For the past 60 years, I held in trust a wooden model of the Mayflower. The Mayflower was the ship the Pilgrims sailed in 1620 as they migrated from England to the coast of America in search of a place where, without fear of punishment, they could practice their Christian faith. As I replaced the rigging on the Mayflower model and reglued the masts so that they could properly hold the varnished canvas sails, I began to contemplate what the Mayflower ship represented. It seems heroic that the Pilgrims were willing to risk their lives to leave England and to sail across a treacherous sea in a ship as small and unstable as the Mayflower, as I was taught, in pursuit of religious freedom.

But then I asked myself if the Pilgrims’ desire to preserve their freedom of religious expression ever masked intolerance of another’s freedom of religious expression? And what does it mean to believe in religious freedom today when many Christian citizens support only political candidates who advocate for their flavor of Christianity while being intolerant of other religions? Is this the freedom of religion that the Pilgrims sought as they sailed on the Mayflower, to promote their own religious vision while repressing all other religious beliefs? Is this the religious expression, shaped by religious intolerance, that we as a nation today profess as sacred governance?