Some objections to the desire-based objection

In his stimulating paper, Bouke de Vries proposes a novel ‘desire-based objection’ to the constitutional recognition of an official religion. In developing this objection, De Vries’s stated target is a particular—and still largely theoretical—form of religious establishment, one that some political theorists believe could be compatible with liberal principles (see Laborde, 2017 for one argument to this effect). This is when recognition is entirely, or at least mostly, symbolic, as when clergy participate in formal state occasions or when religious symbols are displayed in public institutions. According to some, these symbolic manifestations of establishment might be compatible with liberalism, provided they threaten neither the freedom nor equality of all citizens, including members of minority faith communities as well as agnostics and atheists.1