BYU's Policy of Kicking Out LDS Students That Convert: Addressed by Managing Director of BYU's International Center for Law and Religion Studies

THEY ASKED MY QUESTION. I couldn't believe it.

"Under BYU's honor code, LDS students who manifest or practice their conversion to Islam, atheism, or Catholicism lose the ability to enroll, graduate, and receive an otherwise-earned diploma. Please address the extent to which this policy burdens religious freedom under the meaning you've proposed. Given that the ICLRS is housed on BYU campus, please also address the effect of perceptions of this policy on the ICLRS's outreach."

Bob Smith, ICLRS Managing Director.
View the video yourself here (my Q takes up 53:30-56:12)

Now I suppose I should back up a bit and give some context before I detail the question's answer, so you can see why this moment was such a big deal to me. A week ago, I blogged about a discussion series I was invited to attend. Hosted by the International Center for Law and Religion Studies, the one hour, 5th December session at BYU Law promised an address by Professor Robert Smith, the ICLRS's Managing Director, on "A Contest of Greatest Importance: The Battle over the Meaning of Religious Freedom."

In the first draft of my blog post, I expressed my angst about not being able to attend. On a closer read of the invite, however, I noticed that invitees could attend by webinar! I signed up immediately, blocked out the time on my work calendar, and tapped my foot on the floor with excitement. I couldn't wait!

In my blog post, I analyzed the invitation's assertion that "Unless we fully understand the meaning of religious freedom, we are in danger of losing this most cherished “First Freedom” of our Bill of Rights as it is inexorably defined away, leaving little left to be protected." I pointed out that the argument begs the question, as it assumes the assertion it sets out to prove: namely, that the narrow definitions of religious freedom it criticizes misconstrue the meaning of religious freedom. If you want to demonstrate the meaning of religious freedom, proposing a broader definition than your opponent only wins the day if you first assume that that the broader definition is the right one: hence you're back at square one.

Dr. Smith's address, however, offered more than the invitation's tautology: he would attempt to construe the meaning of religious freedom. Given his credentials, the importance of the subject, and my own uncertainty about the meaning of religious freedom, I was an easy sell.

This is my "I'm sold" face

Finally, the day came. I found a quiet spot at work, logged in on my smartphone, and plugged in the headphones. I was all keyed up: it felt like Christmas or the big game or something. I guess it's because I really, really care about this issue. About six years ago, my brother converted to atheism. Unfortunately for him, he did so while a junior at BYU. Now, that in itself is not terribly unusual: there are hundreds of atheists, agnostics, and questioning LDS students at BYU. Most of them simply can their doubts, compromise their consciences, zip their mouths, hide their convictions, populate the pews enough to escape the radar, or some other combination that lets them get their degrees and move on with their lives.

My brother's problem was that he's opposed to putting on appearances. He simply ceased the charade of playing Mormon. A few months later he, like many before and since, was quickly and quietly kicked out of BYU.

 You can start Catholic and graduate Mormon. You can start Muslim and graduate atheist.
But you can't start Mormon and graduate: unless you're still Mormon.

University Chaplain. Jolly fellow. Helped me understand how the Honor Code
applies to the non-Mormon students he's charged with shepherding.

A few years after that expulsion, I began law school at BYU. Amongst the several causes I took up during those three years (inmate advocacy and homosexual rights, for instance), was freedom of religion at BYU. I pestered multiple BYU Vice Presidents. I petitioned the Director of the ICLRS. I cornered the BYU Chaplain. I plead with a member of the Honor Code Committee. I made YouTube videos. I wrote and wrote and wrote. 


Like most of my efforts to change the world, though, my activism fell pretty flat. The conversations were painfully frustrating. Here's one with VP John Tanner*:

*I invite these interlocutors to openly speak for themselves, and to publish their views openly, on this issue. Take my recollections with a grain of salt. Though I recorded the conversations while still fresh, my memory is doubtlessly flawed, and the strength of my views on this subject biases my perceptions.

BYU VP John Tanner. Super friendly, inspiring, sincere.
Hardliner on covenant breakers.

Me:  Who is the decision maker I could talk to about religious freedom at BYU?

VP:  What do you mean?  In what way?

Me:  That LDS students who leave the church or join a different religion get kicked out.

VP:  Oh.  That is a Board of Trustees policy; no administrator has that power.  The Board of Trustees is constituted of the First Presidency as executive members, one general authority, one member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, the Relief Society President, and the Young Women’s General President.

Me:  When is the last time this issue came up?  Article of Faith 11 says that we let all men worship how, where, or what they may.  BYU already allows non-members here, we just charge them higher tuition.  Why not just slap the apostates with a higher tuition but still let them graduate like other non-members? 

VP:  I think this was addressed in the 1990’s.  It’s a tough one because of the additional academic consequences of disfellowshipping or excommunicating a student.  If the student confesses something to a bishop, it would make sense to keep the student here to work with that bishop- but if the student is kicked out he’ll probably leave.  Plus, it adds an additional penalty consequence to the church discipline.  As to kicking out students, what makes the difference is whether the student has made covenants or not.  Those who have made serious covenants and then break them- well, in that case…

Me:  I don’t know- I mean, covenant breakers or not, they’re still people.  Article of Faith 11 says “all men-“ whether a person has made covenants or not or broken them or not doesn’t make them non-persons. 

VP:  Well another thing to think about is that church leaders go to Stake Conferences around the church and parents ask them why their faithful children can’t attend BYU.  BYU rejects a lot of its LDS applicants.  Why should it support apostates when there are faithful members who desire so intensely to come here?

Me:  But BYU doesn’t even require you to be LDS to be a student here- we have students from a number of faiths that we admit over LDS competitors.  As long as that’s the reality that argument fails.

VP:  That’s how the Board thinks covenant breakers should be dealt with.  They made serious covenants.

Me:  Well, what about those whose consciences dictate in their third or fourth year that they should leave the church or join another faith?  Must they betray their conscience in order to graduate after sinking years of their life and their money into going to BYU? 

VP:  Yes, some hypocrites do just keep going to church so they can graduate. Others make it a matter of conscience and leave, which sacrifices their ability to graduate.  Religious freedom is a privilege, not a civil right. You can be any religion you want, BYU just puts a consequence on what you decide.

Me:  I wouldn’t argue that it is a civil right.  I acknowledge that in the BYU context it’s not.  It’s a matter instead of burdening which religion someone chooses to be.  Kicking a student who’s about to graduate out because they choose to leave the church or join a different one is a heavy handed response that seems inconsistent with Article of Faith 11.

VP:  I’m just telling you that’s how the councils of the church would deliberate the matter. (conversation end)

BYU VP and former BYU Law Dean Kevin Worthen. Erudite, powerful.
Hardliner on enforcing student's signed waiver of religious freedom.

Kevin Worthen took a different approach. He argued that religious freedom arguments in this context are null, since by signing the Honor Code students contractually forfeit that freedom: thus, there is no injustice in holding them to their contract. Additionally, he said the consequence is justified since we are right. Being the true church, apostasy from the same is always wrong: to assert otherwise is to admit we don't really believe our religion is God's only.

Due to situational constraints, I didn't have time to fully debate the morality of an educational institution's offer to teenagers of a term that they contract away 4-6 years of their religious freedom, nor the extent to which the Honor Code is an enforceable contract (mutuality of obligation, contracts prof?).  When you're trying to catch a busy VP's ear, you take what snippets you can I suppose.

I will point out the contrast between Dr. Worthen's position and that of James Madison, as quoted by Professor Smith in his presentation:

"These two rights were identified by James Madison in his 1785 'Memorial and Remonstrance Against Religious Assessments” in which he stated that the “Religion . . . must be left to the conviction and conscience of every man; and it is the right of every man to exercise it as these may dictate.  This right is in its nature an unalienable right."

Many would agree with Mr. Madison that individual religious choice, specifically the exercise as dictated by conviction and conscience, is inalienable (i.e. it can't be waived: even by signing the honor code).

At the end of the day though, it strikes me as more odd that a religious man, especially one with Dr. Worthen's training, would be inclined to argue that a teenager can waive her religious freedom. Given the presumption (one that I affirm, coincidentally) that the absence of individual religious freedom is dreadful, it should be of little consequence whether the means to that end is a contract by the agent or compulsion by an external force.

I should respond to his fundamentalist "because we're right" argument as well. I must frankly confess that at the time his words deeply disturbed and frightened me. He previously taught one of my law school classes and came across then as a reasonably sensitive and eminently rational man. The same intolerant reasoning he used would (and did) justify all sorts of egregious burdens on those who believe differently or apostatize, including punishing blasphemers and apostates by stoning/burning, etc. I remember at the time sincerely hoping to never be found in a position of being sentenced by that man in a religious context where he is empowered to hurt those convicted.

ICLRS Director W. Cole Durham. Spiritual rock. Ponderous. 

I agreed not to talk about the contents of our discussion, but I will say Professor Durham gave the most thoughtful defense of BYU's policy that I've yet heard.

Anyway, the point of these stories is that this issue means a lot to me. Now let's return to the moment when I plugged in my headphones.

The first thing I noticed on my iPhone GoToMeeting app was a tab called "Questions." Suddenly I realized that I might be able to interact with the speaker! That prospect contributed to my already sweaty palms. There's a certain fear/thrill in asking edgy questions at BYU Law, I've learned. I felt similarly when, during a Q and A, I called out Prop 8 attorney Chuck Cooper on his non sequitur about gays causing the breakdown of the family.

The thoughtful man you see in the background there behind Mr. Cooper is James Rasband, the BYU Law Dean.
A few months after this pic, & right before I started selling my Homosexuality: A Straight BYU Student's Perspective book at the BYU library, he kindly reminded me that the law school could not protect me from the Honor Code Office.

As Professor Smith started, I began crafting my question on the app. After a few mental drafts, I typed it in the question box but did not press send. Prof. Smith then gave what I though was a solid, well-informed, and amply supported lecture about the meaning of religious freedom, as he promised to do. I invite you to read/watch his address yourself.

At last, the big moment came. With a few minutes left in the hour but the presentation not yet over, I took a gamble that he would field questions, pressed send, and squeezed my eyes shut in the hopes that webinar participants would be included.


Sure enough! The very first question was mine. Some aide read it aloud on my behalf (bless you, whoever you are), loud and clear. I was thrilled out of my shoes. I include the unadulterated transcript here. (The video is here: my Q takes up 53:30-56:12).

This question comes from an online participant. "Under BYU's honor code, LDS students who manifest or practice their conversion to Islam, atheism, or Catholicism lose the ability to enroll, graduate, and receive an otherwise-earned diploma. Please address the extent to which this policy burdens religious freedom under the meaning you've proposed. Given that the ICLRS is housed on BYU campus, please also address the effect of perceptions of this policy on the ICLRS's outreach."

S: Okay that was a, that was a good question a good loaded question. Could everyone hear the question?

I think there's a lot to that and I will have to punt a little bit, let me just say this, that religious societies can define who are members of their society. That's part of church autonomy. It's part of internal decision making. Just as a church can excommunicate one of its members, it can do something less severe by withholding certain privileges.

I never talked with the university about this policy, I don't know how it's been used in practice. So my understanding is very limited, but I would suggest that that is one way to think about that and to think about whether or not society does have a right to withhold its fellowship, if you will, to others who reject its religion.

Now this is short, however, of legal impediments. Obviously a person who no longer studied at BYU would certainly have the right to study at another university, so a fundamental right has not been taken away if they leave.  Just in the same way that someone who is excommunicated from the church, they have the right to join another one if they choose or to comply with the requirements to be reintroduced into the fellowship of that church.

In terms of ICLRS and our standards, I think that's what we would do, we would just I would assert to you that we would consider those values, and the right of religious associations to have internal decision making power.

That was the answer to my question.

Now remember to cut the man some slack: Q and A puts you on the spot, and it's a tough position to answer from, even for the well-trained. That being said, my analysis in blue.

S: Okay that was a, that was a good question a good loaded question. Could everyone hear the question?
Why thank you, I thought of it myself! :-)
 
I think there's a lot to that and I will have to punt a little bit, let me just say this, that religious societies can define who are members of their society. That's part of church autonomy. It's part of internal decision making. Just as a church can excommunicate one of its members, it can do something less severe by withholding certain privileges.

I agree so far. Yes, religious societies can define who the members of their society are.

Unfortunately, that point is completely, 100%, and in all other ways, irrelevant. Why? Because BYU is not a religious society! It is instead an independent, domestic nonprofit corporation (entity # 565683-0140 in case anyone was wondering). The LDS Church arguably doesn't exist (though fascinating, that shall wait for another discussion), but to the extent that it does via COP and CPB, you can see for yourself that it is wholly distinct and separate from BYU.

Yep, BYU is a baby boomer

Founding BYU Law Dean Rex Lee argued CPB v. Amos, the case Dr. Smith referenced in his address.
Said SCOTUS: "Undoubtedly, Mayson's freedom of choice in religious matters was impinged upon,
but it was the Church (through the COP and the CPB), and not the Government,
who put him to the choice of changing his religious practices or losing his job."

Isn't corporate history fun?

Now perhaps BYU is its own religious society independent of the LDS Church. Students, both LDS and non-LDS, are now members of two religions (presumably with President Monson as head in the one, and LaVell Edwards in the other). We could call all those admitted or employed at BYU "members" instead of "students" and "professors." We could make faculty the priesthood leadership (but I guess then you'd run into the women-in-governance problem) and sing hymns like "I belong to the church of B...Y-U." Unless the LDS Church or BYU starts permitting dual religious membership, the two societies could arguably expel/excommunicate their members for religious double-dipping. Steve Young can be Jesus and Cosmo an apostle. I suppose the hazing of Freshman would suffice for the initiating ordinance.

Additional absurd results obtain if gaining student status is equated to membership in the LDS Church, and losing student status to excommunication. For one, the hundreds of non-member students are in for a rude awakening. Second, Mormons who graduated or began but never graduated are no longer Latter-day Saints. (I for one am a temple-attending, enthusiastic Mormon, so I sure hope that's not the case.) Third, a 4.0 GPA would automatically guarantee exaltation. Last, you'd have to submerge acceptance letters in water before sending them out, as us Mormons believe in baptism by immersion.  ;-)

More seriously, Professor Smith's response to this question deeply mistakes the facts, and exposes a common misconception about this crucial issue. As evidenced by the presence of non-Mormons in student ranks, and the independence of the two entities, it is entirely feasible for an LDS student to lose her membership in the LDS church (whatever that putative membership means: since COP and CPB are corporations sole, unlike other churches they rather awkwardly have only one member each, bulging the LDS Church membership ranks to a respectable and very consistent 2) while retaining her student status. BYU, a corporation engaged in the business of selling secular academic degrees, doesn't look like, feel like, or act like a religious society. If you were to step in BYU (and I have: spent 8 years so stepping in fact), it would not smell like a religious society. Since BYU is not a religious society, it is quite impossible for it to exercise church autonomy.

During his presentation, Professor Smith used the word "organization," "association," "entity," or "societies" about 1.5 times per minute (73 times in 50 minutes). Given this substantial emphasis and the nature of his professional work, it is very surprising that his organizational analysis fails so completely.

I never talked with the university about this policy, I don't know how it's been used in practice. So my understanding is very limited,

You don't know how it's been used in practice? You're the Managing Director of a Center on Law and Religion Studies, and you don't know about religious freedom on your own campus? That's something akin to a professional landscaper who, though he presumably walks from his home to his car for work, somehow never notices the overgrown, irregular, sloping path he treads each day.

I've driven international delegates to the ICLRS's annual conference. The ICLRS invites representatives from dozens of countries to come to BYU to learn about protecting religious freedom. How would the Muslim delegates feel to learn that 98% of the students on that campus can only choose to follow Mohammed (peace be upon him) on pain of the equivalent of job termination (specifically, the loss of the ability to enroll, graduate, or have an earned degree post)? In his 7 years as Managing Director, has Professor Smith really never considered the inner vessel, or the potential perception of hypocrisy that a religious freedom conference is hosted on a campus that for tens of thousands adds the specter of expulsion to the already difficult business of finding one's feet during the challenging years of emerging adulthood? 

In any case, as an expert on religious freedom who just articulated the meaning of religious freedom, I expect a far better performance in applying that articulation to a real life question.  Put the lesson you just taught us to work! Less than ten minutes ago you articulated a specific, structured approach to these questions. Permit a reminder during which I evaluate your application of your own approach, line by line, in blue. You said:

"I have attempted to lay out a straightforward description of religious
freedom that can be easily understood and used to defend this right in the battles
looming ahead. Of course, other may have additional suggestions. I welcome those.  There is a battle over religious freedom at BYU, so your description is applicable here.

The fundamentals of this definitional approach are to first identify the groups
claiming the right of religious freedom,

1) Individuals (and families) The question stem identifies "LDS students who manifest or practice their conversion to Islam, atheism, or Catholicism." These LDS students are individuals. Not only do you entirely sidestep the soul-wrenching internal struggles of theses LDS students whose consciences dictate that they should follow Allah, or leave religion, or become Catholic: not once in your analysis did you identify these students as claimants of the right of religious freedom.
Since (A) manifesting conversion and (B) practicing Islam, atheism, or Islam are both obvious religious exercises, yours is a glaring oversight.

2) Religious associations, and You spoke at length about the religious freedom claimed by a religious association: presumably, in this case, the LDS Church. However, your identification is dead wrong, as the situation presents no burden on the religious freedom of the LDS church, including its internal autonomy. As explained above:
(1) The policy is owned and administered by BYU, which is not a religious society. Some would go as far as to claim that it is instead a university (come to think of it, that's how you described it immediately preceding) whose primary transaction is the granting of secular academic degrees.
(2) The LDS church's ability to decide its membership is not affected or implicated by the policy, church membership and student status being entirely independent. 

3) Society at large You appropriately did not mention society, since public square analysis is not relevant in the context of the question.
Doing so, I believe, will direct attention to the rights of religious associations and
society that are often overlooked. You did direct attention to religious associations, in harmony with your attempt to counterbalance what you claim is their relative neglect. In doing so, you have gone too far the other way, and entirely neglected the religious rights of individuals.
Second, I have attempted to identify key principles underlying the right of religious
freedom from each group.

1) For individuals, this is the
a. right of conscience This right is directly implied by the question stem, as manifesting conversion and conversion itself are often, if not usually, matters of conscience. Given how deeply held and intimate religious belief, identity, and practice is to those who have typically spent decades in the LDS Church, the rights of conscience of LDS BYU students merits special (or at least the normal level of) protection. LDS students that convert fear to raise their voices, explore their questions, and direct their lives because of the magnitude of consequences BYU chooses to impose on them. No analysis is complete that fails to at least acknowledge the reality of the tears, struggle, depression, and relational strain experienced by students whose religious minds are either questioning or convicted of a path besides that offered by Mormonism.
The 18-25 age range is the peak time during which, according to some emerging adulthood literature, people are most likely to leave their childhood faith (see e.g. Arnett, Emerging Adulthood). Were Joseph Smith to have and proclaim a First Vision while an LDS student at BYU, your analysis would unquestionably affirm his consequent expulsion.
To summarize, unnecessarily adding to the already difficult stress of a faith transition clearly burdens the right of conscience, a fact you omitted. 

2) For religious societies as entities, this is the
a. right to not be subject to discrimination vis-à-vis other organizations,
b.  the right to internal church decisionmaking or autonomy, and
c. the right to retain the historic uniqueness of religious associations. You spoke at some length about church decision making; however, as is likely becoming monotonous by now, such arguments are irrelevant as there is no church in the situation whose uniqueness, autonomy, or discrimination is threatened. 

3) For society at large, this is the
a. obligation to permit and the right to hear religious voices in matters
of public policy." Again, not germane here.

This exercise feels so reminiscent of law school exams; except perhaps that I'm doing the grading. Ugh, that reminds of taking the bar.

Anyway! Let's continue the analysis, now that we've finished applying his analysis to his own application of that analysis.
but I would suggest that that is one way to think about that and to think about whether or not society does have a right to withhold its fellowship, if you will, to others who reject its religion.

Are you suggesting again that the ability to enroll or have an earned degree post is fellowship of a religious society? That is bizarre. Membership, disciplinary status, temple worthiness, the privilege of participating in meetings or rituals: these are the indices of religious fellowship, not whether you can sign up for weightlifting next semester. In any case, once again, BYU is not a religious society.

Now this is short, however, of legal impediments. Obviously a person who no longer studied at BYU would certainly have the right to study at another university, so a fundamental right has not been taken away if they leave.  

I agree that no fundamental right to study at a university has been deprived. I would note however, as you fail to, that barring a current student from enrolling or graduating is pragmatically equivalent to an employment termination, and as such is a heavy burden to most students. Consider if you were fired from your current job. Wouldn't you, at the least, have to pay transition costs such as a period of lost wages between jobs, the uncertainty of job searching (especially after being involuntarily terminated), having to establish new networks, and losing the comparative advantage of the institutional understanding you'd earned through your work to-date? The consequences are similar for university students.

Additionally, again as a practical matter, it is not always feasible to pick up and go elsewhere, as BYU credits frequently do not transfer to other educational institutions. Three examples: 

1) Religious credits:  many schools do not accept these.
2) Graduate or unique programs: very few credits are accepted. MPA programs, for instance, usually accept no more than 6 credits from a transfer. Students in the final or penultimate semester of their programs thus lose 1-2 years worth of credits, plus the opportunity cost of the year they spend repeating coursework.
3) Law school: obligated to only graduate students that spend their last two years in the graduating school, a law student in her last or penultimate semester has to spend five years with its attendant tuition and opportunity cost to obtain a three year juris doctorate.  Identifying a fundamental right to study at a university is relevant, though barely. Omitting likely, heavy real life consequences while spending time addressing a barely relevant right reflects poorly on your grasp of the burden on the individuals' religious freedom.

Additionally, you euphemistically speak of "a person who no longer studied at BYU" and "if they leave" without attributing the actions (barring enrollment and graduation) to the actor (BYU). Phrases that would reflect an understanding of who is claiming (step 1 of your approach) and who is restricting religious freedom include "a student that BYU bars from enrolling" and "if BYU expels." The students in the question stem did not leave; they manifested conversion or practiced a religion. It was the institution who acted in response by penalizing the students' behavior.

Just in the same way that someone who is excommunicated from the church, they have the right to join another one if they choose or to comply with the requirements to be reintroduced into the fellowship of that church.

That's nice, though irrelevant and not entirely accurate. The students in the question stem were not excommunicated: instead, they were barred from enrolling and graduating. Additionally, as a factual matter, individuals are not legally privileged to be reintroduced into a religious society's fellowship. A religious society could permanently excommunicate a member without recourse and bereft of the obligation to provide a pathway for return.

In terms of ICLRS and our standards, I think that's what we would do, we would just I would assert to you that we would consider those values, and the right of religious associations to have internal decision making power.

You conclude with your weakest argument, as internal decision making is neither threatened nor implicated by the scenario.

As an analytical endnote, you arguably had at least one success. According to your own religious tenets (at least presumably), religious associations are temporary institutions whose duration and importance pales when compared to the immortality and import of a human soul. Your analysis favors the actions of churches over people, and exalts the value of the agency of a corporation above the value of preventing grievous and unnecessary intrusions on the religious agency of what the law calls "natural persons" (and the scriptures, "children of God"). Your answer thus succeeded in giving absolutely zero consideration to the value of protecting the religious free agency of God's sons and daughters, the only entities in the scenario worth saving.

And that does it: response analyzed.

The Emperor's Clothes: Religious Freedom and BYU Law's International Center for Law and Religion Studies

A few days ago I received an email from the J. Reuben Clark Law Society of which I am a member:

December ICLRS Religious Freedom Discussion

Please plan to attend our next Religious Freedom Discussion on Wednesday, December 5, 2012, from 12-1 p.m. MST when Professor Robert T. Smith presents “A Contest of Greatest Importance: The Battle over the Meaning of Religious Freedom.” 

I can't wait. I just registered for the webinar. I would like to participate in the dialogue: to that end, I will comment on the text of the invitation below in blue.

In an important address delivered at BYU-Idaho titled simply “Religious Freedom,” Elder Dallin H. Oaks stated: “There is a battle over the meaning of that freedom. The contest is of eternal importance, and it is your generation that must understand the issues and make the efforts to prevail.” (Emphasis added).

To prevail in this battle, we must first understand what is at stake. We intuitively understand that persecution or torture based on one’s religious beliefs is a gross violation of religious freedom. But what of the government requiring Catholic schools and hospitals to provide contraceptives as part of their employee health insurance plans? Is this a violation of religious freedom?

What indeed? I think Elder Oaks and I would agree that there is an inherent tension between the government's constitutional interest in protecting religious freedom and other legitimate government interests. I would add a few "what of's" to Elder Oaks' borderliner example. What of:

• Some people being exempt from complying with federal laws prohibiting animal torture and slaughter, out of a religious practice of animal sacrifice?
• Some organizations being allowed to terminate an employee based on that employee's status within a particular religion? (e.g. CPB v. Amos, where a man’s exercise of religion cost him his job at the hands of the LDS church: SCOTUS said, “Undoubtedly, Mayson's freedom of choice in religious matters was impinged upon, but it was the Church (through the COP and the CPB), and not the Government, who put him to the choice of changing his religious practices or losing his job.”)
• Religions being privileged to discriminate in other ways comparable organizations are prohibited from doing, e.g. refusing to hire on the basis of sexual orientation? 
• A religious marriage practice (polygamy) being criminalized?
• The United Congregation of Paul employees opting out of paying social security or other payroll taxes?
• Some people getting a pass on peyote or cannabis consumption due to religious affiliation?
• A parent being privileged to prohibit their children from being educated past eighth grade due to religious belief?
• Some children being denied needed blood transfusions due to a parent's religious belief?
• Parents being privileged to compel the religious participation of their adolescent children?
• Some organizations (say, the Jewish Transhumanist Association) being exempt from complying with federal genetic engineering regulations?

Though I don't immediately answer these questions, I think Elder Oaks and I would agree that there should be both a floor and a ceiling to the scope of religious freedom. I think we also both agree that religious speech (declaring one's religious affiliation or beliefs, and preaching and publishing about the contents of those beliefs) is safely nestled between those two bounds.

The answer depends in great part on how we define what religious freedom is.   

I absolutely agree. Let me speak to what I consider to be three crucial criteria, admitting my lack of scholarship on the subject:

Whether we construe religious freedom as an individual or an institutional liberty 

The First Amendment identifies both an institutional (establishment of religion) and individual (free exercise) component to the religious freedom protection. The First Amendment contains a mix of individual and institutional liberties: press, assemble, speech, and petitioning. Prayer in schools and religious displays in public places capture most of the borderline controversy on the establishment (organizational) side: free exercise is where most of the action centers.

Institutional and individual religious freedom frequently conflict. For example, the policy at BYU is to kick out those who convert while at BYU. More narrowly, the burden falls on the religious freedom of the LDS majority: you can come Muslim and leave Catholic, or come Presbyterian and leave Mormon, but if you come Mormon and try to leave atheist or Rastafari, you lose the ability to (1) enroll, (2) graduate, and (3) receive an otherwise-earned diploma.
*[For the sake of disclosure, I should mention that I have fiercely and publicly opposed this policy (see my activism and writings here, here, and here). I should also note that my brother is a victim of the policy (a BYU senior, he chose to be forthright about his conversion to atheism and was consequently barred from graduating)].

The bottom line is that religious freedom is often a zero-sum game: the religious institution cannot simultaneously retain the power to terminate a student or employee on the basis of religious exercise while the individual enjoys protection from the same.

Joseph Smith embraced the individual worship aspect of religious freedom in the well-known Article of Faith 11:
“We claim the privilege of worshiping Almighty God according to the dictates of our own conscience, and allow all men the same privilege, let them worship how, where, or what they may.”  He certainly claimed that privilege previous to establishing a religious order: he entered and exited the grove without a religious affiliation, and endured persecutions long before organizing the church.

On the other hand, the article does use plural terms (we,
our, men, them, they), and Joseph did subsequently canonize a position on institutional religious freedom:
"We believe that all religious societies have a right to deal with their members for disorderly conduct, according to the rules and regulations of such societies; provided that such dealings be for fellowship and good standing; but we do not believe that any religious society has authority to try men on the right of property or life, to take from them this world’s goods, or to put them in jeopardy of either life or limb, or to inflict any physical punishment upon them. They can only excommunicate them from their society, and withdraw from them their fellowship.” -D&C 134: 10"

Does one's progress towards graduation or livelihood constitute "this world's goods" that are deprived from Church LDS employees or LDS BYU students that elect to follow their religious consciences into atheism or Catholicism? Would a policy of disfellowshipment or excommunication alone be more in harmony with both secular and Doctrine and Covenant constructions of individual and institutional religious freedom? To what extent does one or the other prevail when constructing religious freedom?

How we discern between religious and non-religious activity

This criteria must be defined as well to answer the constitutive question of what religious freedom is. I table discussion of this question here and here.

What level of burden qualifies as an impingement

Let me start by pointing out that the religious freedom scope properly centers around how burdened religious exercise is, rather than actual restriction of religious belief or practice. For instance, being unable to detect an internal belief, the state cannot forcibly restrict the same. Instead, they can only regulate the expressions of religious belief: religious exercise. That regulation can vary from light to heavy.

Torture or execution as a result of one's attendance at church or declaration of religious affiliation is clearly an excessive burden on religious exercise. Requiring an organization to (1) identify as a religion, or (2) comply with campaign finance laws, though burdensome at some level, are examples of light impositions. The magnitude of the burden can and should matter when defining the scope of the religious freedom privilege.

Now that we've identified three essential criteria that must be defined to answer the constitutive question, let's return to the invitation email. 

Unfortunately, today there is great pressure to narrow the concept so that it includes little more than religious worship. Equality and discrimination norms increasingly label religious protections as contrary to public policy.
Some favor an outright rejection of the concept of religious freedom claiming that rights of speech, assembly and the press, which apply equally to all organizations, are adequate precisely because any additional protections in favor of religious persons and religious organizations are discriminatory.

I think this depiction of one of the arguments against favoring religious organizations is fair. However, there may be some merit to the evolving norms referenced. Certainly not all eighteenth century Constitutional norms are desirable (e.g. the lack of status of women and slaves), and indeed the harms free exercise was designed to mitigate may have shifted in a way that merits a directional change in interpreting the clause. In a zeitgeist where governmental/religious entanglement proved the most salient danger, the prohibition against favoring a particular religious establishment merited specific attention.

However, the cultural milieu which gives birth to oppressive behaviors has changed significantly. Past prejudices disproportionately targeted categories such as Jew, woman, and Black. Atheists, Muslims, and gays [in that order] now lead the charge in capturing society's vinegar. For instance: all else being equal, an atheist is about 8 times as likely to be rejected as a presidential candidate than a Jewish person.

SCOTUS's Justice Souter wrote: "government should not prefer one religion to another, or religion to irreligion." Given religion's gains over the last couple centuries and the deep cultural prejudice against the irreligious, is that latter juxtaposition perhaps now deserving of a greater relative share of attention?

An analogy to Affirmative Action schemes is relevant here. Though clearly discriminatory, affirmative action quotas can help to level an unbalanced playing field. Once the underdogs are on equal footing, though, their subsidy should cease. Given the robust legal and cultural safeguards in place to protect religious exercise and religious institutions, it may be time now to cease singling out activities and entities deemed religious for special privilege over irreligious activities and entities.

In this battle over the meaning of religious freedom, historical arguments are being amassed suggesting that our Founding Fathers desired a “Godless Constitution.” Making this case, a scholar recently titled his book “The Myth of American Religious Freedom” because laws have historically favored moral conduct when by design the government should be amoral, giving no preference to conduct founded in religious tradition.

The battle over the meaning of religious freedom is thus shifting subtly as religious protections are labeled discrimination and preferential treatment of religion is decried as unequal. Unless we fully understand the meaning of religious freedom, we are in danger of losing this most cherished “First Freedom” of our Bill of Rights as it is inexorably defined away, leaving little left to be protected.

This argument relies on four logical fallacies: (1) the straw man argument, (2) non sequitur, (3) failure to state, and (4) argument from popularity.

First, the argument depicts Mr. Sehat asserting that the government should be amoral by design, and that the Founding Fathers wanted a Godless Constitution. In contrast to that depiction, Michelle Deardorff proposes a fairer summary of the scope that work:

"David Sehat’s book, THE MYTH OF AMERICAN RELIGIOUS FREEDOM, is an engaging exploration of the continuous and seemingly irreconcilable debates over the meaning of the free exercise clauses found in the federal Constitution and in numerous state-governing documents. An intellectual historian, Sehat argues that many of our current debates between the political left and the right, particularly the Christian right, are situated in both groups’ mythologizing the Founding and the free exercise clause, as well as in their interpretation of religious liberties. Ask any schoolchild or most educated adults about the origins of our nation and most Americans will reply that a group of colonists, persecuted for their religious beliefs and practices while in Europe, came to the New World seeking religious liberty. While they initially preserved their own religious beliefs, they soon came to believe that their sole salvation would be in the protection of the religious beliefs of all. In the retelling of this myth, conservatives focus on the centrality of personal religious belief in this narrative and liberals emphasize the emergence of liberty of individual thought. THE MYTH OF AMERICAN RELIGIOUS FREEDOM argues that not only are both versions, and most Americans, wrong with their iterations of history, but that these competing myths can be traced back to the late Eighteenth Century and through the intervening decades. Because political adversaries are using identical language to convey vastly different ideas, the conflict between them is inevitable and dramatic. Sehat contends that if there was a more accurate understanding of the notion of “religious freedom” as it was initially conceived and if both parties understood the suppositions beneath their contentions, at a minimum, a more civil discourse could emerge and ideally we would generate a better understanding of our own history of religious conflict."

Second, the assertion relies on the proposition that preferring conduct founded in religious tradition is necessary for a moral government. This is a non sequitur, as religions do not enjoy a monopoly on morality and moral governments can exist bereft of a preference for conduct founded in religious tradition. Additionally, the argument asserts the necessity of understanding the meaning of religious freedom to avoiding the risk of losing the same. However, it is possible to prevent that loss without a full understanding, and in any case even a full understanding is insufficient to prevent the risk, as it may well be the case that the narrower construction of religious freedom asserted by the opponents of preferential treatment matches and preserves the meaning of religious freedom, fully understood. To assert that a broader construction is the full meaning is to beg the question (I guess that brings the fallacy total to five): the thing to be proved is used as an assumption.

Third, though the argument knocks down the straw man it erected, it constructs nothing in its stead. Concluding that there is a need to understand the meaning of religious freedom may be necessary to avoid its loss, but pointing out the need is insufficient. Without establishing the affirmative case, how will we know whether or not religious freedom is lost?

Last, the argument appeals to the presumed bias of the largely LDS audience: even if the audience similarly decries the inexorable loss of a cherished freedom caused by the godless's unfortunate labeling activity, popular does not equal right. Bloodletting was quite popular and revered, but also dead wrong (in addition to deadly).

I think a more interesting argument revolves around the relative benefits religious organizations offer, and how to allocate the cost of privileging the generators of those unique benefits. For instance, there is a basic liberty value in allowing people to take up whatever hobby they want. However, the shoplifting enthusiast, anti-poverty activist, and rugby fan do not all contribute value equally to society through their hobby activity. There is a reasonable basis for curtailing the shoplifter's hobby, and for rewarding the anti-poverty activist.

Why should our state and federal judges privilege religious organizations over irreligious ones? Are the beliefs of Peace Corp disciples or the practices of Apple adherents less deeply held, or perhaps less beneficial, than that of Catholic ministers? Is the activity of Twilight fans or the NRA less valuable than the contributions of Sikhs or the Baptist church?

We might also ask: is favoring religion over non-religion necessary to elicit the unique benefits of religious activity? Compared to equally treating religion and non-religion, are the cost-benefit tradeoffs net positive?

This Discussion Series Lecture by Professor Smith will seek to clarify the definition of religious freedom so that its full meaning may be preserved.

Once again, the argument begs the question. Barely one sentence ago, criticism was leveled at the act of defining, namely the defining acts that constrict, rather than contract, the magnitude of religious freedom. The solution to the problem of identifying the proper magnitude of religious freedom cannot then merely be whatever definition leaves a lot to be protected. Criticizing the opponent's act of definition, then proposing the act of definition to resolve the question, only works if you assume what you set out to prove: specifically, that a definition broader than the opponent's is the correct one.
 
I have spoken with two BYU Vice Presidents and multiple actors from the International Center for Law and Religion Studies (including it's Director, W. Cole Durham) on the subject of religious freedom at BYU. None of these interlocutors seemed particularly exercised by the fact that LDS BYU students must choose between following the dictates of their consciences to convert on the one hand, and retaining the ability to enroll, graduate, and have their degrees post on the other. Were Brigham Young to follow his conviction to take on additional spouses while managing LDS facilities, he could not contest his own subsequent employment termination. Were Joseph Smith to have his First Vision while a LDS BYU junior, he could not himself graduate.

The ICLRS invites the world to convene on the campus of the very school that would unceremoniously withhold an otherwise earned diploma because a student answered the call of Islam to follow Allah.  That none of these well-informed men detect a level of hypocrisy in convening a discussion series that endeavors to define and preserve the meaning of religious freedom makes me wonder: am I missing something? Perhaps I am alone in the perception that the Emperor is showing just a little too much skin.

Just the same, I look forward to his speech.

The Religious Freedom Discussion Series is sponsored by the International Center for Law and Religion Studies at Brigham Young University, J. Reuben Clark Law School.

Here's my article, published by the Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technology:

Reaching Heaven: How and Why to Perpetuate the Myth of Free Will

Brad Carmack

Ethical Technology

http://ieet.org/index.php/IEET/IEETBlog

September 13, 2012
Predictably Irrational. Dan Ariely’s work on “the hidden forces that shape our decisions” captures well the truth of human decision making: “free agents” exercise their agency in ways both (1) predictable and (2) irrational.

I read Ariely’s work about a year ago as a research assistant in law school for a text about law and logic. Through that research, I learned that our decisions are not free in the sense that each alternative is equally available for selection in the way, say, typing Y is just as easy as typing N. Instead, our choices are influenced by a host of cognitive biases, heuristics, and contextual factors such as the recency effect, availability heuristic, and consistency bias. 

Over the year since I finished that research, I have gradually converted to the determinist camp. Below I illustrate (A) why it is useful to treat illusory free will as non-illusory, and (B) how the illusion of free will informs the ethical use of technology.

(A) Why it is useful to act as though free will is non-illusory

First, let me acknowledge that many well-founded thinkers contest my premise that free will is illusory. That debate, however, is outside the scope of this article. To avoid a lengthy discussion of causal determinism, hard materialism, quantum decoherence, and compatibilism, I will thus disclose my bottom-line conclusions and move on to why I argue it is useful to treat free will as existing.

So here’s the disclosure: I am a hard materialist, incompatibilist, and hard determinist. For those new to the free will dialogue, that means I think that, at the level of a simulating consciousness such as your average Joe, decisions are determined rather than free. As J. J. C. Smart suggests: if determinism is true, all our actions are predicted and we are not free; if determinism is false, our actions are random and still we do not seem free.  As one author points out, Sam Harris offered a similar opinion:



“In his book, The Moral Landscape, author and neuroscientist Sam Harris mentions some ways that determinism and modern scientific understanding might challenge the idea of a contra-causal free will. He offers one thought experiment where a mad scientist represents determinism. In Harris’ example, the mad scientist uses a machine to control all the desires, and thus all the behaviour, of a particular human. Harris believes that it is no longer as tempting, in this case, to say the victim has “free will”. Harris says nothing changes if the machine controls desires at random - the victim still seems to lack free will. Harris then argues that we are also the victims of such unpredictable desires (but due to the unconscious machinations of our brain, rather than those of a mad scientist).”


For reasons discussed at length on my blog, I agree with Smart and Harris. However, in the context of moral decision making, I find pragmatic reasons to sustain the illusion of free will.

Moral responsibility
If all behavior is determined, then certainly there is no behavior worth praising or censuring, right?  To illustrate: a man commits a crime while sleepwalking or because of a brain tumor. Certainly we wouldn’t hold him as morally accountable as we would a comparable criminal with full capacities: right?

Drawing on my pragmatist philosophical foundation, I would posit that moral responsibility is as true as anything, because it works in the context we’re familiar with and communicating in.  Permit an explanation, using the illustration of fully capable Jane Employee, who has just been hired and needs to decide which of five health plans to select.  

As she views the screen in front of her, Jane’s consciousness flits back and forth between five alternatives almost effortlessly (though, in truth, thoughts are not free, but are instead shackled to the price of the action potentials and neurochemical motion that constitute them- good luck thinking “freely” without them).  Like most humans, though, Jane is a lazy decision maker and will avoid choosing if she can. “What’s the default if I don’t choose?” she might ask, hoping to finish her election before lunch. 

Also like most human decision-makers, Jane’s cognitive capacities are hobbled by a host of biases and heuristics, to say nothing of competition for her limited conscious bandwidth.  For example, she might fall prey to the recency effect, and select the last option merely because it was the one most recently presented to her. Alternatively, she might choose the first (primacy effect). If Jane was raised in a collectivist culture (say, east Asian) rather than an individualistic Western one, she might weight which plan spreads cost the most equitably amongst the most people. Or, perhaps her father counseled her to eliminate the middleman, but she feels angry that he didn’t call her on her birthday and so subconsciously rebels against his counsel and feels inclined to choose the middle of the three options (associative bias).

The point of this illustration is that the number of factors relevant to any decision event are extremely large, and fall far outside our conscious computational capacity.  From our perspective, the constricted data inputs we sense, combined with the incredible complexity of our world, creates the perception of agency and of a future that we can help create.  Taken together, it appears to us as though we have a conscious self, exercising moral agency in a world where future states are highly unpredictable.  

This perception is sufficient to justify treating moral responsibility as though it were true (even though free will is, upon examination of the brass tacks, an illusion).  One might analogize this paradigm to Einstein’s theory of relativity: call it the “Theory of Agentic Relativity” if you wish.  

This Theory of Agentic Relativity maintains the ability to make moral judgments, even in the absence of free will. The Theory can even survive the
Argument that Free Will is Required for Moral Judgments,
which goes like this:

  1 The moral judgment that you shouldn’t have done X implies that you should have done something else instead
  2 That you should have done something else instead implies that there was something else for you to do
  3 That there was something else for you to do implies that you could have done something else
  4 That you could have done something else implies that you have free will
  5 If you don’t have free will to have done other than X we cannot make the moral judgment that you shouldn’t have done X

Our ignorance of the knowledge needed to predict the effects that deterministically flow from the predicate causes of the past creates the needed #2 and #3.  It appears to us as though we have options (and indeed that very perception becomes a cause that affects the effect that is the choice: the decision might be quite different sans the perception of agency).  This perception makes morality meaningful, but only in the context of (A) an empathy-programmed community possessing (B) a limited ability to model the determinants of their own behavior.  Thus far, evolution has provided modern Homo sapiens communities with both. 

To summarize, there is no reason to refrain from pursuing or enforcing morality as long as these two hold: (1) ignorance about the future (creating the perception of agency) and (2) the existence of an empathy-based community of consciousnesses (creating the relevance of morality).

(B) How the Theory of Agentic Relativity informs ethical use of technology

In order to have the empathy-based community which makes morality an interesting question, the members of the community must possess the mechanics of empathy. At some level, these mechanics must include the ability to (1) perceive another’s emotion and (2) internalize that emotion. (In this context, I define emotions roughly as well-being status updates, you know, like the ones you used to read on the legacy Face—s that preceded Face—book).

The wellspring of empathy in Homo sapiens is the TPJ/MNS neurosystem, regulated by hormones. Human brains have a temporal-parietal junction system (TPJ) and a mirror-neuron system (MNS).  The TPJ separates “self” and “other” emotions and searches the brain for solutions. The MNS allows you to feel the emotion of another (emotional empathy).  To illustrate, I draw on these gender-averaged facts:
*  When the male’s face stops imitating the emotion of a woman (he’s left the MNS), for instance, she feels he doesn’t care - whereas the guy merely switched to TPJ and is trying to solve the problem. 
*  Men turn off or disguise their facial expressions to suppress showing their emotions.  Females, on the other hand, exaggerate an observed emotion in another.
*  These realities are correlated to estrogen/oxytocin for women and testosterone/vasopressin for men. Switch the hormones and you switch the MNS/TPJ ratio.

These on-average gender behaviors demonstrate the two empathy ingredients noted above: the ability to (1) perceive another’s emotion and (2) internalize that emotion.

However, these empathic communities are by no means guaranteed. Emerging technologies will alter the parameters that make the illusion of free will pragmatic to uphold:
*  More human consciousnesses will become ever-more aware of the determinants of their own choices
*  The possibility of creating consciousnesses outside a community of other empathic consciousnesses will become a reality
*  The ability to predict the decisions of legacy humans will rise


However, until those parameters entirely dissolve, there are some tweaks that tech users and governors can employ to leverage and perpetuate free will benevolently. 

First, use what Cass Sunstein and Richard Thaler suggest in their 2008 book, Nudge: Improving Decisions about Health, Wealth, and Happiness: choice architecture. Understanding the predicates of human decision making, a company might, say, set the health care plan that incentivizes daily exercise as the first option (to benefit from the primacy effect). Or, a state licensing board might set organ donation as the default, mandating an opt-out rather than an opt-in.
Second. As we create consciousnesses in the future, we can and should deliberately add the building blocks of free will:
*  The ability to simulate
*  The meme, “I am a free agent”
*  A block to awareness of the causal factors underlying decisions of the self
*  Ample empathy

As we design the future to include the mechanics of the golden rule (empathy and free will), we engender a future where benevolence is not only possible, but probable. Who knows? We just might make heaven: and that is the most unpredictably rational outcome of all.

Romance intersects law student loan debt

I just came across an ABA article entitled:

QUESTION OF THE WEEK

Has Student Loan Debt Impeded Your Romantic Relationships?

Even before I read other commentators' answers, I knew my answer was a big fat "yes."  Before I explain why, let me give you a flavor of the responses. Here's what one respondent wrote:

"Six years ago, when I was beginning my third year of law school, I was lamenting how I had put my romantic life on hold until after graduation and the bar exam. The fact that I knew I wasn’t going to be dating anyone for at least a year seemed incredibly cruel.

But it got worse. I really struggled with the bar exam and with finding well-paying work. Now it’s been five years since graduation and the combination of low income and high student loan debt have put my romantic life on hold for six years now. Six years!

Imagine meeting attractive women, but not being able to ask them out on dates, lest it turn into a relationship—simply because you know you can’t afford it. It’s really weighs heavy on the outlook for my entire life."

Now, I realize that law grads aren't the only ones whose grad programs and post-grad debt loads stress and limit their romantic lives. However, as a group, law grads do experience some significant obstacles.

• Their grad programs are predictably and consistently demanding. 
• The stress and time burden of law school often displaces the time and resources needed for romantic relationships.
• The critical nature of their training sometimes bleeds over into their perception of the behaviors and motivations of themselves and others. The newly-forged abilities to confront and argue don't always stay in the cage, either. 
• Many of them graduate with exceptional debt loads, not uncommonly between 120-150K. 
• Many struggle to find any employment, adequately compensated employment, or employment within the law: sometimes for years or more after graduation.
• The jobs that are in the law and adequately compensated are often extremely time-demanding and stressful; many romantic relationships are strained by these pressures.

Many of these motifs were evidenced in the responses.

Though most commentators addressed the tension of adding a large debt to the liabilities of a potential partner, my story addresses the side of the grad student him/herself.

I felt frustrated by how long I had to wait to be able to even job search after choosing to go to law school.  I decided to attend law school in October of 2007, and first became capable of advertising myself as a licensed attorney one month before 2012, over four full years later. (I took the LSAT in November 2007, applied in the spring of 2008, began law school in the fall of 2008, graduated spring of 2011, took the bar in July 2011, and took the attorney's oath in December shortly after learning I had passed the bar: that's about as fast as you can do the process). It is difficult to earn money during the summers or during grad school due to the course load and the need to complete externships. Bar prep takes three months of full-time work. Waiting on bar results takes a full four months. And in addition to the opportunity cost of earning income, the bar costs 2 grand, bar fees .5 grand, and bar prep 3 grand.  Graduating into a long-saturated legal market means the job prospects are lackluster.

For me, these ingredients combined to produce an indebted and stressed law grad. Yes, I had the security of knowing I could go home to Idaho if I needed to, but I had long since deliberately left behind the live-with-your-parents-at-28 approach, and had no interest in pursing a life in Idaho.  Yes, I was able to scrape together some meager partial employment sufficient to keep me afloat. Yes, a year later I was blessed with a fantastic and adequately compensated position. In the meantime, though, I floated from place to place to save on rent, lapsed medical insurance, used the internet in libraries and coffee shops, job searched until my list of information interviews bled my pen dry and, worst of all, feared the day I'd lack the ability to make my student loan payments.

For me, there's an intimate relationship between my self-esteem and my ability to pay my own bills. I have no children, and my mind and body are healthy and capable. I have three degrees (Biology and MPA too) and over 20 years of formal education. There was no place in my personal narrative for an individual in my position to fail to pay my own bills. Some debt is fine, (as a general principle home or education investments are rational) but defaulting is failure. Now, this view may be neither reasonable nor charitable, perhaps, but it was my view and my proximity to broke wore heavy.

During this period I dated a steady girlfriend for over a year. We were an excellent match and enjoyed each other very much. We communicated well, and she was supportive of the significant faith transition I was going through at the time. She could care less about my financial condition and was more than willing to have me live with her (at age 31, she'd been employed full-time for four years, was pursuing her master's degree online in the evenings, and had bought a home). An avowed gender egalitarian, it didn't bother me that the better financially-positioned partner was female and I male. However, there was still a hesitation I just couldn't shake: one that had nothing to do with her.

Then at the end of one very romantic night, she proposed marriage. There was no particular reason to say no: I loved her, we both wanted family, we were real with each other and we have similar religious, geographic, and socio-economic backgrounds: hell, we met on eHarmony for Allah's sake! [It doesn't hurt that we communicated well and both spoke each other's love languages (words of affirmation and physical touch), and that she's very attractive.]

But I couldn't say yes. To propose or agree to marriage, for me, required a foundation of financial self-confidence. Not necessarily funds, mind you: though it would have been tight, we'd probably have been okay on her salary until I found steady, higher-dollar employ. And it wasn't that I demand wealth: I've never been terribly interested in money outside eventually having enough to pay middle-class expenses. No, the bankrupt account was not our combined net, but instead my self-confidence: that integral part that refused to turn a blind eye to the ever-present bottom line. For me, I had to be confident I could pay my own bills before I could make an important life decision like marriage.

My partner didn't understand. To her, "love was her whole happiness" (thank you Bublé); why would a temporary spat of underemployment coupled with student loan debt matter more than that? Even after I explained what I was experiencing, she figured something else was the problem, and worried about what that else might be.

I tried. For months. I lingered locally, hoping for either a job or a change of confidence, but eventually I broadened the net of my job search. She was so accommodating, she was even willing to move to where I wanted. Eventually, she tactfully raised the question of marriage again. Long before she brought it up, though, I had already spent weeks agonizing about it.

I remember those days, soul-searching and sometimes crying in sadness or frustration during my runs along the riverbank. Something inexplicable smoldered within me: an anger at myself and the system perhaps, that I had spent so much money, time, hope, and opportunity cost for a credential that rewarded me so meagerly in the one area I really cared about: having a predictable source of income adequate for an above 20K/yr lifestyle. I don't know, maybe it was shallow: but this I do know, that inadequate employment/income was the primary cause of my marital hesitation.

I knew how much she wanted to marry me and I knew I wouldn't be ready until I had a few months of drinking from the healing waters of an income stream that I had earned. Plus, I felt I had to be mobile enough to interview in other areas, and I knew I couldn't afford interstate trips after seven straight years of school followed by seven straight months of under/unemployment. I wanted to lessen her pain and restore my confidence canister, so I broke up with her and launched a two-month programme of couch surfing, informational interviews, hundreds of job applications, and contract work in another state.

Now, nearly nine months later, I am two months into a fabulous job with a top-notch manager and a stellar work culture. My girlfriend moved on long ago. I am just now seeing the light: I feel I'll be ready to open myself to a potentially marital romantic relationship at some point in the next month or two.

FWIW, that is how this law grad's student loan debt impeded his romantic relationships.

See also:

Call Me Maybe When Your School Loan Is Paid In Full

by JENNIFER LUDDEN (NPR)

Is Law School Loan Debt Ruining Your Love Life?

By STACI ZARETSKY (Above the law)