February 2017 Church & State - February 2016

Maine Pagan Wins Right To Wear Horns In ID Photo

  AU admin

A Maine pagan priest won the right to wear goat horns in a state-issued identification card on Dec. 14, months after the Bureau of Motor Vehicles told him to remove them for an ID photo.

After telling the Bureau that he had contacted the American Civil Liberties Union, Phelan Moonsong, 56, received his horns-inclusive ID in the mail within days. The Bureau had previously told him to appeal its decision to Maine’s secretary of state.

Moonsong argued that the horns, which he has been wearing since 2009, are a part of his religious attire.

“As a practicing Pagan minister and a priest of Pan, I’ve come to feel very attached to the horns, and they’ve become a part of me and part of my spirituality,” he told The Washington Post. “The horns are part of my religious attire.”

Women who cover their hair for religious reasons and men who wear religious headgear have often been accommodated in government-issued ID photos. Moonsong argued that his case was similar. His supporters noted that the horns didn’t obscure his face in any way.

BREAKING NEWS

Americans United & the National Women’s Law Center file suit to challenge Missouri’s abortion bans.

Abortion bans violate the separation of church and state. Americans United and the National Women’s Law Center—the leading experts in religious freedom and gender justice—have joined forces with thirteen clergy from six faith traditions to challenge Missouri’s abortion bans as unconstitutionally imposing one narrow religious doctrine on everyone.


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