Sign of the times: the religious right has arrived in Washington.

Anyone who thinks the Religious Right is no longer a potent force in American politics needs to take a look at the front page of the Nov. 6 New York Times. (See page 14.)

There, in living color, you will find a large photograph of several of the invitees who came to the Ronald Reagan Building in Washington, D.C., to watch President George W. Bush sign a bill banning one type of late-term abortion.

Depicted in the photo sitting in a row are Dr. Adrian Rogers, former head of the Southern Baptist Convention; the Rev. Louis P. Sheldon of the Traditional Values Coalition; the Rev. Jerry Falwell, founder of the Moral Majority; Janet Parshall, a right-wing Christian radio talk show host; Jay Sekulow, top attorney for TV preacher Pat Robertson's American Center for Law and Justice, Attorney General John Ashcroft and Roman Catholic Cardinal Edward M. Egan.

Over the years, all of these individuals have, to some degree, attacked the separation of church and state and engaged in activities designed to undermine the protective church-state wall.

Incredibly, Falwell--who actually had the gall to blame America for the horrific terrorist attack of Sept. 11, 2001--is welcomed with open arms by White House staffers alongside some 400 other Religious Right luminaries and their allies.

Americans have mixed opinions about the law Bush signed. But a look at its history shows one thing clearly: It came about thanks largely to incessant lobbying by Religious Right groups that see the measure as one step toward a larger goal of making Americans' reproductive choices conform to theological dictates.

The Religious Right uses the same strategy with other "culture war" issues. They focus on a constitutional right and start chipping away at it. Eventually, they hope to eliminate it entirely.

Americans should not assume that the courts will always protect our freedoms. Bush has already named more than 160 federal judges. He has sought to put several nominees with radical views on the bench. A federal court system stacked with ideologues hostile to church-state separation will not protect us; it will merely rubber stamp the legislative handiwork of the Religious Right as implemented by its congressional allies.

Even without the use of words, The Times photo tells an alarming story. And the story will have a very unhappy ending unless the American people wake up and repudiate the Religious Right's extreme agenda.