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The Saving Grace and Monumental Task of the Establishment Clause

Policy and Advocacy
February 1, 2017 Reverend Cody J. Nielsen

Pew’s 2014 Religious Landscape Study finds that 70.6 percent of Americans identify as Christian. The percentages change across the age bracket, with decreasing percentages of persons identifying as Christians in the younger demographics. But throughout American culture, including our college campuses, Christianity still reigns supreme. Religious groups that identify as Christian outnumber other religious student groups on campus by far. Our campus calendars are built on Christian holidays and holy day of worship, including on certain campuses where finals occur on every single other day (including Saturday) but not on Sunday. This is the America that we live in. But it is not the only American experience we should be sensitive to.

This past week, Donald Trump’s administration signed an Executive Order (EO) that outlined a temporary ban on the immigration and travel of individuals from seven foreign countries that have heavily Islamic populations. Each of the countries were previously noted by the Obama administration as countries to remain cautious of regarding terrorism. The move would have been questioned either way, but it was Trump’s significant misstep in an interview that moved this action into dangerous and potentially unconstitutional territory. 

Mr. Trump, in an interview with Christian Broadcasting Network, noted that Christians would be given priority when it came to immigration and resettlement. These Christians he mentioned were those living in Syria and his rationalizing that those living in Syria were “being treated horribly.” Trump’s statement, combined with the now very public reality that the administration reached out to Rudy Giuliani how to create a Muslim ban is what led the ACLU to file a lawsuit in federal court in New York on Friday that temporary halted the ban on those already in process of traveling to the United States, and specifically for those who were being detained in airports across the country. This lawsuit cited the establishment clause, a statement as part of the 1st Amendment of the United States Constitution which states, Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion.” 

Higher Education is being affected by this executive action in monumental ways. Hundreds of college Presidents have released statements across the country speaking to the immigration ban and the protections of thousands students, staff, and other community members from these foreign countries. Missing within many of these statements, though not all, is a clear indication that this support is for Muslims. And it need be. Because we may debate whether it is a ban on Muslims or not, but in the end, it is being shown that the clear majority of community members on our campuses affected are, in fact, Muslim.

The new administration in the White House has laid every claim possible to remind us in higher education that religious identity matters. Our constitution has for all of its 270 plus years, but also this moment is a clear reminder and indication that one’s religious, secular, and spiritual identity is one of the signature areas of diversity and identity on our campuses. Higher education should thus stop being afraid to support this because the Establishment clause has once again been used as the way to illustrate this. We have an opportunity not only to say that we are protecting these members of our community, but to reach out and ask how to help support them more directly on our campuses. When we do so, we might realize that our institutions can take further steps with, not only, our Muslim students, but Jewish, Hindu, Buddhists, Nontheistic, Sikh, and other communities. In so doing, we demonstrate and live out what we are saying when our Presidents and Board of Regents release statements saying that we will protect our students.

On campuses where work has been done to protect religious identity and to make a visible part of the diversity work on campus, students are beginning to feel safer and more welcome. At Rutgers, the public institution where Kaiser Aslam, the only full time Muslim Chaplain at a public university in the United States is working, President Barchi specifically referenced the Muslim community for helping alongside other groups to create a rally wherein his remarks were being made.  President Barchi’s comments that “we are sensitive to the particularly chilling impact this executive order has had on many in our Muslim community at Rutgers, which is one of the largest in American higher education and which is so integral to our diverse and inclusive university” speaks to a university that has understood this need and has responded with timeliness and care. 

The example of Rutgers and no doubt other Presidents who have spoken directly to the Muslim identity in the midst of this situation once again remind us that we are preparing a global community for a global world. We thus are tasked with the monumental task of making sure that we understand the role of the establishment clause on our campus and respecting the diversity of the communities we serve, getting serious about religious diversity as part of our world. But we can know that the saving grace of this clause gives us the rational to move into areas of higher education diversity work that some have hesitated to engage or been unsure as to whether it carried the same level of importance as other areas. It does, and the events of the past week that continue to play out are a clear indication of the convictions we each need have to support our students in the broadest ways.

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