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AREWE TAKING
OUR
RELIGIOUS FREEDOMS
FORGRANTED?
Is the age-old struggle to preserve religious freedom now at an end in this nuclear age? Is
separation of church and state a closed matter? Do the Declaration of lndependence and the
Constitution absolutely assure our religious freedom in this modern age? Or did the Founding
Fathers only create a climate whereby each succeeding American generation could take up the
gauntlet and fight to preserve the great principie offreedom of religion?
evcr at any time in
history has the world
been enveloped by
freedom of religion.
There has always been
an ongoing struggle to
first obtain and then preserve indi–
vidual freedom of worship. Of
course, threats to religious liberty
have been many times greater in
sorne periods of history than others.
Now another time of great tria! is
The
PLAIN TRUTH June-July 1979
by
Stanley R. Rader
upon us. In many ways the dangers
and problems we now face are far
greater and infinitely more complex
than the perils which confronted our
ancestors. But let us first summarize
the historical struggle between
church and state-between freedom
of choice and dictated worship.
The Historical Antecedents
Religious liberty began in the Gar–
den of Eden. God gave our fi rst par-
ents a clear choice-freedom to wor–
ship Him or outright spiritual slav–
ery. You know the story. Tbe Arcb–
deceiver persuaded Adam and Eve
that black was white and evil was
good. Their judgment was clouded by
their own intellectual vanity. They
chose slavery!
Twenty-five hundred years later
the nation of Israel found itself in
both civil and religious bondage.
Freedom of worship was nonexistent
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