“…our debate about religious freedom should include a conversation about freeing religions and religious people from prejudices that they needn’t cling to and can indeed jettison . . . rightly bowing to the enlightenments of modernity.”

Thus spake Frank Bruni in an April 3 op-ed column in the New York Times.

Mitchell Gold, a prominent gay philanthropist, had been more specific when he told Bruni: Church leaders must be made “to take homosexuality off the sin list.”

 “Be made” to take something “off the sin list” “Be made” by whom?

“Deep-seated cultural codes, religious beliefs, and structural biases have to be changed,” insisted Hillary Clinton at the “Women in the World Summit” in New York on April 26. Otherwise, girls and women would never experience “full participation in every aspect of their societies.”

“Full participation” is deep-seated Clinton code for access to any kind of abortion at any time during pregnancy paid for by the public. But she’s not saying it outright, because most voters don’t like abortion. It’s on their “sin list.”

Glad we’ve got that clear now. Religion is the enemy of health and happiness. To solve today’s social problems all we need to do is jettison yesterday’s religious beliefs. Hope the imams in Syria are listening and willing to oblige.

Clinton and Bruni are talking about what motivates their constituencies: Total sexual freedom without hindrance or consequence.

Are those really the issues that Democratic funders and voters consider of supreme importance?

What has Hillary said about Baltimore lately?

Didn’t there use to be “deep-seated cultural codes” that caused people to respect policemen? To obey parents? To refrain from stealing, and setting fire to other people’s cars?

If she were being logical, Hillary would be delighted that our society seems to have discarded those “cultural codes” pretty easily.

Didn’t there use to be “structural biases” about marriages coming before baby carriages? Didn’t fathers impose “deep-seated cultural codes” on their sons in the name of civilization?

Clinton should be happy. Those structural biases seem to have vanished pretty much without a trace. At least in some parts of Baltimore.

Welcome to the future under the Clinton/Bruni kulturkampf ultimatum.

In his 20-minute filibuster at a press conference with the Japanese Prime Minister on April 28, President Obama talked about how “we” need to care more deeply for Baltimore’s kids in deprived circumstances by voting in the new government programs he wants. “They’re our kids,” he said.

Uh, Mr. President: They are their parents’ kids.

Or is that idea a “prejudice” religious people “needn’t cling to” any longer?

In 2008, Hillary waxed eloquent about how religion is “a spur, an anchor, to center one in the storms, but also to guide one forward in the day-to-day living that is part of everyone’s journey.”

Hmmm . . . sounds like the description of a cultural code or structural bias to me.

Oh, how long ago did she say it? Guess she must think that the activist and donor base of the Democratic Party have “bowed to the enlightenments of modernity” and she has to play to a new audience—she ought to know.

As her mentor Saul Alinsky said, whatever works.

Looking at Baltimore, it’s worth asking: Does it?

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Connie Marshner organized her first pro-life meeting in 1971, among Capitol Hill staffers who sensed a drift toward legalizing abortion.  She’s worked in the movement in one capacity or another ever since.