A truly amazing story emerges from the US of state intrusion on a home Bible group. Home Bible study groups are extremely common among Evangelical Protestants the world over. Typically those who attend their local church on a Sunday go to someone’s house in mid-week to study and discuss a given section of the bible.
One of these groups has been visited by San Diego officials. The group has been told it doesn’t have a permit for ‘a religious assembly’ and therefore shouldn’t have been meeting in the house. It is believed a neighbour complained to officials because of the number of cars on the street. (How many can there have been? These groups typically comprise a dozen or so people at most).
When an official quizzed the owner of the home, Mr Jones, about the meeting, the official demanded to know “Do you have a regular meeting in your home?”; “Do you say amen?”; “Do you pray?”; “Do you say praise the Lord?”. The questions were aimed at determining whether it was in fact ‘a religious assembly’ taking place.
San Diego authorities are currently trying to determine whether a permit is really required and whether the meeting really did amount to ‘a religious assembly’. In the meantime the group will be allowed to go on meeting.
However, one way or the other this is an extraordinary attack on the right of free assembly. People meet in one another’s houses all the time, often for parties which often involve much greater numbers of people than would attend a Bible study.
Perhaps the cranky neighbour who complained to the authorities is a follower of Richard Dawkins, annoyed that Christians should be meeting in large(ish) numbers on his street. Or maybe he just doesn’t like having cars on his street, in which case he must hate parties.
But would officials have called to the house if a party was taking place provided it wasn’t too noisy? Highly unlikely. Why then did they call to Mr Jones’ house?
This is part of a growing trend whereby Christians are finding themselves under pressure for practising their faith in ways long tolerated. In Britain, workers are being disciplined and harassed for wearing crosses. A nurse is suspended for offering to pray for a patient. A teacher is suspended because he didn’t want to attend a gay rights course.
Now the right of a group of private citizens to meet without the permission of the state in order to study the Bible is being questioned. This is getting mightily disturbing.