Yesterday I attended the local Labor Day Picnic sponsored by the local Democrats. The guest speakers were local congressman and Congressional Freethought Caucus member Don Beyer and former DC police officer Michael Fanone. On January 6 Officer Fanone responded to calls for help at the Capitol, was assaulted by rioters, dragged into the crowd on the steps, beaten with pipes, stunned with a Taser, sprayed with chemicals, and threatened with his own gun.
Officer Fanone has become perhaps the most outspoken of the 1,500 officers at the Capitol that day but yesterday he kept his comments focused on the importance of unions and the President’s executive orders that may end collective bargaining agreements with one million federal workers under the pretext that their unions are a national security concern. Because it was after all, Labor Day.
It’s been clear that Christian nationalism played a role on January 6 but there are still questions about just what role and how big a role, so I asked Officer Fanone about it. He said, “There’s no doubt in my mind. You had religious leaders in the alt right Christian nationalist movement telling people that it was their duty to go to Washington. Two of the (six) guys who assaulted me said (in court) their pastors had told them it was their duty as Christian men to go to the Capitol on January 6 and fight on behalf of Trump who was in their mind like a prophet. So yeah, absolutely it was a contributing factor in inspiring a lot of those people and it’s continuing to this day.”
|
|
|
Congressman Don Beyer and Michael Fanone.
We have a lot of definitions of Christian nationalism but here’s a useful one: “a political ideology that seeks to merge Christian and American identities, distorting both the Christian faith and America’s constitutional democracy.” On January 6 there was a lot of anecdotal evidence, flags, signs, and clothing, that pointed to Christian nationalism but the court testimony that came later clarified the extent of the problem. Of course every Christian nationalist there that day has been pardoned including the one who got twelve years for attacking Officer Fanone and the one who got four years. President Trump called them all hostages.
Christian nationalism is seeping into the federal government. When you have a Christian nationalist as Secretary of Defense there’s no reason not to be one, right? The President’s Commission on Religious Liberty will hold its second hearing on September 8 with the general topic of public education. You can be sure they will discuss the benefits of school prayer and of posting the Ten Commandments in every classroom.
The Anti-Christian Bias Task Force has held one hearing at which most of the Cabinet Secretaries had nothing better to do than show up and go over examples of people whose religious beliefs got in the way of getting a COVID vaccine, or they couldn’t home school their kids, or something. I recently wrote here about the Office of Personnel Management’s new rules that allow proselytizing at work in federal agencies as long as you’re on a break.We'll have our Know Your Rights for federal workers out soon. The Secular Coalition is fighing back everywhere we can.
Congress is back in town today after a month-long recess. There’s no telling what bad ideas they will come back with. I’ll be at the Religious Liberty Commission hearing next week, and the one on September 29, also on education, to see which commission member wants the least separation between church and state. The Commission is officially part of the Department of Justice but that’s not where it meets. The hearings are held at the Museum of the Bible. I’m not making that up. You can watch the next one here Monday at 9 am.
|
|
Your advocate,
Scott MacConomy
Director of Policy and Government Affairs
Secular Coalition for America |
|
|
Did someone forward this to you? You can sign up at secular.org with your email and zip code.
The Secular Coalition for America works every day to defend the separation of religion and government and to fight anti-democratic ideologies like Christian nationalism. Your support for this work is vital.
|
|
|
|
|
|
