The Supreme Court’s decision last week overturning New York State’s limits on religious gatherings during the COVID-19 outbreak previewed what will likely become one of the coming decade’s defining collisions between law and demography. The ruling continued the conservative majority’s sustained drive to provide religious organizations more leeway to claim exemptions from civil laws on the grounds of protecting “religious liberty.” …
As white Christians have receded in the population, political and religious conservatives are consolidating behind the claim that believers face widespread discrimination. In the latest PRRI American Values Survey, more Republicans said that Christians face “a lot of” discrimination (62 percent) than believed the same about black people (52 percent) or any other group. White evangelical Christians, the religious foundation of the GOP’s electoral coalition, were even more likely to say that Christians face significant discrimination (66 percent). As with Republicans, more white evangelicals identified Christians as facing bias than said the same about any other group. CONTINUED
Ronald Brownstein, The Atlantic