The Impossibility of Religious Freedom: 'Legal Religion' and its Discontents

Winnifred Fallers Sullivan has written and taught on religious discourse in the US Supreme Court; the regulation of religious practice in US prisons; chaplaincy and the ‘naturalisation’ of religion; the legal establishment of religion; and the politics of religious freedom in a global context. Sullivan trained in the academic study of both Law and Religion at the University of Chicago, from which she holds a JD and a PhD in Religious Studies. In January 1998, the American Civil Liberties Union brought an action on behalf of the group of plot owners who would become known as the Warner plaintiffs. By analysing the testimony and cross examination of the plaintiffs, defendants and expert witnesses, as well as the resulting judgment, Sullivan suggests that Warner is proof of the problematic nature of legislation aimed at protecting freedom of religion. Sullivan’s work is informed by a school of Religious Studies that questions the boundary between religious and non-religious ways of being.