Religious freedom was one of the biggest parts of the American dream for me and my family. When we immigrated to the United States, we weren’t just looking for opportunity. We were looking for a country where belonging and safety didn’t depend on whether your faith matched the majority or not.
Here, the government does not officially favor one religion. That matters more than most people realize. As an immigrant from a minority religious background, I never had to prove that my beliefs aligned with the dominant culture in order to feel American. I should never have to worry that federal policy would be written with my exclusion in mind. Church-state separation creates space for me to exist here fully, and that made leaving my home country feel worth it.
That is why the rise of Christian Nationalism feels so personal to me. I don’t even enjoy using the term “white Christian Nationalism” because it feels like it gives power to the people who argue the United States is fundamentally a Christian nation and should be governed as one. But it’s important to call out this idea of a “Christian nation” that blurs the line between religious identity and national identity. When that line blurs, people like me begin to feel like we are back in a situation where, if we do not conform to the majority, we will be left behind.
In my home country, national identity has increasingly fused with a dominant religious identity. When that happens, even gradually, it changes the atmosphere of a nation. Laws begin to reflect one religious belief. Minorities begin to feel watched and sometimes even excluded. So when I hear rhetoric in the United States suggesting that we are fundamentally a Christian nation and should govern as one, it does not sound abstract. It sounds familiar and takes me back.
Separation of church and state is not anti-Christian or anti-religious. Many Christians are some of its strongest defenders. What we should all be protective of, as Americans of many religions and none, is a constitutional democracy that does not privilege one religion over all others.
We are already seeing this privilege play out in policy debates, including reproductive rights, an issue I’m especially passionate about. When lawmakers push for nationwide abortion bans grounded in one religious belief about when life begins, that is not neutral governance. That is theology entering federal law. In the U.S., no single religious doctrine should determine bodily autonomy.
If separation of church and state fades, it affects more than one issue. It affects who feels secure. It affects whether rights are applied equally. It affects whether citizenship is rooted in shared civic values or in religious conformity. Policy agendas like Project 2025 propose reshaping federal governance in ways that align closely with a particular conservative Christian framework. Supporters may describe this as restoring moral clarity or “biblical values.” But when government policy begins to mirror one theological worldview, that is not simply a societal shift; it is a constitutional one.
The First Amendment both protects the free exercise of religion and prohibits government establishment of religion. Those protections are what allow immigrants like my family to build lives here without fear that our faith makes us outsiders.
When the government begins to privilege one religion over others, that is not a return to America’s founding principles. It is a departure from them. Tying national identity to a single faith tradition may be common in other parts of the world, but it is fundamentally un-American.
For my family, America represented a constitutional democracy where belonging was not determined by belief. We should be careful not to lose that.
Mehar Thakur is a member of Americans United’s Youth Organizing Fellowship Program. The views expressed here are her own and do not necessarily represent the views of Americans United.