Did you know that the founding fathers never intended to prevent the U.S. government from promoting one religion over another? How about the one where Thomas Jefferson never did much of anything for this country because his Deist views on the separation of church and state did not agree with “historical” accounts of the country’s founding principles?

You say you never learned that in history class? Well no worries, because your kids might learn it if the Texas Board of Education gets their way. The board recently voted on a number of changes to the curriculum standards that would require the schools to teach history in a way that serves the predominantly Evangelical Christian agenda of many of the board members. Because all textbooks used in Texas school districts are required to meet the standards set by the Board, the fifteen member body has effectively just re-written over 200 years of history with a few simple votes. This means that students in Texas will not be taught the truth about what our founding fathers thought about religious liberty; and instead will learn that the United States is a “Christian nation,” where the only religious freedom one has is to decide what denomination you are. The Texas Freedom Network—which has been closely following the proceedings—reported:

“Today, the Texas State Board of Education voted to reject an amendment to social studies curriculum standards that would require students to learn that the nation's Founders "protected religious freedom by barring government from promoting or disfavoring any particular religion over all others." The party-line vote -- 10 Republicans against and 5 Democrats in favor of the amendment -- strips away any pretense that this board respects one of the most important freedoms enshrined in the U.S. Constitution.”

Reading this, we have to question whether or not the Texas BoE has even read the Constitution or any of the writings of the founding fathers.

The list of changes does not stop there, however. The board also required references to Margaret Sanger to be included, but not in any positive light. Her staunch advocacy of birth control was conveniently left out of the standards, and the changes instead focused around her discussion of eugenics, taking a predominantly positive advocate of women’s progress and slandering her based on a few disagreeable personal views.

If all of this sounds familiar, that’s because the Board attempted to do the exact same thing last year with science standards by attempting to introduce creationism into the curriculum. Now they are back again to gut history in their quest to re-make the United States into an evangelical nation by indoctrinating our youth, who assume that they are learning the true history of our country in school. This, ladies and gentlemen, is a threat of Orwellian proportions.

Because Texas is such a large state, many textbook manufacturers look to the Texas standards first when creating their books. They do not manufacture books separately for each state, but instead look at what to include based on the curriculum standards of their largest markets. Effectively, this means that textbooks for up to 48 other states (California practically has its own market) could include these same “historical” lessons.

Summing it all up, Kathy Miller, President of the Texas Freedom Network had this to say of the changes: “It is the most crazy-making thing to sit there and watch a dentist and an insurance salesman rewrite curriculum standards in science and history. Last year, Don McLeroy believed he was smarter than the National Academy of Sciences, and he now believes he’s smarter than professors of American history.” If so, he also believes that documents such as the United States Treaty with Tripoli—which states unequivocally “The government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion.”—do not exist. Bet you never learned that one in history class either.

George (Washington) help us.

That’s not the Advisory Council’s fault though. When the President formed the council and the administration decided on the issues it would tackle, discrimination in hiring was specifically left off the list. President Obama has since stated that the issue would be dealt with on a case by case basis within the Department of Justice (DOJ). Ignoring for a moment that this runs directly counter to a campaign pledge where then candidate Obama stated, “If you get a federal grant, you can’t discriminate…against the people you hire,” (We all know campaign speeches are meant to play to a different audience than actual governing is) this is still a fundamental mistake on the administration’s part for two reasons. First, dealing with discriminatory complaints on a case by case basis is a huge headache. Tying up key government resources in the DOJ to review each and every case wastes both time and money that could be better spent else ware. Second—and I would hope that President Obama might know this already—discrimination funded through taxpayer dollars is never ok, no matter what.

It wasn’t ok to publicly fund elections in which women and non-whites could not vote; it wasn’t ok to say “separate but equal” was the law of the land; and it wasn’t ok to prevent individuals from serving in our armed forces based on skin color or gender (we’re still working on sexuality, but we’ll get there). The point is, time and time again the government has said (after much deliberation) that federal institutions and organizations that receive even one federal dollar cannot discriminate. Why do we allow this to happen on a religious level?

The history of that is based, somewhat ironically, in the 1964 Civil Rights Act—specifically in an amendment passed in 1972. This amendment essentially protects religious organizations from nondiscriminatory hiring laws only on the basis of religious beliefs, and in some cases on gender (i.e. priests in the Catholic Church must be male). While this situation is clearly not ideal, it is the law, and religious organizations have generally been given certain rights and protections that do not necessarily extend to others (see: churches, tax exempt status of). So when Richard Stearns says in an interview with the Washington Post, “Our right to hire people who share our faith has been articulated in the Civil Rights Act of 1964, a 1972 amendment to that act, and in several cases that uphold that right,” I reluctantly agree, under one condition: that your organization does not receive taxpayer money to fund those discriminatory practices.

According to Stearns, “…to maintain our identity as a Christian organization, we feel we have to hire those who share those values.” I’m sure that many people felt that their “values” or “identity” were being disturbed when the 19th amendment was passed, or when President Truman desegregated the military, or when President Eisenhower ordered the Arkansas National Guard to allow the Little Rock Nine into Little Rock Central High School, but now we look back and realize that those moments were ones that made us a better, more equal nation. They were tough decisions, but necessary ones. Of all people, President Obama should recognize this. To Richard Stearns: In the unlikely chance you read this, stop using my tax money to promote discriminatory practices because it is rather un-Christian, and extremely un-American.

In a June 2009 decision, the appeals court ruled that the monument violates the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution because, “A reasonable observer would view the monument has having the impermissible principle or primary effect of endorsing religion.” Because the proposal to erect the monument, its approval by the Haskell County Board of Commissioners, and the commissioners’ expressly religious defense of the monument “strongly reflects a government endorsement of religion,” the court ruled the monument unconstitutional.

The American Civil Liberties Union and the ACLU of Oklahoma filed the original lawsuit challenging the monument in October 2005 on behalf of an Oklahoma resident. The case, Haskell County Board of Commissioners v. James W. Green, was originally decided against the plaintiffs in August 2006. The ACLU appealed the case to the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals, which unanimously reversed the prior decision.

The larger question becomes: What now? While we often focus on Supreme Court decisions as setting a precedent, does SCOTUS’s decision not to review the case also not also set a precedent? By declining to review the case, the high court has essentially determined that it finds nothing wrong with the ruling in Haskell. This does—in many ways—set a precedent for future courts to follow in deciding similar cases. And while the arguments of Haskell are in some ways unique, the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled on the basic principle of separation of church and state, and it has unanimously stated what can be viewed as a secular commandment. “Thou shalt not place thy religious symbols on government property.”

Notably, the Obama administration has been far more active in reaching out to various religious groups and key individuals around the world than previous administrations. President Obama has appointed a special envoy to the Organization of the Islamic Conference and created a new position in the State Department specifically organized around outreach to Muslim nations and communities within nations.

However, it is not actually clear how much U.S. foreign policy suffers from this “Western secularism.” Clearly, the United States is by no means the most secular nation in the world with regard to its foreign policy—a distinction probably belongs to the People’s Republic of China with its completely secular government. Additionally, most western European nations and the Russian Federation also adopt irreligious positions in their foreign policy, and other than Russia bringing back memories of the Cold War every so often, when was the last time we had any problems with any of these nations? If it is the case that secularism is dangerous in foreign policy, as the Chicago Council asserts in their report, why do so many nations take a secular or religiously neutral stance in their approach to foreign policy?

That said, one of the key recommendations of the panel does strike a note of common sense. It is a profoundly good idea to ensure that officials actively engaged in foreign policy receive extensive information regarding religions as well as sensitivity training to ensure that they do not insult officials from other nations through ignorance about their religious views and beliefs. (For example, it would not be good for foreign relations if a United States diplomatic team served steak at a reception for delegates from India). To their credit, the Chicago Council has recommended just that sort of training in their report. However, in their remaining recommendations asserting that the United States should begin to unravel the principles of church-state separation in order to facilitate better foreign policy outcomes, the panel ignores much of what religious involvement has already “accomplished.”

First, there are the sexual education programs in Africa that are based on abstinence education through the use of the Bible that have done nothing to stem the spread of AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases. Then there are the rifle sights provided to United States soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan that contain Biblical verses which only further stoke the rhetoric that we are engaged in a “crusade” against predominantly Muslim nations. Finally, there are the results of lectures to officials in Uganda by members of the Religious Right regarding the “immorality” of homosexuality that have led to a proposal that calls for the execution of gays and imprisonment of those who promote homosexuality. Yet after all of this experience with the effects of religious involvement with other nations, the authors of the report still believe that religion is ‘integral’ to American foreign policy.

Read the Washington Post coverage here .

Well, it all goes back to the ages old perception of gender roles. While we have seemingly moved past the barbaric notion that women should not work and should instead stay home and care for the family, we have not completely eliminated the perception that certain fields of work are gender specific. For example, when someone says the word “scientist,” what is the first image that comes to mind? For most, it is more than likely an image of Albert Einstein, or a man in a white lab coat with glasses and frizzled hair. Not many people think about Marie Curie, the physicist and chemist who became the first person honored with the Nobel Prize twice, not to mention the first woman to be honored at all. Almost no one conjures an image of Maria Goeppert-Mayer, the theoretical physicist who won the Nobel Prize for developing the nuclear shell model of atomic nuclei—the same model we continue to use to this day to explain the organization of atoms. Where would science be without their contributions?

The point is, most young women do not grow up hearing about these pioneers and their contributions to science. Most grow up learning from and looking up to mothers who work in office jobs such as insurance, accounting, and real estate or in the medical field as nurses, veterinarians, or (increasingly) doctors. Most girls do not play with model rockets or video games as children. Most are brought up by mothers who played with Barbies as children, and so they buy their daughters dolls instead of computers or chemistry kits. All of this stems from the perception that girls should not be “geeky,” and instead should leave that to guys. By fitting our children into these gender stereotypes, the scientific community is losing out on the potential contributions of brilliant young women everywhere. Instead, we should encourage our children to follow their own paths and interests, letting them know that they can truly grow up to be whatever they want to be, whether it's 'trendy' or not. If that leads to more women engineers, chemists, physicists, mathematicians, and computer programmers, the world will be all the better for it.

Read another great article on this topic here .

DuBois kicked off the forum with opening remarks and was extremely inclusive of all the varying viewpoints in the room. He began by acknowledging the perception among many individuals—especially church state separationists—that the faith-based office is a giant “pot of money” that religious organizations can draw federal funding from. He went out of his way to stress that while this may have been the case in the previous administration, the Obama administration is attempting to re-focus the office on outreach, attempting to bring together organizations around common goals, such as poverty reduction, hunger alleviation, the elimination of teen pregnancy, student mentoring, relief for Haiti, etc. He noted that some of these goals can be met through government funding of secular social service programs but also made the point that much of it requires communication and outreach between government and organizations, amongst organizations, and between organizations and the public. Several times during his remarks, DuBois stressed the “constitutional commitments” that his office faces, and that adherence to those commitments requires the close attention from those both inside and outside government. Perhaps the most promising part of his remarks came when he stated that the Administration “will follow the recommendations of the President’s Advisory Council as much as is legally and practically possible.” This statement seemed to indicate that the administration will follow the vote of the council in requiring religious organizations that wish to be considered for federal funding to incorporate a separate 501(c)(3) organization.

Among the panels that took place during the day was one on the state of the law regarding church state separation and the funding of faith-based organizations by the government. Much of this panel recounted the history of Charitable Choice, the creation of the Faith-Based Office, and legal challenges that have arisen during the past ten years. The panelists discussing these issues were Noel Castellanos, CEO of the Christian Community Development Association, Dan Mach, Director of Litigation for the ACLU’s Program on Freedom of Religion and Belief, Steve McFarland, Vice President and CLO of World Vision, and Bob Tuttle, a Professor of Law at The George Washington University Law School. The most discussed (and most divisive) issue for the panelists was that of discrimination in hiring by religious organizations that received federal funds. While all panelists supported Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act that allows religious organizations to discriminate against those they hire on a religious basis, the panel was sharply divided over whether or not an organization that received federal funds should be allowed to do the same. Steve McFarland was by far the most outspoken individual in favor of retaining the language in the civil rights act, believing that forcing religious organizations to comply with non-discriminatory practices violates the free-exercise clause, while Dan Mach took the opposing viewpoint; believing that religious organizations should not be allowed to use taxpayer funding to discriminate on the bases of religion or sexuality. During the question and answer portion of this panel, most of the questions revolved around this issue, though in the end the group was not able to come to a clear consensus or compromise on what the law should be. All agreed that it was likely to be an issue that the Supreme Court will have to rule on at some point.

The other major panel revolved around the state of social science research regarding the effectiveness of faith-based social service providers versus secular ones. The panelists for this discussion included Mark Chaves, Professor of Sociology, Religion, and Divinity at Duke University, Rebecca Sager, Visiting Fellow at the Center for the Study of Religion at Princeton University, Renata Cobbs Fletcher, Vice President for Public Policy and Community Partnerships at Public/Private Ventures and Stephen Monsma, a Research Fellow at the Paul Henry Institute at Calvin College. Throughout this discussion, panelists reported the results of recent research regarding how effective different organizations are at social service provision. The conclusion that all of them seemed to reach was that religious organizations were slightly better at providing some services (such as homeless shelters and soup kitchens) and secular organizations were more effective at providing others (such as mentoring/tutoring) but overall there was no statistically significant difference in the effectiveness in most service provision. Thus, most of the panelists recommended not playing favorites with government grants towards one side or the other, but instead taking a results oriented approach to determine the best way to help individuals in need.

Read the whole story here.

Why does the Commission on International Religious Freedom exist and what does it actually do?

Composed of nine members, six researchers, and a small support staff, its job is to ensure religious freedom around the world by researching religious discrimination abroad, taking fact-finding trips, holding public hearings, writing an annual report, making policy recommendations and putting out news releases. Recently, the Commission did extensive work condemning textbooks used by a Saudi-run private Islamic school in Northern Virginia, claiming that the textbooks promoted a radical interpretation of the Muslim belief structure. While most external experts agreed with the Commission’s report on this topic, the report—combined with allegations of discrimination—brings to light several questions about the activities of the Commission.

First, why has the commission not investigated claims of religious discrimination regarding the minaret ban in Switzerland? As an organization that is mandated to examine all claims of religious discrimination, it sure seems that they spend a great deal of time investigating claims of discrimination against Christians, and quite a small amount of time dealing with discrimination against other faiths.

Second, why does an organization with nine commissioners, six researchers, and a small support staff need an annual budget of $4.3 million? Granted the commission does a great deal of field work, but even accounting for travel expenses, the sum seems like an exorbitant amount for such a small organization with a limited mission.

Finally, why is the organization exempt from Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) Requests? None of the work that they do is classified and all of their reports are eventually published, yet it is nearly impossible for groups outside of the government to get any information about their current work. While it is typical for organizations created by Congress to be exempt, it is also because most organizations created by Congressional statute also deal with sensitive information.

By the narrowest of margins, the council voted 13-12 to recommend that religious institutions receiving federal funding be required to incorporate a separate 501(c) (3). This requirement would make it easier for the federal government to ensure that public funds are only being used for secular services, and also protect religious institutions from unnecessary federal intrusion into their private financial matters.

By a vote of 16-7-2, the council voted to recommend that religious institutions should not be required to or encouraged to remove religious iconography from rooms designated to hold a federally funded secular social service. Currently, churches and other religious institutions are not required to alter rooms in any way. The vote on this subject allowed three possible options. Aside from the “yes” or “no” positions, there was also a position that would have recommended that churches be encouraged (but not required) to remove religious iconography which drew the seven vote minority.

Note that the recommendations of the President’s Advisory Council are just that—recommendations. As such they are nonbinding and the final decision on what policy changes, if any, should be made lies with Joshua DuBois, the head of the Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships, and ultimately with President Obama.

Read the full story here .

Read CFI’s letter to President Obama regarding deficiencies in his Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships here .

One year later, as the council is poised to release its suggestions to President Obama, the Center for Inquiry feels that there are some serious deficiencies in the council's recommendations that could allow for continued direct federal, state, and local government funding of religious activities and proselytization. This is unacceptable. As a result, we have written a letter to President Obama detailing each of these potential loopholes that we feel he must close in order to restore the distinct separation of church and state that his predecessor so egregiously violated for eight years. The text of that letter is as follows: