Friend:

We are living through a moment when First Amendment rights are being tested like never before. This includes a complete resurfacing of a tragic part of our country’s history – the misuse of religious freedom to advance a discriminatory political agenda. Today, I want to share a few things AU is doing right now to call attention to this unfortunate pattern and to defend the right to believe or not as we choose, as long as we don’t harm others.

First, the next course in AU’s Summer Speaker Series, “Religious Freedom as a Social Justice Issue,” will feature AU Senior Faith Adviser Dr. Sabrina Dent joined by faith leaders Tahil Sharma, Charles Watson and Victoria Hamilton to discuss how racial and religious minorities in America have often experienced religious freedom. Click here to RSVP to join this course at 3 pm ET this coming Tuesday, June 16th.

Second, AU’s legal team has gone to court to help an atheist who paid a heavy price for refusing to participate in mandatory religious activity. In 2015, Mark Janny was on parole in Colorado when his parole officer required him to live at a Christian homeless shelter that mandated he participate in religious programming. Mark objected to the mandatory worship services, Bible studies and religious counseling and asked to live elsewhere.

Mark’s parole officer refused his request and revoked his parole when Mark subsequently declined to attend the services. As a result, Mark was then jailed for another five months. He did not fare well when he represented himself before a lower court, so this week, Americans United, joined by the ACLU and law firm DLA Piper LLP, stepped in to represent Mark on his appeal and overturn this violation of Mark’s First Amendment rights. You can read more about the case here.

Finally, Education Secretary Betsy DeVos continues to exploit the pandemic CARES Act fund as a piggy bank for diverting taxpayer dollars to private, often religious education. And President Trump, during yet another photo op at a church Thursday, and also in a tweet, touted private school vouchers as a misguided response to the public outcry for racial justice. Our public policy team is working with members of Congress to fight against any new federally funded voucher programs, and our communications team is working to make clear that economically disadvantaged families and communities of color should not be used by this administration to advance a private school voucher agenda. Public funds should support public schools.

It is your partnership that allows our team to defend religious freedom during times like this. Thank you for your support, and please remember, if you or your friends ever feel that a violation of church-state separation is occurring in your community, report the violation to us on our website.

In solidarity,