On 13 September 2012, the Religious Freedom Project at Georgetown University’s Berkley Center convened a daylong conference to explore “Catholic Perspectives on Religious Liberty.” Religious liberty, of course, remains a critical concern for the Catholic Church in the United States, in the wake of the Health and Human Services contraception mandate. Furthermore, Georgetown’s storied history is very much intertwined with the history of religious liberty in America. Of particular importance was the conference’s keynote speaker: Cardinal Donald Wuerl. As Archbishop of Washington, Cardinal Wuerl is uniquely positioned to be a counter witness to the many legislative and regulatory threats to the Church and her teachings that originate within the territory of his diocese. As such, Wuerl has taken a great deal of leadership on the religious liberty issue since January.
In his address, the cardinal wove together an argument for the important place of religious faith within our pluralistic modern society. He noted that at the time of the Founding Fathers, it would have be unthinkable to conceive a society that did not prominently display a robust religiosity in the public square. Thus John Adams could say, “Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.” The role of religion in American public life is a deeply embedded tradition, yet that is, of course, under siege by the forces of secularism today.
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