freedom of religion |

"Harshaan Ahluwalia, 2, dribbles a soccer ball during a friendly soccer match in solidarity with young players who wear turbans Saturday, June 15, 2013 in Montreal. Quebec's soccer federation announced it is ending its much-criticized turban ban Saturday." (Photo credit: Paul Chiasson | THE CANADIAN PRESS. Source: The Globe and Mail.)

The secularism-religious freedom divide

August 20, 2013 by Rupinder Mohan Singh

To the north, Canada’s province of Quebec is seeking to prohibit religious symbols such as the wearing of the turban, yarmulke or headscarf by public employees in a political maneuver believed to be veiled in secularism. The move by Quebec’s provincial government follows in the footsteps of the Quebec Soccer Federation, who earlier this summer attempted to ban the wearing of the turban in amateur soccer in the province (the ban was lifted after national and international criticism and objection). […]

Categories: Civil Rights, Interfaith, Politics • Tags: Canada, freedom of religion, Immanent Frame, Kathleen Skerrett, Multiculturalism, Quebec, Religious symbolism, Secularism, soccer, Turban

Happy 4th of July!

July 4, 2013 by Rupinder Mohan Singh

During a conversation last night, a friend reminded me of one of the earliest accounts of a Sikh in the United States, in which a merchant trader from Massachusetts named Captain Stephen Phillips wrote in his journal about a Sikh man that he brought back from India in the late 1700s: After his retirement in the late 1700s, he apparently brought back to his home town of Salem a tall, intrepid Sikh who ‘stalked around town in the turban and […]

Categories: Civil Rights, Events • Tags: Declaration of Independence, Fourth of July, freedom of religion, Independence Day, Massachusetts, Salem, Stephen Phillips, William Bentley

Questioning and defending freedom of religion

March 28, 2013 by Rupinder Mohan Singh

A new book by University of Chicago Law School professor Brian Leiter entitled Why Tolerate Religion? questions the practice of establishing religious liberty as a right: For example, he says a boy might be permitted to carry a dagger to school as part of his Sikh religion, but the same dagger would not be allowed if it were part of a family tradition. Without having read Brian Leiter’s book (see a review by Robert Merrihew Adams here), it would be unfair […]

Categories: Civil Rights, Literature • Tags: Brian Leiter, freedom of religion, Oklahoma University, Rajdeep Singh, Sikh Coalition, University of Chicago Law School

An outdoor mural in Sacramento, California featuring representations of various faiths.

The growth of America’s religious diversity showed in 2012

December 28, 2012 by Rupinder Mohan Singh

On the First Amendment Center, Charles C. Haynes discusses the emergence of religious diversity in America during 2012: The growing visibility and strength of America’s religious diversity is good news for religious freedom. The First Amendment affords legal protections, but it cannot fully prevent people in the majority from imposing social discrimination and political exclusion on those in the minority. As James Madison argued at our nation’s founding, religious freedom is best secured in a society of many faiths and […]

Categories: Civil Rights • Tags: First Amendment Center, First Amendment to the United States Constitution, freedom of religion, James Madison

Culture, Law and the unfulfilled American promise

December 22, 2011 by Rupinder Mohan Singh

Rajdeep Singh, of the Sikh Coalition, writes in the New York Times: Sikh Americans, in particular, continue to face relentless challenges in the post-9/11 environment. Worse still, American law affords inadequate protection to Sikhs against religious discrimination and, in some cases, reflects deep-seated stereotypes about American identity. For Sikhs, it is indeed a two-fold challenge: there are both cultural and legal hurdles that we face in this country that prevents Sikhs from experiencing full equality. These hurdles are not in […]

Categories: Civil Rights • Tags: freedom of religion, Rajdeep Singh, Religious discrimination

Considering the experience of Sikhs in America.

Tag: freedom of religion