As usual, Religious Right leaders are confused. This time it seems that a lot of our opponents don’t understand why Americans United reported the Catholic Diocese of Peoria, Ill., to the Internal Revenue Service for illegal church politicking.

Let me explain. Read more

This Friday, students all over America will choose to remain quiet in school. They’ll be participating in the Day of Silence, an annual event designed to protest the bias and bullying that often silences gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered students. Read more

Every year around this time the Alliance Defense Fund (ADF) issues a memo asserting that public school officials can teach about the religious aspects of Easter in class.

Can public schools actually do this? Yes and no. Like any other discussion of religion in public schools, it all depends on what is being said in the classroom. Read more

An El Paso church’s brazen effort to remove the mayor and two members of the city council has been brought to a screeching halt.

The political drama in the west Texas town started last summer when Pastor Tom Brown of Word of Life Church issued a politically charged email to the community. Brown, who sent the email under the guise of his Tom Brown Ministries, attacked El Paso Mayor John Cook and El Paso City Council Members Steve Ortega and Susie Byrd because the three voted to extend health-care benefits to domestic partners. Read more

Even though the Supreme Court has declined to hear a case about churches using public schools for worship services, the Religious Right just can’t seem to move on.

Last year, the 2nd U.S. Court of Appeals said a congregation, Bronx Household of Faith, could no longer use a New York City public school to hold worship services. The congregation of about 50 had been using a public school, rent free, for almost 10 years. Read more

I’m all for “Religious Freedom Day,” an annual nationwide event that takes place Jan. 16 to mark the passage of one of the great milestone of freedom of conscience in America: passage of Thomas Jefferson’s Virginia Statue for Religious Freedom.

But I’m not for people using the anniversary of this important document to spread misinformation about church-state separation and religious freedom in America – and that’s just what the Religious Right is doing. Read more

The Religious Right’s rigid mindset dictates that its adherents can do things on their own terms no matter what the law or anyone else says. As a student at a Georgia university and the Alliance Defense Fund recently discovered, federal courts don’t support that mentality.

Jennifer Keeton was pursuing an advanced degree in counseling at Augusta State University until it became clear that she intended to impose her religious beliefs on clients in violation of the professional standards of her academic program. Read more

On Oct. 2, a few fundamentalist clergy around the country will observe “Pulpit Freedom Sunday.” They will take to their pulpits and endorse or oppose candidates in defiance of federal tax law, which prohibits nonprofits from intervention in elections. Read more

Poor Erik Stanley.

The Alliance Defense Fund attorney keeps pleading with evangelical clergy to step forward and become political bosses, but the clergy – and the American people – keep saying no.

Stanley and his Religious Right cronies salivate at the prospect of an evangelical Christian voting bloc marching in lockstep under the dictates of rigid right-wing pulpiteers and electing candidates who will tear down the wall of separation between church and state. Read more

The Alliance Defense Fund (ADF) lost another battle this week in its ongoing crusade to bring religion into public schools.

The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the Idaho Public Charter School Commission acted constitutionally when it ordered the Nampa Classical Academy not to base its curriculum on the Bible or any other religious texts.

In August 2009, the Commission told Academy officials that using religious literature as primary teaching materials violates the state constitution and would not be permitted. Read more