Archive Columns: Society and Politics

The Connection of Church, State, Cash

    Of the many perennial tensions in our Constitution, the relationship of church and state always seems to create a bigger fuss than it seems to deserve.

    It takes only a little provocation to make secularists feel threatened; and perhaps only slightly more to make religionists feel slighted. The forces sound the usual alarms and then clash at the summit of the molehill. Meanwhile the twin mountains of secularism and religion remain standing with all their former solidity, neither one noticeably compromised by a creche on the square or a prayer squelched at commencement..

    Frequently forgotten in these tempests, is that the Constitution says only two things about religion: that people should be free to practice as they see fit, and that the government shall not make any religion official, as, for example, in the formerly theocratic states of New England, or the Anglican church in England. To be able to countenance religion in general, but not establish one in particular, seems to me to give the government more breadth in religious matters than most ardent secularists are willing to grant. So, while both camps strike me as alarmist and overly earnest, in most of these disputes I tend to think that the secularists have the weaker and slightly more whiny argument.

    Against this bias though, I found myself leaning to the secularist opinion when I heard that Old North Church in Boston had received a $ 317,000 federal grant to restore its windows. Since Old North is an active church, I would have thought its restoration was the responsibility of its congregation. A 1995 Justice Department decision said the same thing, but this decision has been recently reversed, allowing grants to historic houses of worship.

    According to an editorial, "in order to receive funds a church will have to show that its facility is nationally significant, urgently needs repair, and has educational value and public benefit beyond serving its congregation." I can see how these conditions are sufficient for constitutionality. The grants neither restrain religious practice nor establish official religious practice. If the American public wishes to save a building as an architectural or historic treasure, it should not be constitutionally forbidden to do so because some citizens use the building to exercise a constitutional freedom.

    Still, as a practical matter, the conditions for grants seem too broad. There must be hundreds of colonial and Federal era churches. Being old, they likely housed something or someone of national significance. Being old, they are all in urgent need of repair. Being old, they are all, by definition, historic and therefore have educational value, and so on.

    Obviously, not every church who asks will receive. I suspect, though, that many will apply and I wonder how many buildings have a significance that really warrants national rather than merely local support. Old North is clearly historic, but its national significance is mostly tied up with Paul Revere. Hardly anyone knew about Paul Revere (or Old North Church) until Longfellow wrote his famous poem decades later. Like Betsy Ross and the Liberty Bell, the Church's national significance owes largely to a bit of 19th century mythology making.

    I confess to a bit of pique. Having contributed to the restoration of my local colonial, I realize what I might have saved by waiting.

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