All posts tagged: religious freedom

These houses of worship are older than America. How they outlasted wars, schisms and lawsuits.

These houses of worship are older than America. How they outlasted wars, schisms and lawsuits.

Published by Sam Flores

(RNS) — On Ash Wednesday this year, about a dozen people attended a noon service at Boston’s Old North Church, founded in 1723. Two days later, a handful of worshippers took part in a Shabbat service at Newport, Rhode Island’s Touro Synagogue, dedicated in 1763.  Congregations participating in sacred rituals — it is something both houses of worship have been doing longer than the United States has existed. Such places of worship are rare. The Hartford Institute for Religion Research estimates that of the 370,000 religious congregations in the U.S. today, only about 1% existed at the country’s founding. When the country declared independence in 1776,  there were 3,228 houses of worship across the Colonies. The U.S. was already religiously diverse. Congregationalists led the pack with about 670 congregations, or just over 20% of the total. Presbyterians weren’t far behind (18%), followed by Baptists and Episcopalians (each about 15%), and Quakers at nearly 10%. Methodists had a following at 2%, Catholics were just under 2%, and there were a handful of synagogues and more than a dozen Mennonite …

Trump admin wants to seize Catholic shrine featuring 29ft statue of Jesus for Mexico border wall construction: report

Trump admin wants to seize Catholic shrine featuring 29ft statue of Jesus for Mexico border wall construction: report

Published by Sam Flores

The Trump administration is suing a Catholic diocese in New Mexico to seize land for border wall construction, a move that has led to a federal court case over religious freedom at a landmark pilgrimage site. The Department of Justice filed a lawsuit to acquire approximately 14 acres of land in Dona Ana County belonging to the Roman Catholic Diocese of Las Cruces through what is known as the power of eminent domain. As reported by Bloomberg, the government intends to use the property to install fencing, security lighting and cameras near the base of Mount Cristo Rey. Federal officials have proposed $183,071 as just compensation for the tracts, according to the legal complaint. The site is home to a 29-foot-tall limestone statue of Jesus Christ and serves as a major religious destination. However, the Department of Homeland Security denied what it called “ludicrous” claims that the shrine would be affected. The legal battle centers on the base of Mount Cristo Rey, home to a historic 29-foot limestone statue of Christ that serves as a …

Thomas Paine helped start America. In the Trump era, he’s under fire.

Thomas Paine helped start America. In the Trump era, he’s under fire.

Published by Sam Flores

(RNS) — Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., was revving up a crowd of tens of thousands gathered in Philadelphia for the first major No Kings protest last June. His speech, like the demonstration itself, was focused primarily on pushback against President Donald Trump, whom critics such as Raskin likened to a would-be monarch. But after railing against the president, Raskin paused to focus on one of his favorite Founding Fathers: Thomas Paine, an English-born political writer who supercharged the American Revolution with his wildly popular pamphlet “Common Sense” 250 years ago. Noting that he named his own late son after Paine, Raskin recalled the corset-maker-turned-revolutionary’s dream of an America that would operate as “an asylum to humanity.” Paine, he told the crowd, envisioned “a place of refuge for people seeking freedom from religious and political and intellectual and economic repression from around the world” — and then helped spur a revolution to make it a reality. Less than a month later, at the inaugural service of Christ Church DC — a congregation organized by self-described Christian …

Catholic diocese fights Trump administration plan to seize pilgrimage site for border wall

Catholic diocese fights Trump administration plan to seize pilgrimage site for border wall

Published by Sam Flores

(RNS) — The Catholic Diocese of Las Cruces, New Mexico, signaled in a legal filing it intends to fight the Trump administration’s fast-moving attempts to seize its land through eminent domain to extend the southern border wall. The land targeted by the federal government is at the base of Mount Cristo Rey, a mountain and pilgrimage site topped by a 29-foot-tall limestone statue of Jesus Christ that dates back to 1940. The diocese said the border wall would obstruct pilgrimage routes. “The erection of a border wall through or along this holy site could irreparably damage its religious and cultural sanctity, obstruct pilgrimage routes, and transfer sacred space into a symbol of division,” the Diocese of Las Cruces said, according to legal documents.  Seizing the land or constructing physical barriers would “constitute a significant infringement on religious freedom and the rights of worship, which are protected under both the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution and the Religious Freedom Restoration Act,” the diocese wrote in the legal filing Friday (May 8).  The day prior (May …

Anti-Christian bias task force blasts Biden for targeting ‘traditional Christians’

Anti-Christian bias task force blasts Biden for targeting ‘traditional Christians’

Published by Sam Flores

WASHINGTON (RNS) — A new government report accusing President Joe Biden’s administration of fomenting “anti-Christian bias” is being met with mixed reactions from Christian leaders, with some conservatives celebrating the study and others arguing it appears narrowly focused on the concerns of evangelical Christians and obscures President Donald Trump’s own conflicts with faith groups. The report, which was released on Thursday, is one of the first public actions by the Task Force to Eradicate Anti-Christian Bias, a body created by President Donald Trump in February of last year. Written by a group primarily composed of Trump’s cabinet members, the study concluded that while the Biden administration “generally tolerated religious beliefs that were privately held,” the government under the former president’s leadership nonetheless “zealously pursued actions to limit Christians’ ability to act in accordance with their faith.” The report, which stretches for more than 500 pages, alleges the wide array of incidents it highlights represent clashes between the Biden administration and a “Christian worldview” — particularly among what the report calls “traditional Christians,” who hold conservative-leaning …

America’s founding promise of religious freedom has long coexisted with prejudice, even as many Christians have worked to confront it

America’s founding promise of religious freedom has long coexisted with prejudice, even as many Christians have worked to confront it

Published by Sam Flores

(The Conversation) — As the United States marks the 250th anniversary of its independence, old questions have returned about who belongs and whose religious practices are truly protected in the country. At the start of the year, an arson attack significantly damaged the oldest synagogue in Mississippi. Two days later, local officials in Oklahoma rejected a proposal to build a mosque after opponents declared Islam “hostile to our Constitution.” A Texas GOP congressman complained on social media that a Hindu festival was a “third world” practice. These incidents come amid resurgent claims that the United States is a Christian nation. All this has happened even as President Donald Trump has emphasized a particular idea of religious liberty throughout his second term. In his proclamation for Religious Freedom Day in 2026, he emphasized familiar ideas of Americans’ “God-given right to practice their faith, follow their conscience, and worship their God freely and without fear.” But the statement also seemed to reflect a broader project of lending government support to Christianity. The proclamation linked support for religious …

Southern Baptists have become what they once feared Catholics would be

Southern Baptists have become what they once feared Catholics would be

Published by Sam Flores

“There is no such thing as ‘separation of church and state’ in the U.S. Constitution,” the leader of the White House’s Religious Liberty Commission recently declared. Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, who sometimes preaches at Houston’s Second Baptist Church, made headlines when he made this pronouncement. It was a striking statement from a Baptist, given that Baptists have made a point of defending the fabled wall of separation since the earliest days of the American republic. In fact, in 1960, when Roman Catholic John F. Kennedy was running for president, he delivered a speech to the Greater Houston Ministerial Association, reassuring the assembled Protestant clergy, “I believe in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute.”   Why is defense of this wall, once obligatory for a Catholic politician, now abandoned by a Baptist? Within the larger story of the rise of the Religious right, this reversal highlights remarkably different political strategies deployed by large religious minorities. Catholics, viewed with suspicion by American Protestants, presented themselves as able to blend in to the American …

Muslim father sues over exclusion of Islamic schools from Texas voucher program

Muslim father sues over exclusion of Islamic schools from Texas voucher program

Published by Sam Flores

(RNS) — A Texan whose children attend an Islamic school in Houston sued Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton and Comptroller Kelly Hancock, alleging that schools for Muslim students are being excluded from the state’s new voucher program. The program, introduced by the state’s Legislature in 2025, created a $1 billion fund for private school financial aid. But since Texas Education Freedom Accounts opened for applications on Feb. 4, 2026, none of the state’s accredited private Islamic schools has been listed among those eligible for reimbursement through the program.  The “blanket exclusion of a group of private schools on the basis of their religious affiliation is a clear violation of the U.S. Constitution,” said Mehdi Cherkaoui, a father of two whose children are enrolled at the Houston Qu’ran Academy Spring, a private and accredited school excluded from the program. Cherkaoui, a lawyer who represents himself, filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court on March 1.  The suit says the state unjustly targeted these schools, which Cherkaoui noted are “not schools where kids go to memorize the …

Troops Being Told To Prepare for ‘Armageddon’ In Iran

Troops Being Told To Prepare for ‘Armageddon’ In Iran

Published by Sam Flores

For some US military commanders, the emerging war in Iran is part of a biblical plan to bring about the end of the world as we know it, according to complaints filed by over 100 service members. The Military Religious Freedom Foundation has received a litany of complaints about religious ideology seeping into military orders since the US and Israel began bombing Iran, independent journalist Jon Larsen first reported. Mikey Weinstein, founder and president of MRFF, a nonprofit group established 21 years ago that focuses on ensuring constitutional protections for service members, spoke with HuffPost by phone and illuminated some details of the complaints, which have come from more than three dozen military units situated in at least 30 different military installations. “We started getting calls in the wee hours of Saturday morning from people saying their commanders were just jubilant about this and trying to tell people, ‘Don’t worry, it’s all part of God’s plan,’” Weinstein said. Weinstein said the “metric promised” in the Bible’s Book of Revelation is horrifying and should worry everyone. …

Judge bars most ICE raids at a group of churches

Judge bars most ICE raids at a group of churches

Published by Sam Flores

(RNS) — A federal judge issued an order on Friday (Feb. 13) barring federal immigration enforcement agents from raiding certain churches except in a “true emergency,” handing a preliminary win to a growing number of faith groups that have sued President Donald Trump’s administration over its decision to end restrictions on raids at houses of worship. Judge F. Dennis Saylor of the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts issued a preliminary injunction, siding mostly with the religious plaintiffs. The case, filed last July, centers on faith groups who argued their religious freedom — particularly rights guaranteed by the First Amendment and the Religious Freedom Restoration Act — had been violated by the president’s decision to rescind a 2011 internal government policy that discouraged immigration raids at “sensitive locations” such as hospitals, schools and churches.  Although the judge decided that three of the plaintiffs — a trio of regional Quaker groups — lacked standing, the injunction will apply to all the other plaintiffs, which include five regional synods of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in …