Kate Hawley: The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia ruled on Tuesday that the federally-funded AmeriCorps gang can teach in religious schools. But if they want to teach anything religious, they have to strip their AmeriCorps uniforms. One can only imagine a series of theatrical quick changes: AmeriCorps polo shirt on for math class, but quick, whip it off in time for prayer assembly. On for biology, off for catechism. On for history, off for the Bible as literature. Wait. That one’s complicated. Maybe they could wear their AmeriCorps shirt only half on. Just around the neck, or over one arm. Maybe inside out? So you could read the AmeriCorps logo, but backwards? Would that be Satanic? Undemocratic?

In a ruling last July, U.S. District Judge Gladys Kessler said it’s too hard to monitor the separation between religious and non-religious teaching. But the appeals court reversed her decision, and AmeriCorps is pleased, on behalf of the kids. Why should they be deprived of AmeriCorps services, just because they go to religious schools? Especially when preventing the insidious creep of religion into public policy is a simple matter of costume. As long as AmeriCorps teachers don’t count religious teaching towards their service hours requirement, and they keep those shirts out of religious classes, they’re free to do as they please.

Who knew a shirt could be such a weighty signifier? For AmeriCorps, it functions as an anti-vestment — a guarantee of secular identity. Religion is the subversive winner here, because it defines the terms. The fault lines have been drawn — your clothing defines you as religious, or not. There is no neutral position, unless you eschew clothing altogether. Maybe that’s the solution: totally topless. Let the court deal with that one.