Erica Bryant

@Erica_Bryant_

The American Humanist Association is decrying the city of Rochester's Clergy on Patrol program, saying that it "violates the First Amendment in an elementary sense."

Clergy on Patrol is a partnership between the Rochester Police Department and religious clerics who walk the streets with officers. The city has described the program as an effort to help build relationships and make the city safer.

The legal arm of the AHA sent a letter to Mayor Lovely Warren and Police Chief Michael Ciminelli saying that whatever good intentions lie behind the enterprise, Clergy on Patrol represents an inappropriate and excessive entanglement between government and religion.

"Even the name is of the program is disconcerting, as it implies that religious police are patrolling the city's streets — an image that is abhorrent to a free and democratic society," the letter reads.

The Rev. Marvin McMickle, president of the Colgate Rochester Crozer Divinity School, said embattled communities like some in Rochester need more efforts like Clergy on Patrol, not less.

"Activities that involve the church with governmental agencies ... that are simply opportunities for the church to join with government for the common civic good, ought to be encouraged at every level," McMickle said.

McMickle said there could be a concern if clerics use the streets to proselytize or drive people into their churches, synagogues or other places of worship.

"Any philosophy, any entity that would like to be a part of this going forth is OK with me so long as they, too, are not trying to advance an agenda," McMickle said.

The AHA is based in Washington, D.C., and works to protect the rights of humanists, atheists and other non-religious Americans. Attorney Monica Miller says the organization received a complaint from a Rochester resident who wishes to remain anonymous.

The seven-page letter says that "placing clergy in a role of official partnership with police, walking the streets with them and otherwise serving as official conduits to the community, has the effect of giving them status, thereby providing an endorsement of them and advancing their religious missions."

The AHA fears that the potential for unconstitutional coercion is vast. "A citizen approached by a pastor vested with apparent police powers may feel compelled to conform to the religious beliefs of the clergy in order to avoid adverse consequences of law enforcement."

The letter concludes with a demand that the city terminate the program.

A city spokesperson declined comment.

EBRYANT@DemocratandChronicle.com

Twitter.com/Erica_Bryant_