Living overseas, I’m often a little slow in finding out about what’s newsworthy in the US. So I’ve only just begun to find out about who the next Supreme Court justice is likely to be. Reading the news today, I suppose I would be expected to be happy, since being a Christian means I’m expected to be a Republican. Or perhaps I could dive under the surface a bit and express concern that John Roberts won’t openly condemn abortion. Yet there is something far more troubling than Roberts’ views on abortion, whatever they may be.
As Senators question, interupt, and otherwise dignify the conversation that takes place during recess at a typical American junior high, Roberts attempts to keep himself out of hot water. I don’t envy the guy; people on opposing sides of the aisle are trying to pin him down and he can’t gain the support of some with losing that of others. So I guess his tactic is to appear as neutral as possible, at least until he is confirmed. And so he hides behind court precedent and refuses to state his own views because of cases that are likely to come before the Supreme Court in the not too distant future. In the midst of his ducking and dodging, he assured the Senate that his Roman Catholic beliefs would not influence his decisions if he were confirmed. “There’s nothing in my personal views based on faith or other sources that would prevent me from applying the precedent of the court faithfully under the principles of stare decisis,” Roberts said.
Well that’s a relief.
And so, the soon to be chief justice of the highest court of the United States panders to the illusion that he is, in fact, totally neutral, despite what he may believe on Sunday morning. If Roberts’ “personal views based on faith” will not be influencing his decision making, I think the American people have a right to know which of his personal views will be influencing his decisions. The idea that he can simply make decisions based on the precedent set by previous court cases is utter foolishness, and the fact that such a position is actually the favoured one in our culture is even more absurd.
Without wanting to make personal judgements about an individual’s spiritual state (much less an individual I don’t know), I have to say that the flavour of Roman Catholicism John Roberts has swallowed is akin to a religious starvation diet. If such a religion does not provide an all-encompassing, comprehensive worldview, then it is not worth subscribing to at all. What’s more, the liberals (and conservatives) that are trying to pin him down know as much, and have refused to live according to the supposed neutrality they set as the standard for everyone else.
The fact is, no one is neutral. The idea that we can set aside our personal beliefs and judge neutrally is pure fiction. Everyone has a religion (whether they call it a religion or not), everyone is living according to their religion, and everyone is evangelising for their religion. Allow me to prove this by using a fictitious, though entirely realistic, illustration. I walk into a high school biology class to learn that the subject of the day is Darwin’s theory of evolution. After listening to the lecture for 15-20 minutes I raise my hand a remark that evolution is patently false, because it is in clear contradiction to the Bible. My teacher responds by saying that whatever my person beliefs may be, this is a science class, and for the purpose of the class I must set aside my private beliefs. And just like that, my teacher has expressed her religion (naturalism), lived according to it, and attempted to proselytise me.
Naturalists believe that nature is all that exists, and therefore everything must be explainable in terms of nature. Few naturalists would view their beliefs as religious in any way, yet I suspect that if I were to tell my science teacher that though she may personally believe that God doesn’t exist, for the purpose of the class she must set aside her private beliefs and adopt the assumptions of the Bible, the outcry would be very religious. The fact is that we all have beliefs, and we all make decisions based on those beliefs. The science teacher’s belief that humanity evolved from nothing is an outworking of her belief that nature is all that exists. My belief that evolution is wrong is an outworking of my belief that the Bible is true. Neither position is based on some kind of neutrality. Neutrality is a myth; every decision is based on a belief of one sort or another. To claim otherwise is intellectually dishonest.
In the case of Chief Justice nominee John Roberts, he is claiming that he can perform his duties without reference to his Roman Catholic faith. That may well be true, but if it is, he is still basing his judgments on some other belief. The claim that he can judge a case neutrally is stupid at best, and dishonest at worst. So Roberts owes it to the Senate, and to the American public, to disclose what his beliefs are on the basis of which he will pass judgement on Supreme Court cases. Not all beliefs are created equal and we may not like what he has to say. But at least we can have an honest discussion, instead of hiding behind myths and lies. As it stands now, Senators will have to guess what Roberts believes about abortion, and make their decision on the basis of that guess. The larger issue, however, is that whatever his position on abortion, Roberts has been dishonest about how he will judge cases. If he is confirmed, the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court will have entered into his position through the use of the sort of lies that are not supposed be allowed in a court of law, and he will make judgements of behalf of a country that espouses a myth as virtue.
If the current trend of polarisation continues in the US, and there is every reason to believe that it will, I suspect public figures of all kinds will be under increasing pressure to bow to the myth of neutrality. This, of course, has serious ramifications for Christians; I will perhaps explore these in a couple days.