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Thoughts from volunteer leaders and supporters of Jews for a Secular Democracy. If you have something to share, please be in touch, we would welcome your contributions to the blog!

A Helpful Primer on Secular Government

27 Feb 2020
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An article in the latest edition of The Humanist Magazine, “American Jurisprudence on Trial,” by Gordon Gamm, provides a concise and helpful history of the separation of religion and government and the key issues currently being litigated around the notion of a secular government. Gamm is a longtime leader in both the Humanist and Humanistic Judaism movements. As a retired attorney, his involvement has included providing extensive legal expertise to help ensure that humanists – along with all other Americans...
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Supporting the Goals of the Women’s March

16 Jan 2020
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Saturday January 18, 2020, is the third annual Women’s March, with events taking place in Washington DC, New York, and elsewhere. Activists from Jews for a Secular Democracy will be participating, and if you would like to march with our sign, you can download and print the PDF here. (The dimensions match 11”x17” but can be printed larger or smaller at that ratio.) We’re participating because the goals of the Women’s March align with our own Jewish values, and there...
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Become a JFASD Volunteer Leader!

Become a JFASD Volunteer Leader!

10 Jan 2020
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Are you concerned about threats from religious fundamentalists to reproductive freedom, LGBTQ rights, science-based policy, and secular education in America? Do you want to mobilize your community, congregation, and/or fellow Jews to protect the First Amendment and KEEP RELIGION OUT OF GOVERNMENT? We’re looking for Volunteer Leaders to help organize and shape our grassroots advocacy initiatives, focused on defending secular values at the local, state, and federal government levels, to keep our government neutral on religious matters, and to counter...
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Supreme Court of the United States

Should The Public Fund Religious Schools?

27 Dec 2019
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The upcoming Supreme Court case of Espinoza v. Montana Department of Revenue In January, the United States Supreme Court will hear a case that could erode the separation of church and state and allow for state governments to increase support for religious private schools using public funding programs. The Montana State Legislature in 2015 enacted a law creating a tax credit for citizens and businesses who donate to fund scholarships for K-12 students in private schools. The credit is equal...
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Jews for a Secular Democracy

Contextualizing Trump’s Executive Order on Judaism

13 Dec 2019
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On Tuesday, the New York Times reported that President Donald Trump was preparing to sign an executive order redefining Judaism in the eyes of the federal government as a race or a nationality, not just an religion, with the intent of providing additional ammunition for the Department of Education to withhold funding from colleges and universities that do not act sufficiently to combat anti-Semitism and critics of Israel, including the BDS movement. The text of the executive order, leaked on...
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BlitzWatch

What is Project Blitz and why should Jews care?

26 Nov 2019
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Project Blitz is a coordinated effort by Christian Nationalists to inject religion into public education, attack reproductive healthcare, and undermine LGBTQ equality using a distorted definition of “religious freedom.” Watch the state legislatures of more than twenty states and you’ll notice a nefarious trend: in Texas, Florida, Missouri, and more states, conservative, evangelical lawmakers have introduced nearly identical bills that would impose Christian theology and values on U.S. citizens. These bills are the product of Project Blitz, a well-organized and...
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“The Founding Myth” by Andrew Seidel: A Review

07 Nov 2019
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It is difficult to write a review of a book with which you mostly agree. The Founding Myth is one of those books for most secular non-Christians and those literate in American history and civics. While the conclusions that Andrew Seidel reaches in the book are common wisdom for those of us who value a secular government, its importance lies in the evidence he produces to demonstrate that the Christian nationalist position is founded on myth, erroneous assumptions, emotion, and...
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The Jewish Imperative for Church/State Separation

28 Oct 2019
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In a recent article for the Times of Israel, Paul Golin, the Executive Director of the Society for Humanistic Judaism (our parent organization!), celebrated Rosh Hashanah by explaining the need for American Jews to make clear our belief in science and opposition to religiously based government policy. “Almost all American Jews accept the scientific method as the way to uncover facts about our universe. So why would I bother advocating for us to be loud and proud about not taking...
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