Debating Religious Liberty and Discrimination

Event Religious Liberty
Event Religious Liberty

June 15, 2017 Debating Religious Liberty and Discrimination

Books will be available for purchase and to be signed by the authors.

Thursday, Jun 15, 2017

12:00 pm - 1:00 pm

The Heritage Foundation

214 Massachusetts Ave NE
Washington, DC
20002

Description

Virtually everyone supports religious liberty, and virtually everyone opposes discrimination.  But how do we handle the hard questions that arise when exercises of religious liberty seem to discriminate unjustly?  How do we promote the common good while respecting conscience in a diverse society?

This event, based on a new Oxford University Press point-counterpoint book, brings together leading voices to discuss such questions: John Corvino, a longtime LGBT-rights advocate, opposite Ryan T. Anderson and Sherif Girgis, prominent young social conservatives.

Many religious liberty questions have arisen in response to the redefinition of marriage: How should we treat county clerks who do not wish to authorize same-sex marriages, for example; or bakers, florists, and photographers who do not wish to provide same-sex wedding services?  But the conflicts extend well beyond the LGBT arena.  What counts as discrimination, when is it unjust, and when should it be unlawful?  How should we treat hospitals, schools, and adoption agencies that can’t follow antidiscrimination laws, healthcare mandates, and other regulations?  Should the law give religion and conscience special protection at all, and if so, why?  The authors will discuss these questions and more during this conversation on their new book, Debating Religious Liberty and Discrimination.

 

Featuring authors

John Corvino, Ph.D. is Professor and Chair of the Philosophy Department at Wayne State University in Detroit, Michigan. He is the co-author (with Maggie Gallagher) of Debating Same-Sex Marriage (June 2012) and the author of What's Wrong with Homosexuality? (January 2013), both from Oxford University Press.

Ryan T. Anderson, Ph.D., is William E. Simon Senior Research Fellow at The Heritage Foundation. He is author of Truth Overruled: The Future of Marriage and Religious Freedom (Regnery, 2015), co-author of What Is Marriage? Man and Woman: A Defense (Encounter, 2012) and co-editor of A Liberalism Safe for Catholicism (University of Notre Dame Press, 2017).

Sherif Girgis, J.D., is a Ph.D. candidate in philosophy at Princeton and lead author (with Ryan T. Anderson and Robert P. George) of What Is Marriage? Man and Woman: A Defense (Encounter Books, 2012). He earned a law degree from Yale and a B.Phil. (M.Phil.) in philosophy from Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar.