Thanks to a Freedom From Religion Foundation complaint, an elementary teacher in Little Rock, Ark., will no longer be permitted to proselytize her students.

The elementary school teacher in the Little Rock School District discussed her religion in class and, according to students, “referred to Jesus and God in several conversations.”

A June 21 letter from Staff Attorney Patrick Elliott warned that the teacher’s conduct violated the constitutional principle of separation between state and church. The letter cautioned, “You have an obligation under the law to make certain that ‘subsidized teachers do not inculcate religion’.”

The District responded on Sept. 13, assuring FFRF that the administration admonished the teacher that her conduct “was inappropriate and that she must follow the LRSD 5th Grade Curriculum.”

"There is no such source and cause of strife, quarrel, fights, malignant opposition, persecution, and war, and all evil in the state, as religion. Let it once enter our civil affairs, our government would soon be destroyed. Let it once enter our common schools, they would be destroyed."

- Supreme Court of Wisconsin, Weiss v. District Board, March 18, 1890

A state judge in Texas this afternoon issued a temporary injunction which will continue to create division, strife, fights and persecution. State District Judge Steven Thomas is permitting high school cheerleaders in Kountze, Texas, to continue to display biblical banners as part of football games.

In a curious bit of collusion, the school district had formally asked the court to hold “that the Establishment Clause should not be interpreted so as to require Defendants [the school] to bar the religious banners…”

The Freedom From Religion Foundation, whose complaint began the case, is not a party to the lawsuit. If contacted by those with standing to sue, FFRF is prepared to challenge the continuing violation in federal court, where this case belongs.

“We encourage any student or parent with children in the public schools coming into contact with this religious practice at public school functions to contact FFRF,” said FFRF Co-President Annie Laurie Gaylor. Plaintiffs with standing might also include school employees coming into regular contact with religious banners at school sporting events.

FFRF sent a letter of complaint to the Kountze School District in September about cheerleaders displaying giant paper banners painted with bible verses as part of the start of football games. Football players then run through the religious banners. The cheerleaders sued the school district after it asked them to stop this strange practice.

FFRF has taken complaints about the practice spreading to other school districts, and has recently sent letters of complaint to to Newton I.S.D., Texas; Bossier Parish, La.; Stone County Schools, Miss., and Thackerville Schools, Okla.

“Since the state’s top law enforcer, Attorney General Greg Abbott, and its highest executive officer, Gov. Rick Perry, have openly expressed contempt for atheists and the Establishment Clause, this leads to a climate of intolerance. It takes courage to face down the full apparatus of state government, but we need those brave few to contact FFRF,” added Dan Barker, co-president.

“Don’t let collusion, politicking, and religious fervor in Texas destroy respect for keeping public schools free of religious divisiveness,” Barker added.

Portland, Ore., was not only the setting for the Freedom From Religion Foundation's 35th national convention last weekend, attracting nearly 900 attendees, but for a bright new billboard campaign featuring 15 area freethinkers and families.

The three 14x48-foot bulletins and 12 EcoPosters (10-foot x 22.8-inch billboards) will be up around Portland for a month.

Portland-area FFRF members and families volunteered to take part in the myth-dispelling billboard campaign timed with the convention. This is FFRF's largest “This is what an atheist looks” campaign to date. The group is also debuting a new slogan: “I’m SECULAR and I VOTE.”

FFRF is a national state-church watchdog with over 19,000 members nationwide, including nearly 600 in Oregon. 

See below for a list of participants and their billboard locations.

(Note: FFRF is still waiting to receive the billboard locations for Scott Mullins and Heather Gonsior & Shawn Swagerty, so stay tuned.)

Billboard participants and locations

"This is What an Atheist Looks Like"

Anita Brown: SW 12th Av 100 ftN/O Salmon St WS F/S-1 or W Bumside St 20 ft E/O 16th Av SS F/E-2

Dr. Peter Boghossian: SW Beaverton Hillsdale Hwy 10 ft W/O 42nd Av SS F/W-1

Mark Hecate: Se McLoughlin Blvd 50 ft S/O Woodward WS F/S-2

Sonja Maglothin: SE Powell Blvd 80 ft W/O 28th Pl SS F/E-1

Renee Barnett: NW St Helens Rd 500 ft N/O 31st Av WS F/N-2

Roy and Karen Firestone: SW Salmon St 100 Ft E/O 11th Av NS F/W-1

Brent and Tyler Mangum: SE McLoughlin Blvd 10 ft N/O Bluebird St WS F/S-1

Michelle, Justin, Sylvan, and Scarlett Atterbury: SE McLoughlin Blvd 80 ft N/O 17th Av ES F/S-1

"I'm Secular and I vote"

Caroline Miller: SE 7th Av 100 ft N/O Madison St WS F/S-1

Marsha Abelman: N Victoria 10 ft N/O NE Weidler WS F/E2

Robert Paul Buchman: NW Yeon 70 ft N/O NW Front ES F/N-1

Duane Daminao: NW Gilsan St 100 ft W/O 5th Av SS F/E-1

Lenora Warren: N Interstate Av 3 ft S/O Knott St ES F/N-1

For more information on the campaign and participants view FFRF's Oct. 5 news release here.

by Dan Barker and Annie Laurie Gaylor
FFRF Co-Presidents

Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott has crossed the line from carrying out his secular constitutional duties to defend the state of Texas, to using his government bully pulpit to bully and scapegoat atheists.

At a press conference earlier today with Gov. Rick Perry at the Capitol, the grandstanding attorney general, speaking about FFRF, said:

“We will not allow atheist groups from outside of the state of Texas to come into the state, to use menacing and misleading intimidation tactics, to try to bully schools to bow down at the altar of secular beliefs.”

During the press conference, Abbott openly went after FFRF, and by extension, FFRF’s Texas membership of 700, and all atheists and nonbelievers — now estimated to comprise a fifth of the population. We’ve already heard from Texas FFRF members who have children in the schools, who are worried that their attorney general’s menacing remarks will not only escalate religious violations, but create a climate of hostility toward nonbelievers and their children in Texas.

Abbott called his pandering press conference after announcing he is intervening on behalf of Christian cheerleaders suing their school district in Kountze, Texas, aided by a zealous Christian-right group. The school had properly told the cheerleaders to nix religious banners after being contacted by FFRF, acting on behalf of a local resident who was shocked and dismayed to see bible verses used as part of a public school football ritual. The cheerleaders paint bible verses on giant paper banners, and quote such Christian verses as 1 Cor. 15:57: “But thanks be to God, which gives us Victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.”

Abbott contemptuously described FFRF as “an atheist group from Wisconsin, who came into the state of Texas and tried to silence these students.”

He bragged about his history of activism in favor of state/church entanglements, including getting involved against FFRF “last year, at Christmastime, I think it was this very same group, the Freedom From Religion Foundation, that tried to bully Henderson County in Athens, Texas, into removing a nativity scene off of the county court grounds. There’s a bottom line here, and that is . . . we are not going to either tolerate or accept these atheist groups trying to prevent that freedom of expression here in the state of Texas.”

The Constitution and FFRF are not “preventing freedom of expression,” we are defending freedom of conscience. The Constitution differentiates government (public school) speech from individual speech. Those cheerleaders are free to worship as they like, go to the church of their choice, but not to exploit a public school event, and their school-sponsored podium, to push their personal religious views on an entire stadium. That’s just plain bad manners.

Texas Gov. Rick Perry, who repeatedly referred during the press conference to Abbott as “General,” castigated FFRF and state/church proponents. He said:

“The underlying problem here is that there’s this very vocal, as you shared, and very litigious minority of Americans that are willing to legally attack anybody who dares to utter a phrase, a name that they don’t agree with.”

Perry went on to demonstrate that he apparently has never read the godless Constitution he has taken oaths to uphold, saying: “We’re also a culture built upon the concept that the original law is god’s law, outlined in the ten commandments.”

The reprehensible actions of the governor and attorney general are the very reason our founders adopted a First Amendment — to keep local majorities from tyrannizing the minorities, and government officials from using their offices to promote religion.

TAKE ACTION

Tell Perry and Abbott that they have crossed the line. Phone calls are best, so please call them today!

CONTACT

Governor Perry 
Office of the Governor
P.O. Box 12428
Austin, Texas 78711-2428

Phone: 

• Information and Referral Hotline [for Texas callers]: (800) 843-5789
• Information and Referral and Opinion Hotline [for Austin, Texas and out-of-state callers]: (512) 463-1782
• Office of the Governor Main Switchboard [office hours are 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. CST]: (512) 463-2000
• Citizen's Assistance Telecommunications Device. If you are using a telecommunication device for the deaf (TDD), call 711 to reach Relay Texas

Email Contact Form: http://governor.state.tx.us/contact/

Attorney General Greg Abbott
Office of the Attorney General
PO Box 12548
Austin, TX 78711-2548
Phone: (512) 463-2100
Email: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Background 

Read transcript of governor’s and AG’s remarks 

Read FFRf’s original letter of complaint

Read FFRF’s amicus brief

Read previous press releases:

FFRF files amicus brief in Texas prayer banner case (Oct. 3, 2012)

Texas AG attacks FFRF, butts into banner case (Sept. 28, 2012)

Read FFRf’s original letter of complaintTexas school halts football bible banners (Sept. 19, 2012)

"You see, I do exist."

Florence School District in Florence, S.C., will no longer allow local Christian ministries to hold assemblies in the schools.

In March 2011, Wilson High School hosted an assembly where, under the guise of discussing underage drinking and drug use, Eddie James of Eddie James Ministries preached Christianity to students.

In a letter dated Sept. 16, 2011, Freedom From Religion Foundation Staff Attorney Rebecca Markert warned, “religious programming as part of a school assembly is in violation of the Establishment Clause.”

The superintendent responded Oct. 12, 2011, stating that the administration made “major adjustments to insure that such actions will not occur again.”

Thanks to the Freedom From Religion Foundation, a baseball field in Oneida, N.Y. no longer displays a sign that references god.

Maxwell Field in Oneida displayed a posted sign entitled Little League Pledge on its gates. The very first line of the pledge read, “I trust in God.”

In a July 23 letter, FFRF Staff Attorney Stephanie Schmitt wrote, “The City of Oneida should not be using the power and prestige of the department to impose any religious beliefs onto the many community members of varying faiths or no faith who come to the park for secular purposes.”

In a letter dated Aug. 29, the director of the Department of Parks and Recreation assured FFRF, “The sign has been taken down as of Aug. 29, 2012.”

A principal of an elementary school in Franklin, N.C., no longer includes a reference to god in her official email signature.

The principal of East Franklin Elementary School included an “inspirational” quotation as part of her email signature, “If you can bring one moment of happiness into the life of a child, you are a coworker with God.”

In a Feb. 29 letter, FFRF Staff Attorney Rebecca Markert told the superintendent, “It is grossly inappropriate for a public school official…to include religious messages while using their public school email to conduct official business.”

On March 13, FFRF received confirmation that the principal “took out the reference to God in the quote she includes in her school emails.”

The Pellston, Mich. Public Schools Board of Education meetings no longer open with prayer, after receiving a complaint from the Freedom of Religion Foundation on behalf of a local resident.

The Pellston Board of Education began its scheduled meetings with a prayer, often delivered by a member of the Board. FFRF sent a letter of complaint in July 2011. An attorney for the Board responded, that he did not believe the Board’s conduct was illegal.

In a November 2011 letter, FFRF Staff Attorney Stephanie Schmitt clarified the prevailing law and assured the Board it was in violation of the U.S. Constitution. She warned it to discontinue the practice immediately and “eliminate the need for costly and protracted litigation of an issue that is settled by the courts.”

An attorney for the Board responded in a Sept. 10 letter, “the Board of Education no longer opens its meetings with a prayer. Instead, the Board observes a moment of silence which is not intended to promote religion.”

A public hospital in Hollister, Calif., will no longer allow Christian prayers and verses to be displayed on its walls, after a complaint by Freedom From Religion Foundation.

Hazel Hawkins Hospital formerly displayed Christian prayers, including a plaque entitled “Nurse’s Prayer” on the wall of the Medical Surgical Unit.

In a June 26 letter, FFRF Staff Attorney Stephanie Schmitt warned, “Government-run hospitals have a constitutional obligation to remain neutral toward religion.”

On Sept. 17, FFRF received assurance from hospital management that they “have taken all appropriate actions to address the areas identified and respect constitutional rights of all employees.”

A restaurant in Wiggins, Miss., will no longer offer a preferential discount to church-going patrons, thanks to the Freedom From Religion Foundation.

Western Sizzlin’ Steakhouse promoted a “half off buffet” discount to customers who presented a “church member appreciation card.” The discount was valid only for members of three local Baptist churches.

In a June 11 letter, FFRF Staff Attorney Stephanie Schmitt warned the manager that the restaurant was in violation of the Civil Rights Act and that “it is illegal for Western Sizzlin’ to discriminate, or show favoritism, on the basis of religion.”

The Civil Rights Act says that in places of public accommodation, including restaurants, every person is entitled to “full and equal enjoyment of the goods, services, facilities, privileges, advantages, and accommodations,” without regard to race, color, religion, or national origin.

In a letter to FFRF on Sept. 11, restaurant management confirmed that the they will “discontinue including churches in our discount promotions and programs moving forward and will only offer them to other local businesses and companies that are not religious in nature.”

Thanks to a Freedom From Religion Foundation complaint, a teacher in Abbeville County Consolidated School District, Texas, will no longer be allowed to actively participate in the Fellowship of Christian Athletes student club.

The Wright Middle School science teacher was the Christian group’s faculty sponsor, but actively participated in the group’s 2010 prayer meeting and praised the group’s Christian agenda. She stated in an article on the South Carolina FCA website that the 200-student prayer group was “very sweet and moving” and that at each FCA meeting they’ve had a student come to Christ.

A June 18 letter from Staff Attorney Rebecca Markert warned, “The Supreme Court has stated that public school employees, including teachers, must refrain from actively participating in religious activities while acting within their governmental role.”

An attorney for the District responded on September 14 that the District would “ensure that school faculty understand their role with regard to the sponsorship of religious [clubs] so that no further concerns will occur.”

The city of West Linn, Ore., rescinded an unconstitutional grant to Willamette Christian Church after a Sept. 28 Freedom From Religion Foundation letter of complaint.

It came to FFRF's attention that the West Linn City Council had approved a $1,300 grant to the church, ostensibly to start a teen center called The Summit. City staff purportedly spent considerable time on the proposal, with the regular fees waived.

Councilor Mike Jones, who later became a member of the church, was apparently the driving force behind the grant, fee waiver and overall proposal.

"Finding suitable after-school activities for middle school students and providing them a safe place to gather is laudable," wrote FFRF Staff Attorney Andrew Seidel. "Teen programming may be a genuine concern for the community, and while WCC is willing to address that concern to a certain extent, the record provides ample evidence that the city’s actions crossed appropriate constitutional boundaries."

It's clear that the center, which would have been managed by the YMCA on weekdays, had religious purposes, Seidel noted. "WCC has scheduled 'church-related activities' for twice as much time as teen center activities."

The schedule called for the center to be open 10 hours a week to the general public and 20 hours a week for church activities.

FFRF noted numerous public statements that the main use of the center would be for church activities.

"The primary effect is to help a church expand by funding new construction," Seidel wrote. "In other words, the council gave WCC $1,300 to expand their church space."

FFRF suspected the center would be another way to target children who would otherwise not attend WCC.

"The city had no safeguards against religious use or proselytization at the time the grant and waiver were approved, nor does the city have any way to ensure that YMCA involvement continues. WCC is leasing the space, setting the hours and has the final say in all decisions. Should they choose not to partner with the YMCA, the city has no recourse."

The complaint letter noted other problems with the proposal, including waiver of fees, parking impacts, city officials in their official capacity sitting on a church advisory board and Councilor Jones’ ties to the church.

While the city has not formally responded, FFRF has learned the proposal is dead, at least for now.

According to an Oct. 2 story in the Oregonian, Assistant City Manager Kirsten Wyatt told the newspaper the city decided to immediately rescind the grant to avoid controversy and a legal battle.

"Our options are either fight this or say, 'Hey, $1,300 isn't that much money,' " Wyatt said. "We're chalking this up as a learning experience."

View a PDF version of this letter here. 

Sheriff Jerry L. Demings
Orange County Sheriff's Office
PO Box 1440
Orlando, FL 32802-1440

Re: Orange County Sheriff using 40 days of prayer to lower crime

Dear Sheriff Demings:

I am writing on behalf of the Freedom From Religion Foundation (“FFRF”) and our local members who object to the Orange County Sheriff’s Office (“OSCO”) calling for 40 days of prayer to help fight crime. FFRF is a nationwide nonprofit organization, which works to protect the constitutional principle of separation of church and state. FFRF represents more than 18,500 members across the country including more than 850 members in Florida.

We are appalled and saddened by the random shooting of Danielle Sampson. We join with others in decrying this senseless violence, and demanding reform to get assault weapons off of our streets and protect innocent lives. Our organization, mainly atheists and agnostics, has just donated $250.00 to help the Sampson family pay for Danielle’s medical care at gofundme.com/supportdanielle. However, senseless and tragic violence is not an excuse to disregard the Constitution.

We understand that over the next 40 days, the OSCO will be leading “nightly prayer vigils bringing OCSO and the faith community together to reduce violence.” This call to prayer appears on the official OSCO Facebook page. Below this text appears a picture (enclosed) of hands held in prayer with the official Orange County Sheriff’s Office Badge and the test “Operation Transformation: 40 DAYS OF PRAYER.”

Calling upon citizens to pray is coercive and beyond the authority of any government, let alone a law enforcement arm of the government. Citizens should not be made to feel offended, excluded, or like political outsiders because the Sheriff they support with their taxes imposes religious ritual on them. Put simply, your office is misusing its secular power to call for religious rituals and exhort citizens, regardless of beliefs, to participate in prayer.

It is a fundamental principle of Establishment Clause jurisprudence that the government cannot in any way promote, advance, or otherwise endorse religion. The Supreme Court has said, “The touchstone for our analysis is the principle that the ‘First Amendment mandates governmental neutrality between religion and religion, and between religion and nonreligion.’” McCreary County v. ACLU, 545 U.S. 844, 860 (2005), (quoting Epperson v. Arkansas, 393 U.S. 97, 104 (1968); Everson v. Board of Ed. of Ewing, 330 U.S. 1, 15-16 (1947); Wallace v. Jaffree, 472 U.S. 38, 53 (1985).

As Sheriff, your overt promotion of religion using your official title, badge, and seal gives the unfortunate impression that the County supports and endorses particular religious rituals. The government is sending the message “to nonadherents that they are outsiders, not full members of the political community, and an accompanying message to adherents that they are insiders, favored members…” Id. (citations omitted). “This presents a problem for the Sheriff because the Establishment Clause prohibits the government from ‘promot[ing] or affiliat[ing] itself with any religious doctrine or organization.’” Milwaukee Deputy Sheriffs’ Ass'n v. Clarke, 588 F.3d 523, 528 (7th Cir. 2009), (cite to Sup. Ct. omitted).

Apparently, the OSCO believes that this prayer will lower crime: “According to Chaplain Willie James Barnes, praying for safer streets is something that works. He was part of a similar project with Orlando police in 2008.  ‘It worked. We did it all over the city of Orlando, and I'll tell you the crime rate went down,’ said Barnes.”

The members of the Freedom From Religion Foundation believe that nothing fails like prayer. Prayer is the ultimate cop-out, the ultimate admission that the invoker is giving up, is transferring personal responsibility to an imaginary being. It is particularly vexing to see people congratulate themselves for praying or holding a prayer rally, instead of taking meaningful action, such as working for rational regulation assault rifles and those who purchase them.

Significantly, scientific studies  show that societies with less prayer have less violence:

“Murder rates are actually lower in more secular nations and higher in more religious nations where belief in God is deep and widespread. And within America, the states with the highest murder rates tend to be highly religious, such as Louisiana and Alabama, but the states with the lowest murder rates tend to be among the least religious in the country, such as Vermont and Oregon.  Furthermore, although there are some notable exceptions, rates of most violent crimes tend to be lower in the less religious states and higher in the most religious states. Finally, of the top 50 safest cities in the world, nearly all are in relatively non-religious countries, and of the eight cities within the United States that make the safest-city list, nearly all are located in the least religious regions of the country.”

Furthermore, “studies of heroic altruism during the Holocaust, found that the more secular people were, the more likely they were to rescue and help persecuted Jews.” In fact, when any given factor of societal health or well-being is measured, invariably the less religious countries score better. The least religious countries of this world:

• Have the lowest rates of violent crime and homicide
• Are the best place to raise children
• Are the best place to be a mother
• Have the lowest rates of corruption
• Have the lowest levels of intolerance against racial and ethnic minorities
• Score highest when it comes to women’s rights and gender equality • Have the greatest protection and enjoyment of political and civil liberties
• Are better at educating their youth in reading, math, and science
• Are the most peaceful
• Are the most prosperous
• Have the highest quality of life.

The pattern of lower religiosity to higher societal well-being is not limited to an international analysis.  This trend also exists within United States.  Those states that are the most religious also have a high occurrence of societal ills.  States that tend to be among the most religious in the nation:

• Have the highest rates of poverty
• Have the highest rates of obesity
• Have the highest rates of infant mortality
• Have the highest rates of STDs
• Have the highest rates of teen pregnancy
• Have the lowest percentage of college-educated adults
• Have the highest rates of murder
• Have the highest rates of violent crime.

Prayer is ineffectual.  Public, government prayers not only conflict with the Constitution as pointed out above, but also with biblical teachings.  Christians who know their bible are familiar with the injunction of Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount, condemning public prayer as hypocrisy.  “Enter into thy closet and when though hast shut the door, pray to thy Father which is in secret.” (Matthew 6:5-13).

To avoid the constitutional concerns and the divisiveness these prayers cause within the community the solution is simple: discontinue using your government office to promote prayers. While religious leaders are free to hold prayer rallies, the Orange County Sheriff's Department is not. Public officials should get off their knees and get to work.  Do something practical to help Danielle and prevent other such crimes.  Please inform us in writing of the actions that Orange County is taking to remedy these constitutional violations. May we hear from you at your earliest convenience?

Very truly,

Annie Laurie Gaylor
Co-President

This Sunday, Oct. 7, many ministers across the nation will purposefully violate the law from their pulpits. Called “Pulpit Freedom Sunday,” the day has been marked by the Alliance Defending Freedom (formerly the Alliance Defense Fund) for preachers to openly endorse and oppose candidates for political office, in violation of IRS regulations and just in time for the November elections.

The IRS explains on its website:

Under the Internal Revenue Code, all section 501(c)(3) organizations are absolutely prohibited from directly or indirectly participating in, or intervening in, any political campaign on behalf of (or in opposition to) any candidate for elective public office… [P]ublic statements of position (verbal or written) made on behalf of the organization in favor of or in opposition to any candidate for public office clearly violate the prohibition against political campaign activity.

ADF encourages churches to blatantly break this law, then flaunt their unlawful activity by sending recordings of their sermons to the IRS. ADF publishes lists of churches that participate.

The regulations are in place so that nonprofit organizations (and their donors) do not receive a government subsidy in the form of tax exemption for their political endorsements. Imagine the political hanky-panky should churches be allowed to use their considerable wealth to directly endorse and influence partisan political elections, with no financial accountability to the public! Imagine the political candidates pandering directly for votes by marshalling congregations to directly campaign for them, as well as fund them. The purity of both church and state would be contaminated.

ADF, a theocratic group, believes that churches should be given special treatment, and be allowed to engage in partisan activity while maintaining their tax-exempt status. ADF has openly stated that one reason it promotes the Pulpit Freedom Sunday is because it hopes the IRS will enforce its regulations against a church so that it will have the means to challenge the restriction in litigation.

This brazen disrespect for the law is based on inaccurate constitutional claims. ADF claims the restrictions violate the Establishment Clause by excessively entangling the government with churches’ internal affairs. However, churches choose to be subject to restrictions on political activity as a condition of claiming tax-exempt status, just like all other groups classified as 501(c)(3) organizations, including the Freedom From Religion Foundation. ADF claims the restrictions violate free speech protections, even though clergy are perfectly free to say whatever they like from the pulpit if they do not claim tax-exempt status, or to endorse as individuals outside a church context. Churches are not required to be tax-exempt, and the government is not required to subsidize churches’ political ideologies.

We encourage members and the public to be on watch for unlawful political activity at churches on “Pulpit Freedom Sunday” or any other day. Please visit FFRF’s Churches and Political Lobbying Activity FAQ (http://ffrf.org/faq/state-church/item/14005-churches-and-political-lobbying-activities) for more information. See the FAQ for instructions on submitting a complaint to the IRS directly, or contact FFRF to do so on your behalf. Help us ensure that churches either stay out of politics, or render unto Caesar that which is Caesar’s.

Thanks to Maddy Zieger, legal intern