Religious Liberty on Display in Virginia Elections

Catholics in all 70 parishes of the Diocese of Arlington heard the same letter read from the pulpit last month. Bishop Michael Burbidge asked every priest to urge a “no” vote on the two amendments to the Virginia Constitution that voters will decide on Nov. 3.  

This is religious liberty at work, and in much of the world a bishop who did it would pay dearly. 

In Nicaragua, the Ortega-Murillo regime shut down Catholic radio stations, and Bishop Rolando Álvarez was convicted of treason, imprisoned, then exiled. In Hong Kong, police arrested Cardinal Joseph Zen in 2022 under Beijing’s national security law, and Jimmy Lai, the newspaper publisher and Catholic convert, sits in prison for his defense of democracy. In Nigeria, armed groups kidnap priests and seminarians while government officials willfully look away.  

In Virginia, when a bishop asks his priests to read a letter about life, marriage, and human identity, nobody is arrested. That is the freedom the First Amendment guarantees. 

The bishop endorsed no candidate and named no party. He wrote that the Church is not partisan, and the letter’s content bears him out. Question 1 would put a “fundamental right” to abortion in the state constitution. Question 2 would remove the definition of marriage that Virginians adopted in 2006 and, the bishop warned, enshrine gender ideology by “falsely separating the reality of one’s sex and gender.”  

Pope Leo XIV, the first American pope, made a similar point to the Spanish parliament in June, calling the defense of life “neither a partisan issue nor a confessional interest” but “a goal of civilization.” 

The Washington area has seen this before. In 2009, with same-sex marriage before the D.C. Council, Archbishop Donald Wuerl wrote to the 300 priests of the archdiocese to remind them of the Church’s teaching on marriage. He was doing what a church does: teaching its people.  

I will admit Bishop Burbidge’s public dedication to this cause surprised me. I expected one letter, but instead the amendments have kept coming up, at Sunday and weekday Masses alike. The faithful are being asked to fast on Fridays in October, to pray the Rosary and the Stations of the Cross (a devotion that follows Jesus to His crucifixion), and to keep a holy hour of quiet prayer and adoration. Most Catholics have never heard the Church take so bold and sustained a position on a ballot question. 

If any group in Northern Virginia is a sizable voting bloc for the good, the true, and the beautiful, it may be the 430,000 Catholics of the Arlington diocese. What unites them is the understanding that a vote can have moral consequences. Thankfully, their bishop is reminding them to treat it that way. 

Jesus told Pilate that his kingdom is not of this world, but that has never meant keeping faith out of public life. Our spiritual formation shapes the decisions we make here. We use whatever authority we have to promote the common good and each person’s flourishing, to protect the innocent, and to strengthen the family. 

The Religious Freedom Institute, which works for religious freedom for everyone, everywhere, and on whose board I serve, issued its own statement in support of Bishop Burbidge. Wherever people are persecuted for their faith, the stakes are high, and one of the best ways for the United States to defend religious freedom is to lead by example. A key part of that is letting faith communities speak plainly about their teachings in the public square.  

As a devout Catholic in the Arlington diocese, I have prayed the Rosary with my family on Sundays and the Stations of the Cross on Fridays, and we have taken up sacrifices we usually reserve for Lent. I want my children to learn that a conviction grows stronger through prayer and sacrifice. For me, the bishop’s letter is not an intrusion on anyone’s freedom. It is an exercise of the freedom I hold dear. 

Virginians will decide for themselves on Nov. 3. Whatever the result, Arlington has shown that religious freedom allows church leaders to say to the faithful what they hold to be true and to urge them to act on it.   

We publish a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of the Daily Signal.

Andrea Picciotti-Bayer is director of the Conscience Project. 

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