Friend:

In a double attack on religious freedom, the Supreme Court made vividly clear this week that our country needs a national recommitment to the separation of church and state. On the heels of Tuesday’s decision forcing Maine taxpayers to fund the teaching of a religion that is not their own, yesterday the court did the unthinkable—it abolished the constitutional right to abortion.

Never in my lifetime did I or many of us imagine Roe v. Wade would be overturned. The ultra-conservative bloc is out of touch with the majority of Americans and implementing a Christian nationalist agenda. The decision in Dobbs v. Jackson is a direct attack on the separation of religion and government.

As soon as the decision came down, I and many of AU’s staff joined the immense crowd rallying at the Supreme Court to protest the decision. We were there to be in community with others mourning the decision and to channel our outrage. And we were there to proclaim that religious freedom demands the right to abortion so people can make their own reproductive decisions about their own bodies according to their own beliefs.

Abortion bans undermine religious freedom by imposing one religious viewpoint on all of us. That’s why Americans United is readying religious freedom litigation which will bring this argument to the courts. This week, we take to the streets to voice our support for reproductive and religious freedom. Soon we’ll take that fight to the courts. We won’t back down, and we won’t go backward.

The Carson v. Makin and Dobbs decisions—and especially Justice Thomas’ concurrence in Dobbs—spell out that so many of the rights and freedoms we have fought hard for and cherish are at risk. Contraception, marriage equality, and sexual intimacy. Racial justice. Public education. And above all, religious freedom—the right to live as ourselves and believe as we choose, as long as we don’t harm others. Religious extremists and their lawmaker allies are willing to destroy our democracy to force all of us to live by their narrow beliefs.

At AU, we’re using our pulpit to call for a national recommitment to the separation of church and state as the only way to safeguard our democracy and the freedom and equality it promises us all. In the immediate aftermath of this challenging Supreme Court term, we will be designing a national recommitment campaign—more on that soon.

One of our supporters wrote to me this week with these hopeful words: “This, too, shall pass, and we will continue to fight them at every turn. They may be winning the battles right now, but we will win the war.”

With your support, we are building a movement that will defeat the Christian nationalist crusade and reclaim religious freedom for people of all religions and none. I’m so proud to have you by our side in this work.

With hope and determination,

Rachel K. Laser
President and CEO