated in the U.S. House of Representatives, one Congressman asked:
Which version of the Ten Commandments will be posted? The Catholic version? The Protestant version? They're different, you know [##14|Rep. Jerrold Nadler, quoted by Rob Boston, “House of Horrors,” Church and State, July-August 1999, p. 5.##].
That’s just the trouble. Most people don’t know. Few are aware of the papacy’s presumption across the centuries “to change times and laws” (Dan. 7:25). What is so dangerous about this proposed Texas law is that not only would it blatantly breach the wall between church and state by requiring the conspicuous display on government property of a document peculiar to a particular religious heritage; it would also require public schools to make an overtly theological decision by deciding whether the Catholic or Protestant version of the Ten Commandments will be displayed in their classrooms.
The Pennsylvania Postal Worker
Another case has reached the U.S. Supreme Court which likewise touches the issue of the Ten Commandments and religious liberty.
A postal worker in Pennsylvania’s Amish country resigned his job in 2019 when a contract between Amazon and the U.S. Postal Service began requiring employees to deliver packages on Sunday [15]. Gerald Groff, the worker in question, “told his employers that he couldn’t deliver packages on the Lord’s Day” [16].
Groff’s case, now before the U.S. Supreme Court, involves Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which requires employers to accommodate religious practices unless doing so would mean an “undue hardship” for the business [17]. The High Court has heard arguments in this case [18], but no decision thus far has been reported.
Religious Freedom Applies to All
Whether one professes a particular religious faith, or none at all, freedom of conscience applies to everyone in the United States of America. Whether one is a seventh-day Sabbath-keeper, a first-day Sunday-keeper, or a sixth-day Friday-keeper as in the case of Muslims, all deserve to have their rights upheld. Finding others to do one’s work on a day one’s faith considers sacred should not be so difficult to do. Seventh-day Adventists do it all the time.
It is certainly the hope of every faithful Seventh-day Adventist, and all others who value religious liberty, that Gerald Groff wins the case currently before the nation’s highest court. As with the issue of defining marriage and the rights of non-heterosexuals to have their relationships honored by the state, religious freedom in free America doesn’t solely apply to persons with correct Biblical theology. Just as seventh-day Sabbath-keepers have the right to have their Sabbaths off, so do first-day Sunday-keepers.
Conclusion
Without question, America’s culture wars are moving in the direction of classic Seventh-day Adventism’s eschatological scenario. Let’s keep in mind how Ellen White says agitation for Sunday laws will accelerate in the United States, when the time comes:
It will be declared that men are offending God by the violation of the Sunday-sabbath, that this sin has brought calamities which will not cease until Sunday observance shall be strictly enforced, and that those who present the claims of the fourth commandment, thus destroying reverence for Sunday, are troublers of the people, preventing their restoration to divine favor and temporal prosperity [##19|Ellen G. White, The Great Controversy, p. 590.##].
It isn’t difficult to see the same logic in the words quoted earlier from the current lieutenant governor of Texas, when he states that “you cannot change the culture of the country until you change the culture of mankind. Bringing the Ten Commandments and prayer back to our public schools will enable our students to become better Texans” [20].
Anyone who thinks the sort of religious laws foretold in the thirteenth chapter of Revelation and The Great Controversy couldn’t possibly happen in sophisticated, contemporary America, can no longer sustain such a perspective in light of the current Texas proposals. It is one thing to permit public schools to display religious documents, whether one holds such permission to be constitutional or not. It is entirely different for the state to require that such documents be conspicuously posted in taxpayer-owned, taxpayer-funded institutions.
There isn’t much daylight at all between the logic underlying the proposed Texas law mandating the display of the Ten Commandments and a law that would mandate the observance of Sunday by the citizens of America or any state thereof. The four angels of Revelation 7:1-3 are clearly relaxing their grip on the winds of strife. In the words of Ellen White:
The end is near, probation is closing. O, let us seek God while He may be found, call upon Him while He is near! [##21|White, Messages to Young People, p. 90.##].
REFERENCES
1. “First Amendment to the United States Constitution,” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution
2. Fabriola Cineas, “The Ten Commandments could be in every Texas classroom next fall,” Vox, April 28, 2023 https://www.vox.com/policy/2023/4/28/23699277/ten-commandments-texas-school-prayer-religion
3. Ibid.
4. Ibid.
5. Ibid.
6. Ibid.
7. Ibid.
8. Noah Feldman, “Can Texas Really Put the Ten Commandments in Public Schools?” The Eagle, April 30, 2023 https://theeagle.com/opinion/columnists/noah-feldman-can-texas-really-put-the-ten-commandments-in-public-schools/article_ee874929-c56b-554e-9ef3-b787af8480ed.html
9. “Kennedy v. Bremerton School District,” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kennedy_v._Bremerton_School_District
10. Ibid.
11. Feldman, “Can Texas Really Put the Ten Commandments in Public Schools?” The Eagle, April 30, 2023 https://theeagle.com/opinion/columnists/noah-feldman-can-texas-really-put-the-ten-commandments-in-public-schools/article_ee874929-c56b-554e-9ef3-b787af8480ed.html
12. Keri Heath, “Texas bill promoting Ten Commandments in public classrooms poses complex legal questions,” Austin American-Statesman, May 3, 2023 https://www.statesman.com/story/news/education/2023/05/03/texas-legislature-senate-bill-1515-advances-pushes-for-ten-commandments-in-schools-classrooms/70170060007/
13. Brian Lopez, “Public schools would have to display Ten Commandments under bill passed by Texas Senate,” The Texas Tribune, April 20, 2023 https://www.texastribune.org/2023/04/20/texas-senate-passes-ten-commandments-bill/
14. Rep. Jerrold Nadler, quoted by Rob Boston, “House of Horrors,” Church and State, July-August 1999, p. 5.
15. Jessica Gresko, “Supreme Court to deliver answer in religious mailman’s case,” Associated Press, April 17, 2023 https://www.wtae.com/article/pennsylvania-postal-service-sunday-delivery-supreme-court/43613552
16. Ibid.
17. Ibid.
18. ----“Supreme Court hears religious freedom case for postal worker required to work on Sunday,” PBS, April 18, 2023 https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/listen-live-supreme-court-hears-religious-freedom-case-for-postal-worker-required-to-work-on-sunday
19. Ellen G. White, The Great Controversy, p. 590.
20. Lopez, “Public schools would have to display Ten Commandments under bill passed by Texas Senate,” The Texas Tribune, April 20, 2023 https://www.texastribune.org/2023/04/20/texas-senate-passes-ten-commandments-bill/
21. White, Messages to Young People, p. 90.
Pastor Kevin Paulson holds a Bachelor’s degree in theology from Pacific Union College, a Master of Arts in systematic theology from Loma Linda University, and a Master of Divinity from the SDA Theological Seminary at Andrews University. He served the Greater New York Conference of Seventh-day Adventists for ten years as a Bible instructor, evangelist, and local pastor. He writes regularly for Liberty magazine and does script writing for various evangelistic ministries within the denomination. He continues to hold evangelistic and revival meetings throughout the North American Division and beyond, and is a sought-after seminar speaker relative to current issues in the Seventh-day Adventist Church. He presently resides in Berrien Springs, Michigan