When COVID-19 and religious freedom intersect, political partisans rush to take sides

Response was swift to the Supreme Court's recent ruling against COVID-19 restrictions imposed by New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo on religious services. Much of the criticism focused less on the specifics of the case than on the religious claimants as proxies for pandemic-denying Trumpism.

In an opinion addressing two applications, one brought by the Roman Catholic Diocese of Brooklyn and the other by the Orthodox Jewish organization Agudath Israel, the court decided 5-4 that Cuomo’s restrictions violated the First Amendment’s guarantee of free exercise of religion.

Both applications argued that Cuomo’s regulations violated their First Amendment rights because they are unduly restrictive. Under the regulations, in areas marked “red zones,” no more than 10 people could attend religious services. In “orange zones,” no more than 25 people could attend services — even in cases where the church can seat more than 1,000 people.

Lawyers for the diocese argued that its “spacious churches” are safer than many of the secular businesses that have no restrictions, and that its hourlong Mass takes the same or less time as trips to big-box stores, acupuncture facilities and 9-to-5 jobs.

In the lower court, a health department official testified that a large store in Brooklyn could have hundreds of shoppers present at any given moment, but a nearby church or synagogue was prohibited from having more than 10 or 25 worshippers inside. 

The court found these results “troubling.” It said that while the government had met the first part of the legal test and shown that its regulations were supported by a compelling interest (fighting the coronavirus), it had failed on the second part of the test. The restrictions must be  “narrowly tailored,” but in this case, the restrictions, as applied to the houses of worship, limit religious exercise in a way that is not proportionate to what is needed to prevent the spread of the virus.

As Cuomo himself had concluded before the court decided the case, the religious claimants were better suited for yellow-zone restrictions, which limited occupancy to 50%.

Perhaps more important than what the court said is what it did not say. It did not say that religious organizations are free to flout COVID-19 protocols. It noted in particular that the diocese had consistently been “ahead of the curve, enforcing stricter safety protocols than the State required,” and Agudath Israel had also “rigorously implemented” health protocols.

The court’s ruling also is temporary — it offered relief from the red/orange zone restrictions only until a lower court decides the matter in December. And finally, the ruling is fact-specific; pandemic orders across the nation vary significantly, so the decision cannot be generalized much.   

Despite the narrowness of the court’s ruling in both time and scope, many people on social media and beyond interpreted it in the broadest terms. Commentators painted the religious claimants as selfish and dangerous actors who care little about their congregations or communities and flaunt the seriousness of the pandemic. 

New York Times columnist Paul Krugman tweeted, “The first major decision of the Trump packed court — and naturally it will kill people.”

The Center for American Progress chided the ruling: “Religious freedom is a core American value — not a license to spread a deadly virus.”

Cuomo dismissed the ruling as mere ideology: “We know who he appointed to the court. We know their ideology.” Meanwhile, #AmyCovidBarrett was trending on social media.

Trump overshadows court's decision

For many critics, the ruling was wholly Trumpist. It is true that many Trump supporters have flouted health restrictions in the name of religious freedom, but it is also true that most religious organizations have complied with safety protocols.

The religious claimants in last month's case belong to the latter group; they implemented safety protocols with great care. And their request was modest (for the government to refrain from imposing red- and orange-zone restrictions as long as those restrictions were disproportionate to the risk).

But Trumpism has ruined it for them — and for other religious Americans like them. Both the court’s ruling and the religious claimants were dismissed as ideologically driven, selfish, anti-science Americans who deny the severity of the pandemic and are a public health risk to their fellow citizens. 

This partisan response to the court ruling was predictable, particularly because the case was about religious freedom. In recent years, religious freedom has been consumed by tribal warfare.

Scholars link our growing polarization to group attachments, more than issue positions. We cheer for our political teams and boo the opposition, even though we have more nuanced preferences.

We also assume that the other party is made up of groups that are different from us, even though we’re more alike than we realize. These misperceptions can reinforce polarization. And there’s ample evidence of precisely these group dynamics in how Americans understand religious freedom today.

Tribalism drives views on liberty

Numerous surveys find that religious freedom, while popular, has become associated with partisan politics. One of us conducted a national survey last month, which found that when a generic religious freedom statement was attributed to President Donald Trump, people were less supportive of religious freedom than they were when the statement was attributed to now president-elect Joe Biden or an unnamed “both presidential candidates.”

Democrats, in particular, were turned off when support for religious freedom was linked to President Trump. Their support declined substantially, while Republican support increased. 

In a separate study, people were shown a news story about Muslims and Hindus seeking religious freedom accommodations. The study measured support for these minorities’ claims and found that conservatives were less likely to support them if liberal groups like the ACLU defended the religious minorities. In sum, “religious freedom” was less defensible if the claimant was not part of one’s political tribe. 

It’s easy to see how we got here. The Trump administration aligned itself with religious freedom for conservative Christians. It often presented itself as a heroic defender of these interests, though to truly be heroic, there has to be a sense that you’re fighting off a major threat.

The administration has done exactly that by emphasizing over and over that liberals are waging a war on religion (and traditional Christianity in particular).

COVID-19 has been co-opted by this polarization. A number of Republican politicians have emphasized the harm of shutdown orders and health codes on religious worship and overwhelmed governors of both parties with a deluge of lawsuits. Today, a majority of Republicans feel that Christians face high levels of religious discrimination, and more discrimination than minority groups.

Unfortunately, constantly shouting that religious freedom is under threat and proclaiming that one political party is the offender or defender of religious freedom inflames division and polarizes.

This risks broader support for religious freedom principles, and it even colors how we interpret narrow court rulings. There are legitimate legal and policy debates over when the state has compelling interests to restrict religious rights and what measures are narrowly tailored, but the culture wars will obscure these more complex discussions.

We all lose when our rights are subject to tribal political dynamics.

Asma T. Uddin is author of the forthcoming book “The Politics of Vulnerability: How to Heal Muslim-Christian Relations in a Post-Christian America.” Andrew R. Lewis is associate professor of political science at the University of Cincinnati and author of “The Rights Turn in Conservative Christian Politics: How Abortion Transformed the Culture Wars.”