Alabama Loves Religion. Except When it Doesn't

From a N.Y. Times op-ed piece about Alabama refusing to allow an Imam into the execution chamber when an Muslim prisoner was executed:

Religious liberty is inconvenient. It sometimes requires that we work together to accommodate the religious practices and needs of various groups. It creates problems for anyone looking for quick, efficient solutions to complex issues — for example, whether a state that provides Christian chaplains in the death chamber must also provide an imam.

I am not a Muslim. I am an evangelical Christian minister in Alabama. But my religious freedom — everyone’s religious freedom — took a hit when my state decided that instead of slowing down to accommodate religious difference, the execution, which is final and irrevocable, had to go on as scheduled.

Read the entire column by Alan Cross, a pastor and a missional strategist with the Montgomery Baptist Association, is the author of “When Heaven and Earth Collide: Racism, Southern Evangelicals, and the Better Way of Jesus.”