Since the start of the pandemic, a vocal subset of far-right conservatives have demanded that they need religious exemptions from numerous Covid-19 precautions – from emergency public health orders to masking warrants to warrants vaccine. They claim that the principle of religious freedom means that they should be exempt from following rescue measures.

This claim may soon be tested.

Brad Amos, a former senior video editor at Ramsey Solutions, filed a lawsuit this month against the financial advisory firm for refusing to heed his Christian beliefs. These beliefs, he noted, compelled him to take rescue action in the face of a deadly pandemic to protect his high-risk family members from infection. Amos claims that in response, he was mocked and later fired for wearing a mask, trying to socially distance himself and asking to work from home.

We will see if the same Christians who have talked so much about anti-vaccine “rights” will come to Amos’ defense.

Personally, I doubt it. Because for many members of the religious right, religious freedom only matters if it supports a right-wing political agenda. Indeed, for years, far-right Christian groups have abused religious freedom to do everything from discriminating against LGBTQ people to denying access to reproductive health care. Far from being a legitimate effort to protect the right to freely worship, religious freedom has been manipulated into another tool of the Christian Nationalist Handbook to circumvent any law or regulation they deem appropriate.

At the start of the pandemic, when states were forced to issue emergency public health orders to shut down in-person gatherings, including in places of worship, the same groups that shouted “freedom of religion” against all. law they disliked did so once again. It quickly became clear that if they could get exemptions from emergency public health orders on the grounds of religious freedom – even in the face of a deadly and highly contagious disease – they could win any claim by exploiting freedom. religious.

While it wasn’t obvious enough that these so-called demands for religious freedom ring hollow, an entire industry of anti-vaccine activists has now joined forces with Christian nationalists. Some clergymen even offer to provide religious exemptions – if you pay for them. Liberty Counsel, the law firm that represented Kim Davis, the Kentucky County clerk who refused to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples, is a major player in providing legal advice and representation to those who seek to use religious exemptions to circumvent Covid requirements.

But religious freedom does not seem to matter, it seems, when Jewish groups declare that life begins at birth, not at conception, and that denying the right to prioritize the life of a mother violates Jewish religious beliefs. Religious freedom does not matter when faith-based health care providers say they are morally, religiously obligated to provide care to all, without discrimination.

Many advocates of “religious freedom” have not condemned the Trump administration’s ban on travelers from certain predominantly Muslim countries – a de facto religious test of our country’s immigration system.

And when a religious freedom claim is made in order to save lives, in accordance with public health guidelines, then, at least according to Ramsey Solutions, it should not be granted.

There was never any question of religious freedom. It was still a right-wing political program, masked by faith.

As Jane Field, executive director of the Maine Council of Churches said in November, “That religion is used as a pawn in the service of deception is deeply offensive to us.”

The truth is not that one religious denomination opposes Covid vaccines. And according to the Public Religion Research Institute, “six in ten Americans (59%) agree that too many people are using religion as an excuse to avoid COVID-19 vaccination requirements. The First Amendment’s free exercise clause was never intended to be limitless, especially, as the Supreme Court asserted in 1941, when those limits could save lives.

When policymakers consider the arguments presented in the case of Amos and others, they should keep in mind that respecting religion in public life means respecting all religious beliefs (and non-religion.) The easiest way to deal with a pandemic? Forget politics and focus on saving lives.