No religion has a right to criticize its neighbor and then, when others rise in protest, to say it is being persecuted. If a religious group does not wish to risk having its own words condemned as “homophobic” or “sexist” or “racist” or “anti-Semitic” or “Islamophobic” or anything else, it is best not to make such charges in the first place. For, when one group bears witness against another in the public sphere, the rest of us have a duty to protect our neighbors from unwarranted slander. No group should be allowed to hurl public accusations, and then retreat behind the protected velvet curtain of private religion. Democracy has no room for hit and run pietists.