Friend:

Archbishop Desmond Tutu, still with us at age 90, wrote, “Hope is being able to see there is light despite all the darkness.”

Ten days from the Winter Solstice and the longest night of the year, I’m remembering to hold onto hope as religious extremists continue to attempt to impose their agenda on the country we love.

But hope only exists when we fully acknowledge what threatens it. For me right now, it’s the Supreme Court’s assembly line of cases chosen deliberately to eliminate the remaining restraints against state sponsorship of religion—including the radical, exclusionary and punitive beliefs of white Christian nationalism.

The case argued this past Wednesday, Carson v. Makin, could finish the job started by last year’s Espinoza v. Montana Department of Revenue, which required states to include religious schools in any tax-credit voucher program that funds private schools. A 5-4 majority drew the line at funding religious schools without addressing religious education itself; the super-majority that heard the Carson case this past Wednesday might erase that line altogether.

Should that happen, Maine taxpayers will be forced to pay student tuition at schools like Bangor Christian, which expels anyone who identifies as LGBTQ; requires teachers to be heterosexual, “Born Again” and “active, tithing member[s] of a Bible believing church”; teaches students to “[r]efute the teachings of the Islamic religion with the truth of God’s Word”; and views “the husband” as “the leader of the home.”

An hour down the road, Temple Academy accepts no students who are LGBTQ or do not subscribe to its Christian doctrines; requires parents to sign “covenants” affirming opposition to abortion and same-sex marriage; and requires students to attend religious services weekly and sign pledges to “to live a godly life in and out of school in order that Jesus Christ will be glorified.” Temple also rejects any student with same-sex parents and forces teachers to sign employment agreements stating that “homosexuals and other deviants” are “perverted.”

This could soon be your tax dollars at work!!

I wrote about the insidious, democracy-damning implications of Carson in an op-ed published in last Sunday’s Washington Post. Nearly 3,000 commenters ranged from outraged and angry to surprised and confused to learn about the case and its implications.

That outrage and surprise allow rays of hope to materialize—we can rally the majority who support church-state separation to understand what the dangerous Christian nationalist agenda portends for our country and to summon their collective power to stop it.

Once we fully understand the kind of country the Supreme Court’s six-member majority is ready to create, the awakened and infinitely bigger public majority can use every level of law, persuasion, politics and passion to push back. It won’t be easy and it certainly won’t be quick. But, as Dr. King reminded us, the moral arc of the universe is long but it bends toward justice.

In that, I have full confidence and hope. I feel the same way about you and our AU community. No one has a better understanding of what’s befalling our country, or a more passionate determination to rescue us from it.

As we look toward the fast-approaching new year, I hope it fills you with purpose and resolve, because we’ll need all that and more as we face this Court’s next assaults on religious freedom in the coming year.

So fortify yourself with loved ones, rest, good food and the unwavering belief that we—the inclusive majority—have every tool to prevail.

And accept my deepest thanks for all you do, and warmest wishes for a wonderful holiday season if you’re celebrating.

The fight is on. Rest up. Be ready. And never stop hoping because the success of the American experiment depends on all of us.

With hope and gratitude,