Competent adults should be free to believe and do whatever they want so long as they do not violate the 3L Legal Principle. That what they believe falls into the category of religion is irrelevant. The entire issue of separation of church and state becomes mostly irrelevant if we simply adhere to the 3L Legal Principle. Many people champion a strong separation of church and state because they either fear the state will forcefully impose religious mandates on those who reject those mandates or fear the state will forcefully prevent religious people from peacefully practicing their particular religion. Simply adhering to the 3L Legal Principle resolves both reasonable concerns.

Competent adults should be allowed to peacefully exercise their religious views, whether they adhere to a majority religion or a minority religion, without interference from anyone. Likewise, atheists, agnostics, and other nonbelievers also have an absolute right to entirely reject, and be free from, all religions or any belief in any god so long as they are peaceful. Like everyone else, nonbelievers have a right to be left alone and live as they please so long as they do not violate the 3L Legal Principle. As in the case of defending the rights of others to engage in offensive speech or non-violent racism peacefully, a genuine commitment to the 3LP is evident when non-believers zealously defend the peaceful rights of believers and vice versa. Such mutual respect for the views of others is a prerequisite to having any effective free exchange of ideas and discussion on this subject in any event.

That a person interprets their religion to require them to violate the 3L Legal Principle should also be irrelevant to the law. The law should never permit anyone to violate the 3L Legal Principle for any reason, including religious or non-religious ones. People of faith and people of no faith should be treated equally under the law. No special rights should exist for any person, group, organization, or government.

Our goal should always be to enforce the 3L Legal Principle in a just, reasonable, and fair manner while always affording due process. The government’s role is not to mandate or even send messages regarding what to believe or how to run our lives properly. While private citizens are free to peacefully advocate for and do what they please with their bodies, property, money, and time, the government should remain officially neutral on the issue of religiosity generally. While people remain free to attempt to persuade others to adopt their particular beliefs, coercion consistently violates the 3L Legal Principle and must be strictly prohibited by law.