must be able to differ in structure and substantive content. People must be able to practice their own religion in the way they want to... and this cannot happen if all religions in America are made equal in structure and practice. The individual conscience in a certain religion, however, must be treated the same as any other religion. A Christian conscience must be treated the same as that of a Buddhist conscience. A Catholic conscience must be treated the same as that of a Mormon conscience, and so on. One cannot discriminate against a religion if all religions are indeed seen as equal in regards to the individual conscience. It would be like discriminating against someone because they do not like coffee with their breakfast. If one decides that they would rather have orange juice with their bacon and eggs, which is up to them. It is their choice. And just because someone else may happen to like coffee with breakfast, doesn’t mean that either person is any more or any less equal to the other. They simply have different tastes. So if one person was Jewish and the other was a Hindu, neither of them could be regarded as superior or inferior to the other. If their individual consciences were truly equal, they would just accept one another for who they are, not what religion they choose to practice. And other people in that particular environment would accept them as well. Perhaps the Jewish person does not like some aspects of the Hindu religion, or vice-versa, but that doesn’t mean that they are not equal. They simply have different tastes. Another question arises: "Should a religious conscience be equal to a secular one?" The answer to this is yes. If America is truly "the land of the free," then all consciences and individuals should be regarded as equal to one another, no matter if they are religious or secular. Ideally, this is what America stand for: freedom. The freedoms to be religious -- and freedom to be secular -- a...
