Editor’s Note: This week, “The Wall of Separation” blog is featuring the essays and videos submitted by the winners of Americans United’s 2025 AU Student Contest, which asked high school and college students to reflect on this two-part prompt: How and why do religious and/or nonreligious groups, on their own or together, advocate for the separation of church and state? How have they been successful, and what does their example mean for present and future advocacy for the separation of church and state? You can find all of the winning essays and videos here. Submissions do not necessarily reflect the views of Americans United.
I grew up in the Philippines, where religion gets very political.
Growing up, my religious background was very complicated. We were Catholic and then we weren’t. My mom converted to non-Catholic Christianity and we bounced around a lot. Jehovah’s Witnesses one year, Protestant the next, and we even ended up in a new religious movement that believed Jesus was a woman hiding in the Chinese mountains. In college I joined a Jewish club. I’ve been an atheist, considered Buddhism, and nowadays find the easiest way to describe my faith is in the philosophy of Omnism. I think I also called myself a Wiccan in high school.
While I was very fortunate to explore different religions to find out what resonated, I found that this personal freedom was limited. Outside of it, the Filipino Catholic church controlled a great deal of the policies and laws that shaped the country, the communities in it, and the experiences I would have.
I went to a Catholic private school where I was made to attend weekly Mass, was punished for dozing off during sermons, and made to explain my religion to teachers just so I wouldn’t be asked to lead the rosary. Even going to a public school wouldn’t have made a difference since they were also heavily Catholic, but they’re so underfunded that religious private schools are often your only option for a good education.
The Philippines is a country where the line between government and religion gets blurry. When I was sixteen, I tried to find birth control to give me peace of mind as I felt ready to explore my sexuality. And after trying to get an IUD, I was shooed away by doctors who threatened to tell my parents. Not that my mother would have minded, but the shame was still instilled in me.
I realized just how much the church influences lawmakers whose laws hurt people. Abortion? Illegal. Divorce? Illegal. Sex-ed? Non-existent. Adultery? Punishable by law with terms favoring men over women. I watched friends leave school early to raise children when we were just 13. Women I grew up around are still stuck in abusive marriages, and Muslim communities continue to experience Islamophobia because of a lack of diverse religious education in our curriculum.
Back then, I didn’t have the words for the despair I felt at a system that wasn’t working. Now I do. That’s why I care so much about the separation of church and state, because I’ve lived through what it looks like when that line disappears.
Here in the U.S., I learned that many groups, both religious and nonreligious, are fighting to protect that line despite the rise of Christian Nationalism in our government.
Groups like Americans United for Separation of Church and State, the Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty, the Freedom From Religion Foundation, Catholics for Choice, and the American Humanist Association, just to name a few, work hard to bring together believers and atheists alike, arguing that government neutrality allows all faiths to thrive without infringing on human rights to healthcare, education, or policies that impact real lives.
These groups advocate for church-state separation through lawsuits, public education, and policy work. So much of the religious freedom afforded to us today has been shaped by the people in these organizations.
For example, the FFRF continues to fight Christian Bible mandates, and conformist religious practices in schools. Americans United has been involved in 20+ cases fighting Christian Nationalism in 2025 alone. All these groups, AU, ACLU, CFC, BJC, and the like, have been protecting citizens from feeling unseen by a government that wishes to push a singular, suffocating, and sometimes extreme, religious influence.
Catholics for Choice has collaborated with students like me who go to Catholic universities to spread awareness on the condom ban at religious campuses. Their work on campuses like mine has led to student groups that focus on reproductive health care, and their influence has been so strong that I felt compelled to document the fight in my latest documentary project called “Student Body.”
These groups bring Muslims, Jews, Christians, and Humanists together to say that government neutrality is religious freedom. Because of them, public schools can’t force students to pray to a God they don’t believe in (shoutout to “Breakeven” by The Script). Our taxes are not going to religious leaders’ salaries. And people like my aunt, who divorced her abusive husband here in America, can live freely, without her rights limited by church law.
Freedom is fragile. And we are learning this lesson as Christian Nationalism continues to spread in spaces where laws are made. These conservative ideas are the exact same ones that shaped the Philippines’ bans on abortion and divorce. That’s why I’m proud to see people of faith and non-faith standing side by side to fight it.
When I was eighteen, I walked into a Planned Parenthood in the U.S. and got the IUD I couldn’t have back home. No sermons. No threats. Just me and the choice I made to take care of myself.
I wish this freedom was something people in the Philippines could experience. That’s why the fight for church-state separation here is so important, and why groups like Americans United are vital. So that one day, seeing us fight for religious neutrality in government spaces can empower nations like mine to do the same.
