Shortly after I began my job at Americans United, a group of faith leaders I knew from my time at the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism (“the RAC”) invited me to join their Capitol Hill visit to discuss a host of equality-related issues with a congresswoman. I went so I could raise the importance of church-state separation.
Upon entering the congresswoman’s office, we sat in a circle, with the congresswoman at the head.
I wasn’t prepared for what happened next. One of the Christian pastors asked us to join hands and then began the meeting with a spontaneous prayer in the name of Jesus. As everyone bowed their heads, including the congresswoman, I glanced around the room for eye contact. No such luck.
Then it got worse. The same pastor suggested that we go around the circle and everyone take a turn saying their own prayer. As faith leader after faith leader prayed out loud and my turn approached, I struggled with how to handle the situation.
On the one hand, I didn’t want to alienate myself from the others, including the congresswoman, whom I was there to persuade. On the other hand, the prayers undermined the very principle I was there to discuss. The pastor was not only making his Christian prayer, followed by a host of other Christian prayers, an explicit part of our congressional visit; he was encouraging a member of Congress acting in her official capacity to participate. She did.
When elected officials blur the line between their personal faith and their public duties, they send a signal that some constituents count more than others. They also pressure attendees (like me), who want to make a good impression, to participate.
When my turn came, instead of praying, which would have felt both wrong and insincere, I shared my hope that our lawmakers could find a path forward that protects everyone’s freedom and equality — the core principles of church-state separation. After the meeting, I went up to the only other Jewish participant, who shared that she felt equally disturbed by the disrespect for church-state separation. We both had also felt ignored when the opening prayer, which shouldn’t have happened in the first place, was blatantly Christian.
I never reached out to that pastor to explain my concerns. I was worried about making waves and I didn’t want to overreact.
Today, I wouldn’t make the same mistake — especially not when our government is encouraging prayer from a national stage. That’s why, even with so much else to talk about, I feel compelled to speak out against the White House’s “America Prays” initiative, announced at the last meeting of President Donald Trump’s Religious Liberty Commission. The government website describing this initiative frames it as “an invitation to Prayer and Rededication of the United States as One Nation Under God … in preparation for the 250th birthday of our country.”
The initiative’s website lists “prayers and proclamations throughout American history” — both to inspire more prayer and as a type of proof of “the Judeo-Christian [read: Christian] principles of our founding,” as Trump put it at the meeting. The prayers listed are primarily Christian, with only one prayer coming from Jews and none representing other faith traditions.
The government should not be in the business of inviting people to pray or telling us when and how to pray. That role belongs to individuals, families and faith communities — not politicians. Government-promoted prayer undermines church-state separation, ignores the many Americans who don’t pray or pray that way and co-opts religion for political purposes.
It also paves the way for worse. AU’s Board of Trustees Vice Chair, the Rev. Dr. Brian Kaylor, together with the Rev. Beau Underwood wrote a book about how the normalizing of civil religion, which includes government encouragement to pray, laid a foundation for the extreme Christian Nationalism we are seeing today.
Given the current composition of the U.S. Supreme Court and the way some related cases about government-supported religious symbols and prayer have come down over the past decades, now may not be the right moment to challenge church-state separation violations like this one in court. But it is the right moment to raise our voices.
If our leaders want to unify the country as we approach America’s 250th birthday, they should call us to shared civic ideals like church-state separation — not a particular religious practice. We must remind our communities that initiatives like America Prays are bad for religious liberty, bad for religion and bad for America. Together, over time, we can protect religious freedom for all.
And to that, let’s all say: Amen.
Rachel K. Laser is president and CEO of Americans United for Separation of Church and State.