When government privileges the so-called secular aspects of Christmas over the religious aspects, or when it detaches the cultural accessories of Christmas from their religious roots, it is, in effect, taking the anti-religious side in the continuing struggle over the meaning of Christmas as a cultural resource. And it is in that sense establishing, not the neutral secularism that is built into our constitutional dispensation, but an anti-religious secularism that is foreign to that dispensation. (p.8, Dane, Perry, "Christmas" (November 2006). Available at SSRN)His argument is, in short, that using government property to display Xmas trees and Santas, absent their religious context, is deleterious to our establishment-centered Constitutional provisions; the clearest, but least popular, solution is to not use government property to celebrate or endorse any aspect of any holidays. He recognizes that accomodationist positions of embracing pluralism won't work, and would be likely to cause more legal issues than they solve. And he admits that the austerity here isn't attractive, but it is, incontrovertibly, a true legal solution, and perhaps the only workable one.
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Technorati tags: God, Religion, Church-state
