In his remarks May 12, Biden’s Secretary of State Antony Blinken has reaffirmed that “religious freedom is a human right,” but since his speech March 30 denigrating the Unalienable Rights Commission, he has been stating that religious freedom is not more important than other rights but is co-equal.

The Commission reinforced the importance of religious freedom, but the progressive agenda requires that religious freedom be submissive to the state so that abortion can be promoted and expanded as a “right” equal to all other human rights. Religious objection and dissent is problematic for supporters of this agenda. These qualifications placed on freedom of religion are very troublesome.

In his 2020 political campaign, Biden promised to sue the Little Sisters of the Poor and force them to comply with government policy on contraception and abortion to which they object on the basis of conscience and religious belief. The shift in language dealing with religious freedom is seen by some as laying the ground work for such additional legal action. For this purpose, the Little Sisters of the Poor must be portrayed as hiding behind religion in order to conceal their underlying bigotry.

There are often conflicts between our cherished rights which are codified in the constitution. For example, our right to freedom of speech is not protected if we yell fire in a public space. While all of our rights are valued individually, compromises must be made between the various rights under some circumstances.

By elevating abortion to a “right” equal to freedom of speech and freedom of religion, the ground is set for forcing people with religious beliefs that oppose abortion to compromise those beliefs. For example, laws may be passed restricting opponents of abortion under freedom of religion from attempting to restrict the “right” to an abortion…that could be a hate crime, similar to attacking a religion.

No one can predict where this could go. It could mean that other social issues could be declared a “right” and thus be protected from dissent by preventing the exercise of freedom of speech on penalty of law. Best not to go down that path.