Hobby Lobby Ruling: "The end of the beginning."

Today the Supreme Court ruled in favor of religious liberty, one of the foundations of our teetering civilization. Certainly we are happy with the ruling--because anything else would have been catastrophic.

But let's step back a little, historically. The fact that a government of the United States could blithely, without a second thought, compel U.S. citizens to violate their deeply held religious convictions, is outrageous. And remember: the HHS mandate not only violates the First Amendment, but threatened conscientious objectors with fines of $100 per day per employee. And for what? Free contraceptives.

Rush Limbaugh put this in perspective today:  

"In the Hobby Lobby case, narrow though it may be, the Supreme Court, by 5-4 majority decision, defended liberty. And it should be noted that even after this decision, birth control remains widely available. It is dirt cheap no matter where you want to go get it. The fact is, if you wanted to be entirely -- well, not entirely -- if you wanted to be somewhat negative about this, you could say that the most appalling thing about today's decision is that we had to even endure it, that we had to even go through this.

We had to sit on the edge of our seats to find out if people who own a for-profit company will also be allowed to exercise their religious views under our laws. The fact that that was up for grabs is an indication of where we are nationwide and where we're heading. I think it's just amazing, given that we're supposed to have freedom of religion enshrined in the Constitution, it should never have been an issue. The only reason it is is because we have a political party today conducting an all-out assault on the Constitution because they don't like it."  Emphases added.

I think that is the correct way to view today's decision. Yes, it is a victory--but we are taking back ground that should never have been lost in the first place. Our situation reminds me of Churchill's statement after the second battle of El Alamein. The Nazis still held most of Africa and continental Europe, so the great Englishman, while happy with the victory, knew it needed to be put in perspective:

"This is not the end, it is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning."