Written by Don Byrd
News worth following today includes the start of a hate crimes trial in Cleveland, Ohio, where a conservative group of Amish defendants are charged with forcibly cutting the hair of fellow Amish as punishment for what they believe to be violations against the faith. Sam Mullett, Sr. is accused of being the ringleader of the move to police orthodoxy with force. He sees his role as parental and his actions as church discipline. He may be missing a key point:
The defendants — including four of Mullet’s children, his son-in-law and three nephews — say the government shouldn’t intrude on what they call internal church disciplinary matters not involving anti-Amish bias. They’ve denied the charges and rejected plea bargain offers carrying sentences of two to three years in prison instead of possible sentences
of 20 years or more.
…
“You have your laws on the road and the town — if somebody doesn’t obey them, you punish them. But I’m not allowed to punish the church people?” Mullet told The Associated Press last October. “I just let them run over me? If every family would just do as they pleased, what kind of church would we have?”
Does the right to church autonomy extend to intrude on the body of a member with physical force? Want to kick them out of church? Sure. Air their sins publicly as you see them? I suppose so. But holding someone down to cut their hair in offense to their religious beliefs is a bridge too far, turning the idea of religious liberty upside down.
