Addressing current threats to freedom of religion in the U.S., Daniel Mark points to troubling intellectual trends on both ends of the political spectrum. From the left, he sees an emerging worldview that seeks to single out long-held religious belief and practices—especially about marriage and sexuality—as forms of “discrimination”:

Underlying the identity politics of sex and the current attacks on religious freedom as discrimination is a postmodern—or rather hypermodern—denial of human nature that amounts to a rejection of all reason and all authority. This movement, in essence, rejects anything that stands in the way of the radical personal autonomy to choose, unrestrained, not only what we do but even what we are.

One central consequence of this denial of human nature is that it leads ineluctably to a denial of human rights. Without a firm view of human nature, we cannot construct a coherent account of human rights. I am aware, of course, that the people I have in mind here claim all sorts of things in the name of human rights. But the new menu of human rights is selective, subjective, and, finally, indefensible. . . . Having abandoned the proper grounds for human rights in order to make room for their ever-expanding list of demands, they have left the concept of rights stretched so thin that the very idea is endangered.

Looking to the right, and the Christian right in particular, Mark fears those who find the roots of left-wing excesses in the same classical liberal tradition that gave the world religious toleration in the first place:

[It’s necessary to] ask what [these] critics of classical liberalism envision: is their goal to build a newer, better, likely smaller Christendom, or is [it] to create just enough space to rebuild a Christian culture within a classical liberal order? Do they wish to reground individual rights on a true and sound basis, or do they want to instrumentalize, minimize, and relativize individual rights, which they see as inimical to the common good in the long run? Do they believe in political, economic, and religious liberty not just in prudence but in principle? Do they believe it was wrong for the pope to kidnap Edgardo Mortara or just poor judgment about the consequences? In the end, do they see classical liberalism and Christianity as compatible or incompatible? . . .

The critics may say that I am naïve about classical liberalism, but, if so, my naïveté only goes so far. I am not here to contend that religious freedom and individual rights are enough on their own. . . . I recognize that liberty alone is insufficient. Virtue, which requires religion, is also necessary. . . .

But the critics contend that classical liberalism itself necessarily, inevitably undermines the very conditions that make its own existence possible. . . . If they’re right, then it is futile to try to foster a Christian culture within a classically liberal order for the long term. This is why we hear more and more talk today about integralism, about un-separating church and state, about Christian monarchists. At risk of oversimplifying, I will say that those conversations don’t sound as if they’re about restoring a Christian culture but about restoring Christendom.

While it is commendable that administrators of several universities finally called upon police to crack down on violent and disruptive anti-Israel protests, the actions they have taken may be insufficient. At Columbia, demonstrators reestablished their encampment on the main quad after it had been cleared by the police, and the university seems reluctant to use force again. The school also decided to hold classes remotely until the end of the semester. Such moves, whatever their merits, do nothing to fix the factors that allowed campuses to become hotbeds of pro-Hamas activism in the first place. The editors of National Review examine how things go to this point:

Since the 10/7 massacre, Columbia’s Jewish students have been forced to endure routine calls for their execution. It shouldn’t have taken the slaughter, rape, and brutalization of Israeli Jews to expose chants like “Globalize the intifada” and “Death to the Zionist state” as calls for violence, but the university refused to intervene on behalf of its besieged students. When an Israeli student was beaten with a stick outside Columbia’s library, it occasioned little soul-searching from faculty. Indeed, it served only as the impetus to establish an “Anti-Semitism Task Force,” which subsequently expressed “serious concerns” about the university’s commitment to enforcing its codes of conduct against anti-Semitic violators.

But little was done. Indeed, as late as last month the school served as host to speakers who praised the 10/7 attacks and even “hijacking airplanes” as “important tactics that the Palestinian resistance have engaged in.”

The school’s lackadaisical approach created a permission structure to menace and harass Jewish students, and that’s what happened. . . . Now is the time finally to do something about this kind of harassment and associated acts of trespass and disorder. Yale did the right thing when police cleared out an encampment [on Monday]. But Columbia remains a daily reminder of what happens when freaks and haters are allowed to impose their will on campus.