FFRF and Faithful America host protest event during Trump’s all-day Sunday prayerfest 

The Freedom From Religion Foundation and Faithful America are joining forces to co-sponsor a provocative protest this Sunday, May 17, over the entanglement of government and Christian nationalism on the National Mall that day.

President Trump has proclaimed “Rededicate 250: National Jubilee of Prayer, Praise & Thanksgiving” in the capital’s central space on Sunday. In response, the two groups will be erecting a 15-foot-tall balloon of a golden calf with a Trump-like visage, which Faithful America first debuted on the National Mall in October 2024 next to signs such as “False prophet.” The balloon will go up on green space on 3rd Street between Jefferson and Madison near the Mall and Capitol.

FFRF, a national state/church watchdog whose 41,000 members are largely nonreligious, is pleased to be working with Faithful America, a network of progressive Christians confronting white Christian nationalism.

“We want to ensure there is a presence in support of separation between religion in government during this spectacle of Christian nationalism hosted by the federal government,” says Annie Laurie Gaylor, FFRF co-president. “And we can’t think of a better image than this tongue-in-cheek golden calf.”

A new poll that Pew Research Center has released in the shadow of the White House’s “large-scale revival” finds that a majority of adult Americans (52 percent) think “conservative Christians have gone too far in trying to push their religious values in the government and public schools.” A majority (54 percent) of Americans also say that the government should enforce the separation of state and church while 13 percent say it should stop such enforcement. Only 10 percent of U.S. adults have a favorable view of Christian nationalism.

Trump announced the all-day prayer fest during remarks at the National Prayer Breakfast in February. The full-day spectacle of prayer, testimony, scripture and worship calls on Americans to gather “to rededicate our country as One Nation to God.” FFRF has lambasted the prayer rally, noting that speakers at the overtly sectarian gathering include major Christian nationalist figures alongside cabinet members, and Christian bands playing along with military bands. FFRF has also criticized the numerous cabinet officials who’ve released slick endorsements via videos and social media.

“This government-sponsored prayer fest is the epitome of exactly what our secular Constitution forbids our government from doing: putting on church, placing its imprimatur on religion and conferring governmental blessings to a particular faith that can only be called MAGA Christianity,” Gaylor says. “It is a fusion not only of church and state, but also of our federal government with Christian nationalism.”

FFRF’s Freedom of Information Act request seeking information on public funding is on appeal, so financial details are murky. “One nation under God” is the theme of the prayer fest’s sponsor, Freedom 250, an initiative President Trump announced in December that a group of senators is investigating for possibly siphoning off up to $100 million in taxpayer dollars intended for America 250, a campaign created by Congress to celebrate America’s birthday with inclusive civics events, not religious revivals.

Gaylor points out that almost a third of U.S. adults today have no religious affiliation and an additional 7 percent belong to non-Christian faiths, and concludes, “We are part of ‘We the People.’”

The Freedom From Religion Foundation is a U.S.-based nonprofit dedicated to defending the constitutional principle of separation between state and church and educating the public on matters relating to nontheism. With more than 41,000 members, FFRF is the largest association of freethinkers (atheists, agnostics and humanists) in North America. For more information, visit ffrf.org.

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Freethought Radio – May 14, 2026

After reporting alarming Christian nationalist news, we talk with Amy Littlefield, author of “Killers of Roe: My Investigation into the Mysterious Death of Abortion Rights.”

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Americans still favor state/church separation despite Christian nationalist push

The Freedom From Religion Foundation is pleased to report that a new Pew Research Center survey offers an encouraging reminder.

Despite the growing noise of Christian nationalism in American politics, most Americans still reject the idea of churches controlling government or politicians using religion to wield power. The findings arrive amid increasingly aggressive efforts by religious nationalists to blur the line between church and state, including a White House-backed Christian nationalist revival in the heart of Washington, D.C., this Sunday calling for a “rededication” of America as “One Nation under God.”

Most notably, Pew found that nearly eight out of 10 Americans say churches and other houses of worship should not endorse political candidates, and two-thirds say religion should stay out of day-to-day political matters altogether.

“That is a powerful reaffirmation of America’s secular Constitution,”says FFRF Co-President Dan Barker. “Most Americans still support the basic principle of separation between state and church — and are looking for greater separation between politics and religion.”

The survey also found that support for enforcing state/church separation remains stable, with a majority of Americans saying the government should continue enforcing it. Significantly, the already small share of Americans who want the government to stop enforcing the separation of religion and government has actually declined in recent years.

FFRF says this demonstrates that while Christian nationalist rhetoric may dominate headlines and political rallies, it does not represent mainstream public opinion.

“The loudest voices are not necessarily the majority,” notes Barker. “Most Americans still understand that secular government protects everyone’s religious freedom, including the freedom to not practice religion at all.”

The survey also shows growing public awareness of Christian nationalism itself. Nearly 60 percent of Americans now say they have heard at least something about the movement, a substantial increase from just two years ago. Importantly, unfavorable views of Christian nationalism significantly outweigh favorable ones, with only 10 percent favoring it.

FFRF posits that as more people see attempts to inject Christianity into public schools, lawmaking and government institutions, they’re becoming more aware of the threat it poses to democracy and religious liberty.

The survey also found that a majority of Americans believe conservative Christians have gone too far in trying to impose religious values through government and public schools. FFRF says that concern reflects growing public unease over attacks on secular education, reproductive rights, LGBTQ+ equality and religious freedom.

At the same time, FFRF notes that the survey contains warning signs that cannot be ignored. Support for declaring Christianity the nation’s official religion has increased modestly in recent years, particularly among Republicans.

Still, the broader picture remains clear: Most Americans do not want a theocracy.

The survey’s findings show that the Constitution’s promise of secular government remains precious to the American public — an encouraging sign for everyone working to defend the constitutional principle of separation between state and church against an increasingly organized and well-funded Christian nationalist movement.

The Freedom From Religion Foundation is a U.S.-based nonprofit dedicated to defending the constitutional principle of separation between state and church and educating the public on matters relating to nontheism. With more than 41,000 members, FFRF is the largest association of freethinkers (atheists, agnostics and humanists) in North America. For more information, visit ffrf.org.

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The 3 Things Christians Choose Instead of Truth

USDA employees sue after Sec. Brooke Rollins promotes Christianity in official emails

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In an attempt to beat back the rising tide of Christian Nationalism in the government, federal workers at the U.S. Department of Agriculture are suing the agency and Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins for using her position and the department to illegally promote Christianity.

They say she’s actively and regularly proselytizing in work emails, “promoting her own preferred brand of Christian beliefs and theology to the captive audience of employees that report to her.” And she acts like her religion is the default faith for the entire agency.

They have plenty of examples, too. Like on Independence Day last year, when she concluded an email with the phrase, “May God continue to protect the United States of America and may His favor shine over all her land.” Or in November, when she cited “gratitude towards a loving God” for inspiring the first Thanksgiving. Or just before Christmas, when she sent out a video saying “The spirit of generosity flows from the very first Christmas when God gave us the greatest gift possible, the gift of his Son and our Savior Jesus Christ, who came to free us from our sins and open the door to eternal life. This is the reason for the season.”

While the first couple of examples might be forgivable, the Christmas one was more of a sermon, and the pattern is one of escalating religious rhetoric. And that really came through in an email sent to everyone on April 5 to mark Easter.

Notice the wording (emphases mine): “Today we celebrate the greatest story ever told, the foundation of our faith, and the abiding hope of all mankind… [T]his Easter let us too be alive with hope, full of Paschal joy, and confident in the mission each of us has been called for… One Nation, Under God.” The lawsuit adds how she also references “the foot of the Cross on Good Friday,” “sin” being “destroyed,” “Hell” having “t[aken] a body, and discovered God,” and Jesus being “raised from the dead.”

On the same day she sent that email, she blasted out an equally deranged message on her official X/Twitter account, saying “Death has been defeated” and “Christ is King!”

You expect a pastor to lie like that, not a government agency head. Her mythology doesn’t speak for the department. Yet Rollins has repeatedly acted like her personal religion represents everyone who works under her. “It is exactly the sort of government-sponsored religious coercion, religious sermonizing, and denominational preference that the Establishment Clause prohibits,” say the Plaintiffs.

When a complaint was filed over that Easter email sermon, a USDA spokesperson told CNN, “The Secretary is within her rights to send a message to employees and the public on the Easter holiday. Just like Secretaries of Agriculture and Presidents have in the past.” Obviously, that didn’t address the substance of what she actually did. And acknowledging the holiday like other government officials in the past is very different from promoting one in particular, which is what Rollins did. It also meant she wasn’t going to stop using her platform to promote Christianity.

Like this tweet from September, honoring her God because it was a Sunday:

Or this one from early November. It wasn’t even connected to a holiday. It was just an unnecessary merging of her job and Christianity:

And just last week, she promoted the National Day of Prayer, quoting the Bible and falsely stating that “our country’s foundation is built on faith”:

It’s notable that Rollins hasn’t bothered paying even cursory attention to religious holidays for other faiths. (You won’t find a Hanukkah video, for example.)

Those seven Plaintiffs say they feel pressured to agree with Rollins on matters of faith and that refusing to go along with her delusions could lead to “negative consequences.” None of them has suffered those consequences yet, to be clear. But legally speaking, Christians have won plenty of legal battles arguing that they might be harmed in the future if they practice their faith, like refusing to make wedding websites for same-sex couples even if no one had asked them about it.

The Plaintiffs include religious and non-religious people who say they feel like they cannot be open about their faith because Rollins has made it clear only her religion matters. One of them asked to be removed from the email list Rollins was using to proselytize, but she was told by a higher-up that she couldn’t do that and that elevating the request even higher might “create trouble” for her. They’re asking the court—in this case, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California—to declare Rollins’ actions violate the Establishment Clause and therefore must stop.

Americans United for Separation of Church and State and Democracy Forward are the two groups representing the Plaintiffs, along with Bryan Schwartz Law. The National Federation of Federal Employees, which represents about 19,000 USDA employees is also a party in the lawsuit. They called the Easter email a “particularly egregious example of Trump administration officials abusing the power of public office to impose their beliefs on others and promote one narrow view of Christianity.”

In a sane world, this would be a straightforward case. But the Trump administration and its allies in the courts have repeatedly allowed Christians to get away with shit that no other religious or explicitly non-religious people would be allowed to do. No Muslim Secretary of anything would ever get away with sending a similar email about Ramadan.

And as if to dig in even more, when ABC News asked the USDA for comment, a spokesperson said, “While we do not comment on pending litigation, we will keep the plaintiffs in our prayers during this process.”

The irony is that the Department of Agriculture is very much an agency that should care about science and facts, not prayer and mythology.

Before Rollins was installed as Agriculture Secretary, she worked for Texas governor Rick Perry and led a couple of right-wing think tanks. She’s pretty much every character in The Hunting Wives rolled up into one. She’s been under fire for rescinding a Clinton-era rule that said no roads could be paved within national forests, a move that would further destroy our nation’s natural beauty. She also suspended financial awards to Minneapolis (and the entire state of Minnesota) for alleged fraud claimed by a right-wing provocateur even though his claims were wildly misleading. Which is all to say Rollins, like everyone else in the Trump administration, isn’t interested in doing her job but rather using her position to promote right-wing talking points no matter how much harm she causes to farmers and other people directly affected by her agency.

To be clear, the issue here isn’t that Rollins is religious. It’s that she’s apparently incapable of separating her personal faith from the institution she’s supposed to run. The Department of Agriculture isn’t a church. Federal employees aren’t her congregation. Either she’s unaware of all that or she doesn’t care.

That’s the arrogance at the core of Christian Nationalism. Rollins sees herself as a missionary in a position to force her views on tens of thousands of people at once. Her message isn’t subtle either: If you don’t share her theology, you don’t fully belong. And yet lawsuits like these are often treated, by conservative Christians, as evidence that Christianity is somehow under attack. As if saying “Merry Christmas” is now forbidden. That’s not what this is about. That’s the straw man we should all expect in response, though.

Even worse is how mundane this whole lawsuit feels. While the Plaintiffs are absolutely right to challenge all this, it’s hardly the most egregious violation of church/state separation we’ve seen from Republicans in charge. They’ve normalized abusing their positions so much that major scandals in previous administrations are just days that end in “Y” for this one. But the bottom line is that Rollins’ conduct is still illegal and the courts should say so.

FFRF warns about Trump counterterrorism strategy targeting secular Americans 

The Freedom From Religion Foundation is expressing its concern over the deeply authoritarian and unconstitutional language contained in the Trump administration’s newly released 2026 United States Counterterrorism Strategy.

The document pinpoints secular political groups, transgender advocacy and anti-fascist political activism as potential terrorists while promising aggressive government action against organizations deemed “anti-American” or “radically pro-transgender.”

FFRF, a national state/church watchdog whose membership is largely nonreligious, is concerned about the single but prominent reference to “violent secular political groups,” which appears to stigmatize nonreligious Americans. The document does not define “secular,” a term that can apply to anything that is not specifically religious and doesn’t necessarily refer to nonreligious individuals or groups.

“We know of no current ‘violent secular political groups,’ so it is chilling to see the administration connect violence with peaceful and educational secular advocacy,” points out FFRF Co-President Annie Laurie Gaylor. “The federal government has no business treating secularism, political dissent or support for LGBTQ+ rights as inherently suspect ideologies requiring surveillance and ‘neutralization.’”

FFRF emphasizes that secular Americans are not enemies of the state. Nonreligious Americans make up nearly one-third of the country, and younger generations are increasingly secular. Our secular Constitution explicitly guarantees freedom of conscience.

Perhaps in its most disturbing passages, the strategy states that “our national CT [counterterrorism] activities will also prioritize the rapid identification and neutralization of violent secular political groups whose ideology is anti-American, radically pro-transgender, and anarchist.” The White House document goes on to promise that the administration will “map them at home, identify their membership, map their ties to international organizations like Antifa, and use law enforcement tools to cripple them operationally before they can maim or kill the innocent.” This kind of language and rhetoric, which is associated with authoritarian governments, dangerously conflates protected political viewpoints and secular advocacy with terrorism and extremism.

The document portrays conservatives and Christians in the United States and worldwide as uniquely persecuted while depicting progressive political movements as looming internal threats. It specifically references “the politically motivated killings of Christians and conservatives” and cites the assassination of Charlie Kirk by “a radical who espoused extreme transgender ideologies.”

FFRF also condemns the document’s ominous embrace of extrajudicial-style rhetoric from President Trump himself, who declares in the document’s foreword: “If you hurt Americans, or are planning to hurt Americans, ‘We Will Find You and We Will Kill You.’”

Americans should be deeply disturbed by a counterterrorism strategy that combines militarized rhetoric with ideological targeting. Counterterrorism powers are dangerous tools, which, as history shows, can be used to target marginalized groups, dissidents and political opponents.

The document has already drawn widespread criticism from national security experts and former officials, who have described it as incoherent, amateurish and politically motivated rather than a serious strategic framework.

The administration’s criticism of “anti-American” ideology could be used to justify expanded surveillance, investigations or suppression of lawful advocacy groups and political organizations. Congress, civil liberties groups and the public should closely scrutinize the administration’s use of counterterrorism authorities to ensure that national security powers are not weaponized against secular Americans, LGBTQ+ advocates or political dissenters.

FFRF will continue to defend the Constitution’s foundational principles of freedom of conscience, secular government and protections for unpopular speech and minority viewpoints.

The Freedom From Religion Foundation is a U.S.-based nonprofit dedicated to defending the constitutional principle of separation between state and church and educating the public on matters relating to nontheism. With more than 41,000 members, FFRF is the largest association of freethinkers (atheists, agnostics and humanists) in North America. For more information, visit ffrf.org.

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FFRF insists that Ark. sheriff’s office halt inmate baptisms

Photo by Guido Coppa on Unsplash

The Freedom From Religion Foundation is urging the Drew County (Ark.) Sheriff’s Office to immediately stop encouraging or coercing inmates to undergo baptisms.

FFRF was recently informed that the Drew County Sheriff’s Office has been baptizing Drew County Detention Facility inmates. A March 12 post from the sheriff’s official Facebook page reads:
I am very proud of these 13 men and women (many I have known for years and even watched grow up) who made that public profession today at Pauline Baptist Church. While the Devil tried to do his best to ruin the day we would not allow that to happen. He made cuffs not want to come off and he even tried locking the rear doors on the transport van where detainees couldn’t get out to be baptized but we made sure to help fulfill God’s plan and we got them there.
I want to thank all of those who come and witness to these men and women and to our staff for making it work!
God is at work,
Sheriff Tim Nichols

FFRF is demanding that the Sheriff’s Office cease the practice of coercing inmates to participate in religious exercises. 

“By organizing, hosting and promoting inmate baptisms and celebrating inmates’ conversions to Christianity on its official social media, the Sheriff’s Office is unconstitutionally favoring religion over nonreligion, and Christianity over all other faiths,” FFRF Staff Attorney Sammi Lawrence writes to Sheriff Tim Nichols. 

A county detention facility is an inherently coercive environment and inmates and detainees are literally a captive audience. When the Sheriff’s Office entangles itself with religion and makes it clear that it’s encouraging inmates to convert to Christianity, inmates will no doubt feel pressured to convert and participate in religious activities to be seen as cooperative and well behaved. Inmates and detainees who are aware of the Sheriff’s Office’s promotion of Christianity will not genuinely feel free to refuse to participate in its religious activities. This practice is constitutionally impermissible. And the Sheriff’s Office’s promotion of religious activity needlessly marginalizes the 38 percent of Americans who are non-Christians, including the nearly one in three adult Americans who are religiously unaffiliated.

“It is egregious and unacceptable that a sheriff would arrange Christian baptisms for inmates, using sheriff’s department transportation, time and staff to take them from the prison to the sheriff’s church of choice,” FFRF Co-President Annie Laurie Gaylor says. “The sheriff may not involve himself or the Sheriff’s Office in the conversion of inmates, or use official communication channels to post his personal beliefs in God, not to mention ‘the Devil.’ We expect this to stop immediately.”

The Freedom From Religion Foundation is a national nonprofit organization with over 41,000 members and several chapters across the country, including hundreds of members and a chapter in Arkansas. Its purposes are to protect the constitutional principle of separation between state and church, and to educate the public on matters relating to nontheism.

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The 3 Things Christians Choose Instead of Truth

White House to host taxpayer-funded Christian Nationalist rally in D.C.

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The White House will host a Christian Nationalist rally this weekend to honor the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. That’s not me exaggerating what’s actually happening; that’s quite literally the plan.

“Rededicate 250: National Jubilee of Prayer, Praise & Thanksgiving,” taking place this Sunday on the National Mall, is described as a way for all Americans to come together “with Scripture, testimony, prayer, and rededication of our country as One Nation to God.” And of course they’re referring only to the Christian God because this administration has made clear religious freedom only applies to conservative Christians. (It’s happening shortly after many of those same Christians celebrated a right-wing Supreme Court ruling allowing states to suppress the power of the Black vote—another item on conservatives’ longterm wishlist.)

They’re calling it a “rededication” but that’s also a misnomer. America was never dedicated to the Christian God in the first place. Not legally. Not metaphorically either.

Nor is this by any means a private gathering. There are numerous corporate sponsors, and funding for the massive event comes in part from “millions in public dollars earmarked for the nation’s 250th birthday celebration,” according to the Washington Post. (The exact amount isn’t clear.) The event will technically be organized by the non-profit Freedom 250, but that’s a White House-affiliated group that some senators have already said could “violate federal bribery, conflict of interest, and ethics laws.”

The nine-hour event—capped by a literal worship service—will feature a slew of right-wing religious zealots, all of whom have looked the other way because Donald Trump pays them lip service while going against damn near everything the Bible teaches.

But it begins on Saturday with warm-up acts, including MAGA-aligned conspiracy theorists Sean Feucht, Eric Metaxas, Mark Driscoll, and Greg Locke.

Feucht referred to the event back in February after getting off a planning call with the White House. He said at the time, “I never would have imagined our own government getting behind revival meetings!”

Even the White House is echoing that idea. This is how the government’s website describes this event:

At sunrise, the National Mall will transform into a large-scale revival, beginning with worship, testimonies, and music, and culminating in a powerful national moment of prayer. Streamed to parishes, the event is amplified through coordinated media and a lead-up series with pastors and partners highlighting the Church’s role in history and civic life. A main stage and faith-based activations will set the scene for high-energy praise, prominent Christian artists, and major faith leaders, creating an energized moment of unity.

Right Wing Watch has a helpful rundown of all the “Christian Nationalists, Grifters, Charlatans & More” who will participate in this charade.

Outside of administration officials, the speakers include Dr. Larry Arnn (president of right-wing Hillsdale College), singers from Liberty University and Grand Canyon University, evangelist Franklin Graham, MAGA pastor Robert Jeffress, the actor who played Jesus in The Chosen, and dozens of other bootlickers. Pete Hegseth is also on the lineup, though it’s unclear if he’ll be reading from the Bible or the Pulp Fiction screenplay. There are a few non-Protestants in the lineup—former New York Archbishop Timothy Dolan, Minnesota Bishop Robert Barron, Orthodox Rabbi Meir Soloveichik—but all of them are conservatives who have a history of promoting Christian Nationalism. As the Guardian put it, “The lineup includes no Muslims, no representatives of historically Black churches, no Indigenous faith leaders and no mainline Protestants.”

And driving home the point that this now represents the country’s quasi-official religion, music will also be provided by the Air Force, Navy, and Marines.

But none of this paints an accurate portrait of the country—not now and not in the past.

“I’m unaware of anything like this, with this involvement of senior government officials, on this scale, trying to paint this false picture of the United States as a quote unquote Christian nation,” said Amanda Tyler, executive director of BJC, a Baptist group that aims to promote religious liberties through church-state separation as outlined in the First Amendment. “Trump’s rhetoric in the past 18 months is how he’s ‘going to make America Christian again,’ that it’s his job to push religion. This is all part of that piece.”

…

To say people who wrote the Constitution believed in God or prayed in public, said Princeton University historian Kevin Kruse, is as revelatory as saying they “wrote by candlelight.”

“It’s not causal,” he said. “Look at the document. The only rules they wrote about religion were ones that keep religion at arm’s length. No establishment, no limits on free exercise, no religious test for office.”

“There’s a difference between saying America is a nation with many Christians in it and that America is a nation dedicated to Christianity and defined by it,” Kruse said. “Those are very different things.”

The irony is that the Trump administration is seriously pretending this is absolutely not a Christian-only event:

The White House directed questions about the jubilee to Freedom 250. An adviser to the group, Danielle Alvarez, said the organization “welcomed input from faith leaders and communities across the country” and the event “will bring together diverse voices from many faiths, backgrounds, and communities to reflect on the extraordinary story of America.”

“Diverse voices from many faiths”! Right. Everyone from far-right Christians to further-right Christians.

When White House faith adviser Paula White-Cain hyped up the event two weeks ago, Brittany Baldwin, executive director of the White House’s 250 Task Force, addressed common questions she had heard, such as what the event will look like and how different faiths would be represented. Her response? “We’re really focusing on our heritage as a Judeo-Christian… Christian Nation.”

White-Cain soon added that Christians had raised concerns that the event might honor different religions—God forbid!—but rest assured, she told them, that no other faiths would be honored: “They’re like ‘Well, are we going to be praying to, like, all these different gods and stuff?’ But really, it’s about the history and the foundations of our nation, which was built on Christian values, on the Bible.”

She came so close to getting it. It would be pretty damn frustrating if a government-sponsored event included prayers to gods you don’t believe in… but she failed to connect the dots that that’s precisely what this event involves for the majority of Americans who don’t subscribe to her rancid beliefs.

I guess it makes sense that a celebration of Christianity is built on lies. Because in no way does this event represent the breadth of religious beliefs across the country. It doesn’t even represent the variety of Christian beliefs in this country. If the country gave a damn about its founding ideals, none of this would be happening at all since we’re supposed to be a secular nation that doesn’t pretend to have a national faith at all.

Instead, this event is being run by the very people who have spent decades spreading lies about our history—and trying to get those lies taught in public schools in places like Texas.

The all-day event — gates open at 9 a.m. and it will wrap at 6 p.m. —includes military bands, six Christian musical performers and speakers organized around three “pillars,” which the web site listed as “miracles” God imparted on America in the past, “personal testimonies of God’s healing” and a “unified moment of rededication.”

It also will feature one of the six 18-wheeler “Freedom Trucks” created by Freedom 250, which are traversing the country to teach about the founding of the nation. The material was created by two organizations that have led efforts to inject conservative content in K-12 classrooms: PragerU, a nonprofit that offers “a pro-American, Judeo-Christian message,” according to its tax forms; and Hillsdale College, a Christian school in Michigan.

For what it’s worth, there are alternative events honoring the nation’s 250th, though none will be as massive as this one. In Philadelphia, for example, later this month, American Atheists will host an event called “America Beyond 250: Reclaiming the Promise of Pluralism.”

America Beyond 250: Reclaiming the Promise of Pluralism is a half-day event that will push back against the dangerous and exclusionary narratives of White Christian Nationalism and advance a vision of a more inclusive and democratic future.

At a time when debates over history, identity, and belonging are intensifying at all levels, this event brings together advocates on the front lines, public thinkers, scholars, and community leaders to confront the stakes of our current moment and to imagine what comes next — and what we need to do to make the vision a reality.

The Secular Coalition for America added in a statement:

“America’s strength has always come from its religious freedom,” said Steven Emmert, Executive Director of the Secular Coalition for America. “Events like ‘Rededicate 250’ aim to link patriotism to Christian nationalist ideologies, which is both false and deeply alienating to the growing number of nonreligious Americans. National commemorations should unite Americans across diverse beliefs, not elevate one religious belief over others.”

…

“At a time when we should be reaffirming our commitment to pluralism and constitutional values, efforts like this move us in the wrong direction,” Emmert said. “Our national celebrations must reflect all Americans – not just those who follow a particular faith.”

Unfortunately, these voices of reason don’t control the purse strings or have the power.

What makes this event so disturbing isn’t just the selfishness and ignorance of everyone involved, it’s the way they’re tying patriotism into a religious rally. As if everyone who doesn’t share their faith is inherently un-American. These people routinely complain that Christians are victims of religious discrimination—to the point where the Trump administration had a sham task force to study “anti-Christian bias”—and yet here they are using the levers of power to promote their religion over all others. The same levers they use to oppress atheists, Muslims, and even progressive Christians.

They will use a taxpayer-funded stage backed by the White House, military bands, corporate sponsors, and millions in public dollars to claim they’re victims of religious persecution.

That’s the core of Christian Nationalism: There’s nothing spiritual about it. There’s no compassion involved. It’s just about uniting conservative Christianity with every branch of government to elevate faith over non-faith and one faith over all others.

The organizers of this spectacle aren’t interested in honoring the First Amendment or the concept of religious pluralism that actually defines this country. They’re going to do on the National Mall what they’ve been trying to do in history classes throughout the country: exclude voices that aren’t theirs in order to rewrite history and make themselves look like the good guys. That’s why they’re bringing in propaganda outlets like PragerU and Hillsdale College. They want everyone to accept a mythological version of America that never existed.

This ought to be a time of real celebration, but we aren’t going to get it because the sort of people who would’ve proudly supported the Confederacy (and everything it stood for) are now in charge. This rally doesn’t represent America, historically or morally. If anything, the founders went out of their way to prevent exactly this kind of government-backed religious favoritism from taking root.

The best we can hope for is that this event will one day be seen as a perfect example of how we strayed from any founding ideals worth preserving.

FFRF targets unconstitutional prayers by Arkansas archery coach

Photo by Balint Mendlik on Unsplash

The Freedom From Religion Foundation is urging the Valley View Public Schools system to immediately put a stop to a district archery coach’s practice of leading team members in prayers.

A concerned district parent informed the state/church watchdog that the archery coach at Valley View Intermediate School has a pattern and practice of leading students in Christian prayer before tournaments and official archery events, such as a recent awards ceremony. Audio provided to FFRF from this ceremony confirmed that the coach and what appeared to be a coach-selected student led the entire audience, including other students, in an explicitly Christian prayer. 

The parent who reported this unconstitutional practice explained that they are not religious and that they are “more than disappointed” that their child has been “exposed to such blatant proselytizing.” 

FFRF has written to the district to stand up for students’ and parents’ rights of conscience.

“Here, the archery coach is undeniably pushing her personal religious beliefs onto students by coercing the entire archery team to participate in prayers as part of official school-sponsored activities,” FFRF Staff Attorney Sammi Lawrence writes. “The coach is blatantly crossing the constitutional line and violating student-athletes’ First Amendment rights.”

Student-athletes are especially susceptible to coercion, and the relationship between student-athletes and their coaches is inherently ripe for coercion. Students know that their coaches control their positions on the team, including who plays in each game. When coaches lead students in prayer or direct students to lead their teammates in prayer, students will no doubt feel that participating in the prayer is essential to avoiding punishment, pleasing their coach, and being viewed as a team player. They are unlikely to speak up against their coach pushing religion on them, even if they do not feel comfortable. It is unrealistic as well as unconstitutional to make students choose between allowing their school coach to violate their constitutional rights or openly dissenting — with the risk of punishment and further retaliation.

School-sponsored prayer also needlessly marginalizes students, such as our complainant’s child, who are nonreligious, or those who are members of minority faiths. Statistically, nearly half of Americans born after 1996 are nonreligious.

FFRF asserts that to protect students’ First Amendment rights, Valley View Public Schools must immediately investigate and ensure that the Valley View Intermediate School archery coach ceases leading students in prayer and assigning students to lead other students in prayer.

“FFRF has long believed that students should never feel they have to pray to play,” FFRF Co-President Annie Laurie Gaylor says. “District sports coaches are well aware of the position and influence they hold. Students’ rights must be protected from coercive religious practices, especially when they feel participation influences their standing on the team.” 

The Freedom From Religion Foundation is a national nonprofit organization with over 41,000 members and several chapters across the country, including hundreds of members and a chapter in Arkansas. Its purposes are to protect the constitutional principle of separation between state and church, and to educate the public on matters relating to nontheism.

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