Religion can do a lot of things. It can inspire, create conversation, cause disputes, but recently religion seems to be coupled with one thing specifically: fear. After the attacks on 9/11, religion has been the epicenter of a lot of discussion. Let it be the Al-Qaeda declaring war against the West in the name of God, or the conservative branch in America who thinks marriage between a two individuals is a slap in the face of God himself.

From the United State’s point of view the point of religion of most concern is the religious groups who believe the attacks on 9-11 were justified. Even though some theorists believe the 9-11 attacks were conspiracy staged by the government itself – but we won’t get into that.

The New York Times reported that federal prison chaplains were ordered to remove religious materials and books from the chapel libraries that are normally available to prisoners.

Many prisoners, angered by removal, have filed a class action lawsuit for the violation of their right to practice religion, which is guaranteed to them in the First Amendment.

Traci Billingsley, a spokeswoman for the Bureau of Prisons, said the agency was acting in response to a 2004 report by the Office of the Inspector General in the Justice Department. The report recommended steps that prisons should take, in light of the Sept. 11 attacks, to avoid becoming recruiting grounds for militant Islamic and other religious groups. The bureau, an agency of the Justice Department, defended its effort, which it calls the Standardized Chapel Library Project, as a way of barring access to materials that could, in its words, “discriminate, disparage, advocate violence or radicalize.”

Not everyone is a terrorist. But if you’re in prison and religion brings you some kind of comfort no one has the right to take it away from you. First Amendment! Hello!?

The attempt to neutralize “recruiting grounds” in jail for potential terrorist cells is a lame attempt to flex the muscle of homeland security. These people are in jail. JAIL. I wouldn’t be so much worried about terrorist cells developing because of the amount of religious texts at the local chapel libraries – but more worried about the hell the prisoners are going to raise because of the blatant injustice that is being tossed at them.
—Eming Piansay