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Should Religious Schools That Accept Public Money Be Allowed to Discriminate?

By dianeravitch
October 9, 2026 //
5

The U.S. Supreme Court has opened a can of worms by its recent decisions allowing public dollars to flow to religious schools.

Some of the conservative Justices claim to be “originalists,” devoted to the original text of the Constitution as it was written. Yet the Court’s six conservative Justices have blithely discarded the “separation of church and state” that was continually upheld in principle (though not always in practice).

The First Amendment to the Constitution says:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press, or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

Those who think the United States was meant to be a Christian nation will find no support in the Constitution. The word “religion” appears only once, in the First Amendment. The word “religious” appears only once, in Article VI, clause 3, which says that there shall be no religious test for holding public office. (“…but no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States.”)

The word “God” does not appear in the Constitution, nor any reference to The Ten Commandments, nor to Christianity, nor to any Biblical precepts.

The Founders clearly opposed government “establishment of religion,” which the Supreme Court interpreted as no direct government subsidy of religion or religious schools for at least 200 years. And the Founders believed that Americans should be free to practice their religion or no religion.

The Founders’ silence about religion did not signify that it was unimportant, but that it was a matter of private conscience, no business of the state to control, subsidize, censor, ban, support, or aid. This was for most of our history the long-hallowed tradition of separation of church and state.

There were, as I noted, exceptions to that principle of separation. In 1947, in the Everson decision, the Court allowed the state of New Jersey to pay transportation costs for Catholic students. In 1965, the Elementary and Secondary Education Act allowed students in Catholic schools to receive remedial services from public school teachers. That part of the law was struck down by the Supreme Court in 1985 (Aguilar v. Felton), but the Court reversed that decision in 1997 (Agostini v. Felton), so long as the students were received remedial instruction in secular subjects). In 1968, the Court allowed New York to pay the cost of textbooks for children in religious schools. In 1983, the Court allowed Minnesota to pay parents for educational expenses, including parents whose children attended religious schools. In 2002, the court approved a voucher program in Ohio for religious schools.

Clearly, the “wall of separation” had many exceptions and holes through which public aid went to students in religious schools.

In recent years, the Court has gone even farther, basically concluding that any public benefit to public and private schools should be extended to religious schools. Excluding religious schools from the same benefits as other schools, so went the argument, was a denial of religious freedom.

The prohibition of an “establishment of religion” continues shrinking with each new decision touching the issue of public funding and religious schools. The convenient fiction that sidesteps the “establishment clause” is that the public money doesn’t go to the religious school; it goes to the parents who choose the religious school.

Today, many states whose constitution unambiguously prohibits any public funding of religious schools are directly funding religious schools, without bothering to amend the language of their state constitution.

In response to the new permissiveness of the Supreme Court towards vouchers, such programs have spread in the states, although voters have never approved a state referendum to endorse vouchers. Voters don’t like vouchers, but rightwing billionaires like Jeff Yass in Pennsylvania do. Billionaires fund political campaigns. Money talks.

Now, the public awaits the crucial decision from the Supreme Court–the one that is likely either to eliminate the line between church and state. Or to draw a line in the sand.

Linda Greenhouse covered the U.S. Supreme Court for The New York Times for thirty years, from 1978 to 2008. Here are her thoughts on the issue (gift article):

Chief Justice John Roberts has accomplished so much of his agenda that it’s not easy, as he begins his 22nd Supreme Court term, to think of what unfinished business might remain.

Affirmative action is dead. Roe v. Wade is a fading memory. The Voting Rights Act of 1965 is in shreds, rendered incapable of serving its original mission of preventing states from undermining the political power of minority citizens. The executive branch agencies known collectively as the administrative state have lost their independence, with the president now able to fire nearly all agency heads for any reason or no reason at all. Federal judges are no longer to defer to an agency’s interpretation of its own authority, instead being told to decide for themselves the validity of agency regulations. Historical claims that fly under the banner of “originalism” have frozen the government’s ability to regulate the ownership of lethal weapons.

While it’s a daunting list, some readers might notice that I have omitted one major focus of the Roberts court. Doesn’t religion belong in any inventory of completed projects?

Not yet.

That may seem a startling conclusion, given how significantly the court over the past decade has reoriented the relationship between church and state — a recent law review article by three constitutional law scholars calls the shift “a systematic dismantling of the previous legal regime.” A series of decisions, most of which bear the chief justice’s name, has established the principle, without precedent in constitutional history, that whatever public benefit secular institutions get, religious institutions are entitled to as well. The first of these, in 2017, required Missouri to include a church’s school in a state program to resurface school playgrounds, despite a “no aid” provision in its Constitution that barred the state from giving money to churches. Exclusion of the church from the program, Chief Justice Roberts wrote, was “odious to our Constitution.”

In 2022, the court declared unconstitutional Maine’s exclusion of religious schools from a program that subsidizes private school tuition for families in districts without a public secondary school. If the leap from preschool playgrounds to secondary school tuition seemed head-spinning, it was a leap the chief justice did not acknowledge in his opinion, Carson v. Makin. The principles of the first decision “suffice to resolve this case,” he wrote.

That is a huge amount of ground for the Supreme Court to have traversed in a short time. More is on the way. In its new term, which begins next week, the court will decide whether the equality principle these cases have established is enough, or whether religion is entitled not just to equality but also to preference, in this instance a carve-out from the rules that constrain secular institutions. The case is from Colorado, where a state “universal preschool” program operating since 2023 offers free prekindergarten to all 4-year-olds. Families can choose any participating preschool, secular or religious, that meets the quality standards established at the direction of the legislature. One of the standards is a nondiscrimination requirement: In admitting students whose families apply, the school may not discriminate on the basis of “race, ethnicity, religious affiliation, sexual orientation, gender identity, lack of housing, income level or disability.” Some 2,000 public and private schools, including dozens of religious schools, take part in the program.

For the Archdiocese of Denver, the sexual orientation and gender identity portions of the nondiscrimination provision posed a conflict. The archdiocese requires that parents who send their children to its schools accept the Roman Catholic Church’s teachings on marriage and family, asking them before enrollment to sign a statement of “community beliefs.” Same-sex and transgender parents need not apply. The archdiocese told its parishes not to participate in the program and requested an exemption from the two provisions. The state’s Department of Early Childhood replied that there was no option in state law for an exemption; every aspect of the nondiscrimination policy applied to all.

Two parishes, St. Mary, in Littleton, and St. Bernadette, in Lakewood, sued the state, along with a husband and wife from Littleton who wanted a state-funded Catholic education for their children. (The archdiocese joined the lawsuit but was dismissed for lack of standing.) The plaintiffs’ basic argument was that under the analysis the Supreme Court applied in the secondary school tuition case from Maine, Colorado’s refusal to grant the exemption violated the First Amendment’s guarantee of the free exercise of religion. The Federal District Court in Denver, in a decision affirmed by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit, disagreed.

“This case is different,” the appeals court said. It explained that while the Maine case and the cases that preceded it concerned a public program’s actual exclusion of religious schools, Colorado has “welcomed and actively solicited their participation.” The court added: “The only relevant limitation on any preschool’s participation is the nondiscrimination requirement which applies to all preschools regardless of whether they are religious or secular.” It noted that the state was neither targeting religion nor “attempting to prohibit funds from being used for religious purposes.”

The anodyne sound of that observation — that of course the state wasn’t preventing the direct use of public money for religious education — shouldn’t obscure the full dimension of the change the Supreme Court has wrought in the constitutional law on religion. The notion that the First Amendment’s other religion clause, the prohibition against the “establishment” of religion, might have anything to say about this arrangement sounds now like the vestige of a distant past, so thorough has been the establishment clause’s erasure from constitutional notice.

This case, St. Mary Catholic Parish v. Roy, puts to the justices the question of whether they are satisfied with what they have accomplished so far. Is equality enough? And if discrimination is an issue in the case, wherein does the discrimination lie?

For the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, the powerhouse religious law firm that brought this case to the Supreme Court, the question is clear. The news release it issued in April, when the court granted its petition, offered this account: “The Supreme Court today agreed to decide whether Colorado can continue excluding Catholic families and preschools from the state’s ‘universal’ preschool program because of their faith.” A tendentious framing, but well tailored to reach the ears of those justices primed to take an apocalyptic view of any seeming incursion on the interests of religious believers.

A “friend of the court” brief filed on the state’s side by Marci Hamilton, a religion scholar known for opposition to the court’s current course, proposes this counterframing: “This court should not undermine Colorado’s commitment to equality by transforming religious freedom into a doctrine that mandates taxpayer-subsidized discrimination.”

This case has flown under the radar in the months since the court granted the Becket Fund’s petition, but it won’t remain there as the Nov. 3 argument date approaches. Equality or preference? The choice is stark — and Chief Justice Roberts’s project, for now, remains unfinished.

Categories Colorado, Injustice, Justice, Religion, Separation of church and state, Vouchers

Reverend Benjamin R. Cremer: What’s Wrong with Pete Hegseth’s Emphasis on Religion in the Military

By dianeravitch
October 6, 2026 //
4

Reverend Benjamin R. Hegseth recoiled when he heard that Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth planned to create a new religious agency within the military.

Here is why:

Hello my friends,

Given recent events, I wanted to send out this newsletter to you today and reflect on them.

On September 30th during his “State of the Force” address, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced the creation of the Pentagon’s new Office of Religious Affairs. As of the writing of this post, no individual has been publicly named or announced to head this office.

According to Hegseth, the office will give military chaplains a “direct line” to him without “staff filters” and “bureaucratic dilution” that he characterized as an impediment to meeting service members’ religious needs.

“The experts, our chaplains, will finally have an advocate at the highest levels,” he said. “Policy and resources will serve the mission, not smother the mission.” “Accordingly, our department, therefore, has a sacred duty, first class religious support wherever we send our warriors,” he said.

He ended this announcement by saying, “as Psalm 33:12 extols us, “blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord.”

Mikey Weinstein, founder and president of the Military Religious Freedom Foundation, told USA TODAY on Oct. 1 his organization “condemns in the strongest terms” what he called Hegseth’s “immoral, unethical and unconstitutional actions” that, in his view, violate the First Amendment ban on the government “respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.”

He said his organization would continue working to combat what he alleged was “Christian nationalist bigotry, hatred and prejudice” in the military until “fundamentalist Christian religious extremism is forever eradicated.”

I think it’s easy to shrug off Pete Hegseth for many, or even see this as a good move for “religious freedom,” but I just want to put this move in the context of Christian history, which causes me to agree with Mikey Weinstein.

When nationalist political leaders in the past have created a position that oversees the religious aspects of the military that answers directly to that leader, the goals are often deeply disturbing.

Let me give you just a few examples.

Under the Romanov autocracy, the Russian Tsar ruled by “divine right”. In 1721, Peter the Great abolished the independent patriarchate of the Russian Orthodox Church and replaced it with The Most Holy Synod, a government department headed by a secular government official who was appointed directly by the Tsar.

This effectively turned the clergy into a branch of the state bureaucracy. The Tsar appointed a Protopresbyter of the Army and Navy to oversee all military chaplains. These chaplains were tasked with preaching absolute loyalty to the Tsar, ensuring soldiers took their holy oaths of allegiance, and reporting any political subversion within the ranks directly back to the autocracy.

While the Soviet Union was officially an atheist state, it provides one of the most explicit example of an authoritarian regime appointing officials to manage the “spiritual” and ideological affairs of the military. After the 1917 revolution, Leon Trotsky and the Bolshevik leadership established political commissars. These commissars were unified under the Main Political Directorate of the Soviet Army and Navy.

Historians often note that commissars acted as a direct substitute for military chaplains. Instead of theology, they enforced Marxist-Leninist ideological purity.

However, during World War II, facing an existential threat from Nazi Germany, Joseph Stalin temporarily reversed his harsh anti-religious policies. He personally met with church leaders and sanctioned a revival of the Russian Orthodox Church to boost wartime morale. He permitted the church to collect funds for tank columns and bless troops, intentionally co-opting religious fervor to serve state military goals.

When Adolf Hitler consolidated power, his regime sought to co-opt and control Germany’s fragmented religious landscape. In 1935, Hitler appointed Hanns Kerrl as the Minister for Church Affairs, tasked with forcibly aligning the Protestant and Catholic churches with Nazi ideology, a process known as Gleichschaltung (coordination). Within the military, the regime kept a tight grip on religious personnel.

Hitler also appointed Franz Justus Rarkowski as the Catholic Field Bishop of the Wehrmacht. Rarkowski was a fanatical supporter of the regime who used his office to issue pastoral letters telling German soldiers that fighting for the Führer was a holy duty blessed by God, ensuring that religious service members did not develop a crisis of conscience while carrying out aggressive warfare.

Following his victory in the Spanish Civil War, General Francisco Franco established a highly centralized, right-wing authoritarian regime deeply intertwined with the Catholic Church, a system often termed “clerical fascism”.

Franco secured a concordat with the Vatican that granted him the right to nominate Spanish bishops, ensuring only politically loyal clergymen were appointed. He revived the Military Vicarate, appointing a Military Archbishop to run the spiritual affairs of the armed forces. Under Franco’s oversight, military chaplains held officer ranks and were integrated into the command structure to ensure the military remained a staunchly conservative, nationalist, and religious pillar of the state.

A foundational pillar of American democracy is a civilian led apolitical military. Service members swear an oath to support and defend the Constitution, rather than a specific leader, political party, or religious text.

Just as historical regimes used religion or political commissars to bind the military’s loyalty directly to the ruler’s ideological vision, our concern should be that the explicit Christian nationalist and fundamentalist views Hegseth adheres to could be used to redefine military loyalty. If defending the nation is conflated with defending a specific cultural or religious identity, the military, full of people with different beliefs, could be a place of infringement of religious liberty, causing deep division, impeding military readiness. Military promotions could be based on ideological loyalty rather than qualifications, which is ironic given Hegseth’s consistent comments about “merit based” institutions. And most disturbingly, the military could be weaponized for domestic political, ideological, and religious purposes, undermining its historical role as a neutral defender of the entire populace. Time will tell what course this move will take us.

Given this administration’s continued push for consolidating power in every sector of government and society, this move within the department of defense should be deeply troubling for every American and Christian in America.

As a Christian in America myself, I unequivocally believe that Christianity doesn’t need political privilege or military power.

It needs less arrogance.

It needs less entitlement.

It needs less animosity towards those who are different.

It needs more humility.

It needs more generosity.

It needs more compassion and understanding.

It needs more Jesus.

It needs to be vocal about the separation of church and state rather than any selfish insistence that our country must favor our religious group above all else.

The reason I don’t want a “Christian nation” isn’t because I’m against Christianity. It’s because I’ve studied church history and learned about the horrors caused by the church crawling into bed with the empire. Separation of church and state doesn’t just help protect religious freedom, it helps keep Christianity Christian rather than becoming an empire.

Nationalism keeps telling us Christians to take up our swords and make our nation “Christian” by any means necessary.

Jesus keeps calling us Christians to take up our crosses and be like him, serving the world through grace, humility, compassion, and self sacrificial love.

May it be so with us.

Categories Citizenship, Democracy, Religion, Separation of church and state

What Will the New Federal Voucher Program Mean for Public Schools?

By dianeravitch
October 1, 2026 //
0

In January 2027, the federal government will launch a new voucher program. It’s available to states if the Governor opted to participate. The program was part of what Trump called his “One Big Beautiful Bill,” but which critics called “One Big Ugly Bill,” because it locked in big tax cuts for the wealthiest while cutting benefits for middle-class and poor Americans.

At the recent conference of the Network for Public Education, our board met to discuss whether we would support resistance or collaboration. Although we understand that some schools want to capture any money they can to support their students, we decided to stand strongly for the principle: PUBLIC DOLLARS FOR PUBLIC SCHOOLS. AND ONLY PUBLIC SCHOOLS. we concluded that if public schools accept vouchers, it will normalize the ideas embedded in the program, that is, that education is a consumer good. We believe it is a civic responsibility.

Leigh Dingerson’s description of this new program was published by In the Public Interest, which reports about the privatization of everything.

Public schools may participate in the program, but only for programs and activities that they do not already provide, like after-school tutoring, transportation, and field trips.

Leigh Dingerson wrote:

The idea that government has an inherent interest in providing a free, public education for every child used to be sacrosanct, except among a small set of radical reformers like Milton Friedman. But a 40-year campaign for “school choice” has quietly gathered steam. Proponents of privatization are now openly acknowledging that their sights are set on eliminating public schools. They want to eliminate the U.S. Department of Education (founded to ensure the civil rights of children in schools) and offer no-strings-attached public dollars to private and religious schools. And now, a lawsuit filed in Nebraska just this month argues that the U.S. system of public schools violates the First Amendment and asks the state to declare public schools unconstitutional.

The first nationwide, federally funded school voucher program is set to begin in January, but it has already become a political football in both red and blue states. Governors are being pressured to allow vouchers to be handed out in their states, and deep-pocketed special interests like the Heritage Foundation and large faith-based networks are spending tens of millions of dollars to build the infrastructure to funnel federal funds into private and religious schools.

There is much we don’t yet know about the program, including the mechanism to collect and dole out the money via Scholarship Granting Organizations (SGOs). Regulations are being developed by the Department of the Treasury and are expected within weeks. But we do know this: States are not obligated to participate in this program. In fact, governors or other designated agencies must decide annually whether to allow federally funded vouchers to be handed out in their states.  

What Can Be Done?

The implications of almost-universal private school vouchers are enormous. The federal tax credit voucher program signals a massive shift towards a privatized, market-based system with few if any guardrails to serve our most vulnerable students, ensure equity, rein in discrimination, or address educational quality.

What can state advocates and policymakers do?

Encourage your governor to opt out of the program.

  • The governors of Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Oregon have publicly announced their intention to decline to participate in the voucher program. Remember that the decision to participate or opt out of participation in the program must be made Governors may simply wait a year to see how the program plays out.

Consider legislation to narrow or guide your state’s participation.

  • Vermont has enacted a law that establishes criteria under which the state will participate in the program. It includes that SGOs have a “core mission of providing educational opportunities to economically underprivileged students” and that neither the SGO nor any school that receives funding under the program may “discriminate against any student” in a variety of categories. It also requires each SGO to report annually to the House and Senate Committees on Education, including data on the use of the voucher funds and the individuals receiving them.
  • In Rhode Island, the legislature has passed legislation which requires that both the legislature and the governor must jointly approve any decision to opt in to the program.

Watch for efforts to commit state funding to corporate entities vying to help administer the program.

  • A number of corporate entities have been created to “facilitate” and profit from the implementation of this program. For example, in Florida the legislature recently earmarked $2 million in its budget, apparently to contract with LearningSpring, a Denver-based start-up affiliated with the Koch network, to offer an online platform to help administer the federal voucher program.

Understand where your state might have authority to protect public education and ensure the integrity of taxpayer spending in the private market.

  • Familiarize yourself with your state’s private school (and homeschool) regulations and consider legislative language to strengthen them, and understand any state requirements for registered nonprofit organizations and whether they place any restrictions on, or allow oversight of, Scholarship Granting Organizations.

 What’s the matter with vouchers? The research is clear.

School vouchers are not new. We have half-a-century of experience with vouchers. Education Law Center’s Public Funds for Public Schools Project documents the many additional and important down-sides to vouchers. Among them:

 As students return to schools this fall, some have noted that this may be “the last normal year” for American schools.  It’s important for advocates of public education to make sure this critical institution doesn’t crumble.

Leigh Dingerson
Senior Research Fellow

Additional Resources

The following organizations offer additional resources on vouchers and the federal voucher program:

Education Law Center
Public Funds for Public Schools project.
The National Coalition for Public Education
The Network for Public Education

Categories Budget Cuts, Education Industry, Elections, Ethics, Extremism, Funding, Privatization, Religion, Resistance, U.S. Department of Education, Vouchers

Reverend Benjamin R. Cremer: “When Did Jesus Say, ‘Let the Little Ones Defend Themselves in Court'”

By dianeravitch
October 1, 2026 //
11

The Reverend Benjamin R. Cremer has an unusual personal history. He grew up in a strict evangelical family in Idaho. He was home-schooled. He became a pastor, following in the path of his faith.

But somewhere along the way, he had an epiphany. He began to change his views. He became tolerant of those who did not share his faith. He began questioning his beliefs. He accepted LGBT people. His views and his life changed. He somehow developed a democratic disposition, an understanding that people of different races, religions, and ethnic groups can live in peace together, solving problems by discussion, collaboration, and mutual respect.

In this post, he deplores the extreme cruelty of Trump’s zeal to deport immigrants. Children are going to court to plead their case–without a lawyer.

This is wrong. When I first read about children under five in court, without a lawyer, I was shocked. Is this still America? Maybe we should call ourselves “Trumplandia” until we once again have national leaders who know and respect the Constitution and who have a heart, a brain, and a soul.

Rev. Cremer writes:

More and more migrant children all over the nation, some as young as two years old, are having to represent themselves in immigration court.

On Monday, September 28th, 25 children sat in an immigration court in Harlingen, Texas awaiting their hearing before a judge. A caseworker sat and quietly explained to the children who everyone was in the room, from the interpreter to the judge behind the bench.

According to a reporter present, among the first to appear before the judge was a 13-year-old Honduran boy named Angel. He didn’t have an attorney.

Asked whether there was a reason he couldn’t return to Honduras, Angel told the judge, “My mom and almost my entire family are here. It’s too dangerous to go back.”

But that wasn’t enough for the judge, who told the boy he did not qualify for asylum. “Would you like to request voluntary departure, or should I issue a removal order?” The judge asked.

“I don’t know,” Angel replied before bursting into tears. He stared ahead stoically and continued to cry, eventually saying: “I have no one. I have nothing.”

“I understand, but based on your answers, US immigration laws are very strict,” the judge concluded, and gave Angel until the end of the month to appeal his deportation order.

Hundreds of unaccompanied migrant children who were detained trying to cross the southern border or whose families were picked up by Immigration and Customs Enforcement are being held in shelters operated by the Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of Refugee Resettlement, which is tasked with the care of unaccompanied migrant children, the reporter said.

In March 2025, the Trump administration terminated most of the federal Legal Services for Unaccompanied Children Program, which funded organizations providing legal representation and legal orientation to unaccompanied migrant children. The American Bar Association says that action put representation for roughly 26,000 children at risk. 

More recently, the situation became even more serious. In November 2025, according to the Senate Finance Committee and immigrant-rights organizations, the administration began withholding payments to organizations representing unaccompanied children. By July 2026, the Senate committee said more than $65 million was being withheld for legal services already provided, and the federal contract supporting the network expired July 31.

The government had a federally funded system specifically designed to provide these children legal representation, and the Trump administration substantially disrupted and ultimately replaced that system.

All while claiming to “uphold Christianity” and “uphold family values.”

Our country is treating children this way. In the name of Christianity. In the name of patriotism. It is inhumane, cruel, and has absolutely nothing to do with human dignity let alone Jesus, who said “whatever you do unto the least of these, you do unto me.

Whenever I write on this subject, I will always have a few callous comments that come up, so I want to address them here.

The first I’ll hear is, “Blame the parents, not our government! They never should have brought them here!”

A toddler didn’t decide to cross a border or choose the circumstances that brought them here. Yet children can end up in immigration proceedings where they are expected to understand an extraordinarily complicated legal system.

The Department of Justice explicitly says that immigration judges cannot appoint an attorney or guardian ad litem for an unaccompanied child. The child can therefore be left to obtain representation through private or pro bono resources or proceed without a lawyer.

Making a child bear the consequences of a situation they had no control over and forced to navigate a complex legal system is inhumane. It is callous to blame people you don’t know for circumstances you can’t even fathom.

The second comment I’ll receive often is, “If they just self deport they wouldn’t have to go through the legal system and get deported.”

That heartless logic just skips over the fact that these are children who can’t simply decide where they will live and arrange their own return.

An immigration removal proceeding is a legal proceeding against the individual child. Where is a child supposed to go when the country of citizenship may be a place they barely remember, where they may have no parent, guardian, home, meaningful support network, or be incredibly unsafe and violent?

The United States can have immigration laws. It can enforce its borders. It can also retain human dignity and recognize that a two-year-old should not have to advocate for themselves in a complex removal proceeding in unfamiliar circumstances they are already experiencing.

For me, it isn’t just that our government is treating children this way. It is that those who claim to follow Jesus continue to support the government treating children this way and even cheer them on as they do, treating all immigrants as if they are subhuman creatures that need to be eradicated from our society.

It’s not just the callus cruelty of our government, it’s the callous cruelty of the hearts that continue to cheer it on.

If we can’t even unite around the issue of children never deserving to be treated this way, then I’m at a loss of how we will ever find common ground.

This isn’t a matter of a “political opinion.” This is just inhumane.

For those who are seeking to help these children, you can find out how through Kids In Need Of Defense: https://supportkind.org/get-involved

“Woe to those who make unjust laws, to those who issue oppressive decrees, to deprive the poor of their rights and withhold justice from the oppressed of my people, making widows their prey and robbing the orphan.” -Isaiah 10:1-2

Read more here: https://www.cnn.com/2026/09/28/politics/texas-immigration-court-minors

Categories Cruelty, Immigration, Religion

Why You Should Attend the NPE Conference This Weekend!

By dianeravitch
September 22, 2026 //
4

Carol Burris, executive director of the Network for Public Education, explains why this NPE conference will be stellar.

She writes:

A community governs its public schools. Neighbors elect a board, set a budget, and decide what their children learn. That is exactly what privatization threatens, and it is what NPE’s national conference is built to defend. Over two days, September 26–27, at the Hyatt Regency Conroe near Houston, more than 40 sessions take on the fight from every angle. Here’s a taste of what’s on the schedule.

Vouchers and charters. In “Beating Vouchers in Court,” Derek Black, Jessica Levin, Fred Jones Jr., and Sharon Krengel will walk through recent wins in Montana, Utah, and Ohio, where voucher programs were declared unconstitutional. They will also review the live challenges in Tennessee, Wyoming, Florida, and Missouri. In “A View from the Trenches,” two Florida school board members and an Arizona teacher offer a candid account of what universal ESA vouchers have already done to how public education is funded and governed. And a session on the federal tax-credit voucher scheme, set to launch in January 2027, lays out what advocates in opt-in and opt-out states can do right now. 

In “Taxation Without Representation — Using a Conservative Argument to Combat Charter Schools,” Gregory Walace, Alison Chaplar, Betsy Flanagan, Daniel Marcano Jr., and Jennifer Simões will show how that framing sparked a grassroots movement, moved public opinion, and helped drive proposed legislation. “What’s Next for Charter Schools? A Review of Charter Strategies Across State Lines,” Patti Everitt, Gregory Walace, Carol Burris, and Dave DeMatthews lead an interactive look at how charters keep expanding in key states with few guardrails and little public engagement, which national initiatives fund that growth, and the research and messaging advocates can share across state lines to push back.

Takeovers are where democracy gets stolen outright. Houston high schoolers will describe how they organized against the HISD takeover. Parents from Houston (CVPE) and Fort Worth (FORT) share how they are fighting to win their voice back. An Indianapolis panel will dissect the sharpest trick of all — an elected board left in place, but stripped of control over buildings, transportation, and property taxes. “The Struggle to Govern Ourselves” will confront the research showing takeovers overwhelmingly target majority-Black districts, while organizers from New Orleans share hard-won lessons from years on the front lines. And in “The People’s Board,” presenters will take on Student Outcomes Focused Governance, the corporate model quietly sidelining elected members in board after board.

Follow the money. Maurice Cunningham, Mercedes Schneider, Mike DeGuire and David Armiak teach their best techniques for tracing dark-money networks back to the billionaires and foundations bankrolling privatization in two sessions. Other sessions map the private firms profiteering off vouchers and spotlight Wisconsin’s campaign to get voucher and charter costs printed right on taxpayers’ bills. 

The money grabs keep getting more creative. Texas advocates expose SB 1882 “partnership” charters as a fast-track privatization grift. Another panel takes on corporate tax breaks — energy-hungry data centers now the worst offenders — draining billions from schools. And with 17 states cutting or capping property taxes in 2024–25, national and state experts lay out how to defend the local revenue public schools depend on.

Faith, nationalism, and the classroom. Sessions on building school–congregation partnerships and mobilizing faith leaders in hostile states sit alongside a hard look at Christian Nationalism and its playbook for defunding and reshaping public education.

The newest battlegrounds. Randi Weingarten joins experts to debate AI’s role in classrooms — cognition, privacy, mental health, and the environment. A separate panel takes on ed-tech overreach and the lawsuits challenging how it commercializes student data. And student organizers from SEAT share how they’ve carried the fight to school boards, the legislature, Congress, and the Supreme Court.

The skill builder sessions are the reason you will leave with more than notes. Charles Siler, a former Goldwater Institute lobbyist who helped build the privatization playbook before turning on it, joins Manny Garcia to teach what messaging actually moves people. Rachel Coyle and Susan Spicka show how to win over hostile legislators. Others cover new-media strategy, gathering community input at scale, and getting real press traction beyond the press release. 

The keynotes anchor it all: Diane Ravitch and Texas AFT’s Zeph Capo open Saturday; Southern Education Foundation CEO Raymond Pierce speaks at lunch; investigative journalist Katherine Stewart headlines Sunday brunch; and Howard University’s Dean Emerita Leslie Fenwick closes us out.

You’ll meet the students, parents, teachers, clergy, researchers, and organizers who are actually winning in courtrooms, at statehouses, and on ballots. Privatizers have the money. We have the people, the passion and the plan. Register now here, book your room here in the hotel block, and join us in Conroe, Texas, right outside Houston.

I can’t promise that hotel rooms are still open but Carol will help you if you made a terrible mistake and forgot to sign up.

Categories Accountability, Bigotry, Budget Cuts, Censorship, Charter Schools, Childhood, Closing schools, Corruption, Democracy, Education Industry, Equity, Ethics, Failure, Freedom to Learn, Freedom to Read, Funding, Parent Groups, Privatization, Religion, School Choice

Arizona: Vouchers Are Working Well for Religious Schools

By dianeravitch
September 22, 2026 //
2

Gene Glass, one of the nation’s most eminent education researchers, sent me the following perspective on how vouchers are subsidizing religious schools in Arizona.

But first a short primer on why Americans have honored “separation of church and state” until recently.

Until recently, every state and the federal government abided by the principle that public money should not be spent on religious schools or religious education. The term “separation of church and state” was first used by Thomas Jefferson. Like other Founding Fathers, he abhorred the idea that the state should pay the tuition of students at religious schools. Students had the right to attend religious school. But not at public expense.

Today’s advocates of school choice claim that the Founding Fathers had no views about public schools, but they are wrong.

In 1785, the Founding Fathers wrote the Land Ordinance, which described the layout of towns that would be built as the new nation expanded westward. Every new town would have 36 lots, each a square mile. Lot number 16 was designated for a public school, centrally located so it could serve all children. The Land Ordinance of 1785 said: “There shall be reserved the Lot No. 16, of every township, for the maintenance of public schools within said township.”

Later, the Founding Fathers added lot 36 as a school land, with the understanding that it could be sold off to produce income for the public school.

They certainly showed no preference for public support of private or religious schools.

Today’s voucher movement, as many scholars have documented, had its origins in the resistance to the Brown V. Board of Education decision of 1954. Most whites in the South did not want their children to attend schools with Black children; several Sourhern legislatures passed voucher laws to allow white children to escape desegregation, but federal courts knocked out all those laws.

Vouchers experienced a resurgence in recent decades. But every time they went to a state referendum, they have always lost, usually by large margins. The public doesn’t want to pay the tuition for children at religious schools or at private schools that exclude students because of their race or disability or other characteristic.

Despite the fact that the public opposes vouchers, state after state has adopted them, typically because state legislators want to satisfy religious activists.

Professor Glass sent the following description of what is happening in Arizona. Bear in mind that voters in Arizona overwhelmingly defeated a voucher proposal in 2018. The Republican governor and legislature ignored the vote.

Professor Glass wrote:

Thanks to reporting by 12News, we’re finally getting a clearer picture of which schools are raking in the voucher money.

For those of you who haven’t followed the voucher program closely, a word to the wise: It has been a colossal pain to get information about the program, especially after the Legislature opened it up to every student in the state in 2022.

Sure, state officials bend over backwards to give parents information about how to use the program, as they should. But if you’re a run-of-the-mill taxpayer (or news reporter) who wants to know how your $1.15 billion is being spent, well, you’re out of luck.

Fortunately, Craig Harris at 12News took it upon himself to open up that black box. He and his colleagues have battled with state officials for several years now (and borne the brunt of the outrage from the pro-voucher crowd).

As part of that transparency battle, 12News successfully sued the Arizona Department of Education to get records on 2 million transactions in the Empowerment Scholarship Account (AKA, voucher) program.

The 12News reporters then shared a list of 190 private schools in Arizona that are raking in the voucher money, which is how we’re able to shed some light on how the game is playing out in Southern Arizona.

As we went through the list, one thing became glaringly apparent: Christian schools are dominating the voucher game.

Just look at the Southern Arizona schools that brought in the most voucher money since 2022:

  1. Salpointe Catholic High School: $15.2 million
  2. Pusch Ridge Christian Academy: $8.8 million
  3. Yuma Lutheran School: $7.9 million
  4. Desert Christian School: $7.1 million
  5. Yuma Catholic High School: $6.3 million
  6. Saints Peter and Paul Catholic School:$5.9 million
  7. St. Elizabeth Ann Seton School: $5.9 million
  8. Lourdes Catholic School: $5.4 million
  9. Southwestern Christian School: $5.3 million
  10. Calvary Chapel Christian School: $5.2 million (they also have campuses outside Southern Arizona)

Every single one is affiliated with a Christian denomination.

It’s the same pattern throughout the state. Christian schools got the lion’s share of the voucher money, while only two secular private schools brought in enough voucher money to crack the top 50.

Just going by the names of the schools, we counted 52 “Christian” schools, 37 “Catholic” schools, 15 “Lutheran” schools, four “Baptist” schools and three “Adventist” schools, plus a smattering of “parish,” “Bible” and “chapel” schools.

______________
Gene V Glass

Emeritus Regents’ Professor, Arizona State University

Editor, Education Review edrev.asu.edu

Categories Arizona, History, Privatization, Religion, Separation of church and state

ProPublica: Idaho Permits “Faith Healers” to Substitute for Medical Care for Children

By dianeravitch
September 3, 2026 //
9

Should states permit parents to trust “faith healers” for their children’s medical care? Should the state do so when the child is seriously ill? Should the state stand by idly when children tested by “faith healers” die?

That is what happens in Idaho. Under the protection of freedom of religion, parents may trust their sick children to “faith healers,” even at the cost of their lives.

Audrey Dutton writes about this quirk in the law, which was once widespread, but is now legal only in Idaho.

With the growth and political clout of old-time religions, this dangerous practice may spread to other states. When does freedom of religion become deadly?

Dutton writes:

In Idaho, parents who say their faith prohibits lifesaving medical care for their children can’t be charged with child neglect or manslaughter. Supporters of this protection over the years have included lawmakers who voiced support for “traditional” Idaho values.

But from at least the 1880s through the early 1970s, it was illegal for parents in Idaho to choose prayer over medical care when a child’s life was at stake, newspaper archives and historical documents show.

“Every parent of any child who willfully omits, without lawful excuse, to furnish necessary food, clothing, shelter, or medical attendance for such child, is guilty of a misdemeanor,” reads the 1887 edition of Idaho territory statutes, published before statehood.

The statutes included no mention of spiritual belief as a “lawful excuse.” Three years later, the state constitution explicitly put limits on Idaho’s freedom of religion. It would not excuse “acts of licentiousness,” polygamy or other practices “inconsistent with morality or the peace or safety of the state.”

It wasn’t long before the law came down on members of the Followers of Christ, a faith-healing sect that arrived in Idaho in 1899 and remains active in the state. From 2015 to 2025, the sect’s congregations in Idaho experienced 15 preventable deaths of children, according to ProPublica’s reporting.

Pearl Annis was a 13-year-old girl whose parents had moved from Oklahoma to Idaho’s Magic Valley in the spring of 1915 with at least one other Followers family. The Annises and their 13 children shared “a two-room shack,” a local newspaper reported. An officer and a doctor visited the home after neighbors voiced concern. They found Pearl in bed, fully dressed and on the cusp of death.

Her father, Lurid P. “Lewis” Annis, was arrested on a misdemeanor charge of refusing to provide medical attention. Pearl was taken to the hospital, according to the news story, and died there with what today would be described as septic shock from a bowel blockage. The newspaper, which didn’t appear to follow up on Annis’ criminal charge, called the Followers church “a religious cult” and Pearl’s death a consequence of “religious mania.”

News archives and historic records don’t say how many times Idaho acted on similar cases in the decades after.

But one legal battle over lifesaving care drew attention in the 1960s, as sickness made its way through a Followers family in a Boise suburb. The mother died in December 1965. Her 4-year-old daughter died the following June.

Days after the girl’s death, a judge ordered the state to take custody of her 10-year-old brother under Idaho’s child protection law. The boy was admitted to a local hospital with pneumonia, a complication of the measles. He spent days in critical condition but survived. The judge told the father that to regain custody, he would have to be willing to give the boy medical care as the law required.

A doctor testified that without the hospitalization, the child “almost certainly would have died,” a newspaper report said.

The father’s lawyer told the judge that his sect was rooted in “faith that God will heal the sick.” The law in the 1960s was clear, though: a parent had a duty to protect their child’s health, no exceptions. The judge told Samuel’s father: “The law governs conduct. Religion governs opinion.”

But the legal landscape was about to shift. It came with little public attention.

During a full-on rewrite of Idaho’s criminal code in 1971, the Legislature added a section that said the state could not bring endangerment charges against someone “who chooses for his child treatment by prayer or spiritual means alone.” Legislative records don’t make clear how the wording originated. The passage of another law one year later, affirming the “spiritual means” language and applying it to other crimes, has been credited to the Christian Science church, another Christian denomination with Idaho members.

(The Christian Science website says the church’s practice of “healing in the way Christ Jesus taught” is not “faith healing” and that members are free to choose any form of healthcare. The church also supported Oregon’s full removal of its faith-healing exemption in 2011.)

Faith-healing exemptions soon became widespread nationally. The trigger was the federal Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act of 1974, which set out to standardize the nation’s child welfare system by giving states grants to more effectively investigate reports of child abuse.

The Department of Health, Education and Welfare interpreted the law as requiring states to have a faith-healing exemption to qualify for the grants — an interpretation that records from the time don’t explain.

Open the link and keep reading to learn how federal law changed to deal with “faith healing.”

Categories Accountability, Childhood, Ethics, Extremism, Health, Religion, Safety, Separation of church and state

The U.S. Constitution is NOT Based on the Bible

By dianeravitch
August 12, 2026 //
12

It is no accident that the U.S. Constitution does not mention God or the Bible. It does not mention the Ten Commandments. It says that there will be no religious test to hold public office. The First Amendment guarantees freedom of religion, meaning every person is free to practice their religion or no religion at all. And it assures that Congress will never establish a state religion, that imposes one religion on everyone.

A commentator who uses the nom de plume “Quikwrit” offered this analysis:

AS WE celebrate the 250 anniversary of our Declaration of Independence, it is well to remember that the man who almost single-handedly wrote the Declaration, Thomas Jefferson, was a Deist, as was George Washington, Benjamin Franklin, and many other of our Founding Fathers who also created and signed our Constitution. The ideas of personal freedom in our Constitution come not from the Bible, but come from the philosophy of The Enlightenment which so many of our Founding Fathers were adherents to.

Washington, Jefferson, Franklin and all the other Deists among our Founding Fathers hated that they were forced to enroll as members of England’s official government Christian Church, and that’s why they wrote the First Amendment that not only gives We the People freedom OF religion but also freedom FROM religion.

The First Amendment forbids government from “respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” In other words, in America there can’t be any government “respecting” of any religion in any way, and the government can’t prohibit people from practicing whatever religion they want to practice.

Our Founding Fathers also wrote into Article VI of our Constitution that “no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States.” Our Founding Fathers didn’t want anyone to have to belong to any religion in order to hold public office.

Our Founding Fathers made it unconstitutional for our government and public schools to support or teach any religion or to require any religious affiliation for anyone to hold public office, and THEY CAREFULLY AND DELIBERATELY LEFT ANY MENTION OF GOD ENTIRELY OUT OF OUR CONSTITUTION.

Our Founding Fathers left God entirely out of the Constitution so that Americans could define God in whatever way they wanted, or to hold that there is no God, because, as the history of the world shows time and again, whenever there is an official government religion, there is conflict and suppression of someone’s rights. And such fighting is about to break out in America as states like Texas begin to require teaching “the Bible” in schools — but WHOSE BIBLE? Catholics use the septuagint version of the Bible that includes Old Testament books that were used by the Apostles in their teaching and that are referred to in the New Testament by Jesus and in the Epistles. The Protestant Bible eliminated those OT books. Whose Bible will be taught in public schools? And whose Ten Commandments will be taught? Different Christian religions, as well as the Jewish religion, have different Ten Commandments.

Europe tore itself apart in bloody religious wars of Christian versus Christian that went on so long they are called “The Hundred Year War” in our history textbooks. The ancestral families of our Founding Fathers suffered in those wars, and that kind of bloody and ruinous religious conflict is what our Founding Fathers wanted to avoid by leaving any mention of God entirely out of our Constitution and forbidding any government involvement in any religion.

I’m a life-long practicing Christian, but I don’t want my religion unconstitutionally imposed on anyone.

Categories Religion, Separation of church and state

Benjamin R. Cremer: A Christian Case for Separation of Church and State

By dianeravitch
August 7, 2026 //
1

Benjamin Cremer was raised in a strict fundamentalist home in Idaho and home-schooled. He became an Evangelical Christian minister. Several years ago, he began to question his church and eventually was expelled. He is now affiliated with the Wesleyans and keeps asking hard questions.

He wrote:

On June 26th, the Trump Administration’s Religious Liberty Commission released a draft report calling for a reexamination of the traditional understanding of separation between church and state. The report argues that religion and government should be viewed as partners rather than distinct institutions and recommends expanding the role of religious expression within public life and government institutions. Supporters see these proposals as necessary protections for religious freedom.

Others, however, have expressed serious concerns. They warn that when government begins treating religion as an essential partner rather than maintaining neutrality among faiths, the rights of religious minorities, dissenting Christians, and nonreligious citizens become more vulnerable. History repeatedly demonstrates that when governments become closely aligned with a dominant religious tradition, those outside that tradition often find their freedoms diminished.

From a Christian perspective, this concern should not be dismissed lightly. The church has often suffered most when political power became intertwined with religious authority. The same New Testament that calls believers to proclaim Christ boldly also presents a church that transformed the world without controlling the state. The earliest Christians did not seek privileged status within the Roman Empire. They sought faithfulness to Jesus.

For this reason, many Christians continue to defend the separation of church and state not because they want less Christianity in society, but because they want the church to remain free from political control and governments to remain free from religious domination. They recognize that religious liberty is strongest when government protects the freedom of all faiths rather than privileging one faith over others.

The Historical Problem

Few ideas are more misunderstood in modern American politics than the separation of church and state. Many people hear the phrase and assume it means separating God from public life, silencing religious voices, or forcing faith into the private sphere. Historically, however, the principle emerged largely because Christians had experienced the dangers of governments controlling religion and religions controlling governments.

The separation of church and state is not an attack on Christianity. In my opinion, it is one of the greatest protections Christianity has ever received.

For most of history, governments and religions were deeply intertwined. In ancient Egypt, rulers were often considered divine. In the Roman Empire, religious devotion and political loyalty were fused together. Citizens honored the gods not merely as a matter of personal belief but as an act of civic responsibility. Religious conformity was seen as essential to social stability and national prosperity. 

The earliest Christians lived within this system. Their refusal to participate in emperor worship and sacrifices to the Roman gods was viewed as dangerous. They were often accused of undermining the social order because they would not give ultimate allegiance to the empire’s religious expectations. The church began as a minority movement that understood firsthand the dangers of state-controlled religion.

Ironically, after Christianity became the dominant religion of the Roman Empire in the fourth century, many Christians began wielding the very power that had once been used against them. Over the centuries, state churches often persecuted dissenters, imprisoned religious minorities, punished heresy through civil law, and sometimes used violence to enforce theological conformity.

Catholics persecuted Protestants. Protestants persecuted Catholics. Both often persecuted smaller Christian groups such as Anabaptists, who were the most persecuted set of Christians during both the Protestant reformation and Catholic counter reformation. The result was centuries of religious conflict throughout Europe.

One of the most devastating examples was the Thirty Years’ War, a conflict fueled in part by religious and political rivalries that killed millions and left large portions of Central Europe devastated.

The lesson became increasingly clear that when governments gain authority over religion, faith becomes vulnerable to political manipulation. When churches gain governmental power, the temptation to coerce rather than persuade becomes difficult to resist.

The American Experiment

The founders of the United States were deeply aware of this history. Although many founders held religious beliefs themselves, they also understood the dangers of establishing a national church.

The First Amendment begins with two related protections: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” These two principles work together. The government may not establish or favor a particular religion. At the same time, the government may not interfere with citizens freely practicing their faith. This arrangement was not designed to weaken religion. It was designed to protect it.

Many of the strongest advocates for religious liberty were Christians themselves. One of the most important was Roger Williams, a Baptist minister who argued that government involvement in religion corrupts both institutions. He famously described a “wall of separation” that protected the church from the state as much as it protected the state from the church. For Williams, faith must be freely chosen. Genuine belief cannot be compelled by political power.

The New Testament Perspective

The New Testament offers remarkable support for this principle.

Jesus consistently resisted attempts to merge God’s kingdom with political domination. When crowds wanted to make him king by force, he withdrew. When questioned about Roman taxes, he responded, “Give to Caesar what is Caesar’s, and to God what is God’s.” Before Pontius Pilate, Jesus declared that his kingdom was “not from this world.”

Probably the most remarkable example is Jesus refusing the temptation from Satan to have power over all the kingdoms of the world, which would have been the entire Roman Empire at the time. Jesus refused because he didn’t come to seek power over others for himself, which is how earthly empires operate. He came to bring and share the power of God with the world. 

This did not mean that Jesus was unconcerned with public life. His teachings had profound social and political implications. Rather, it meant that God’s kingdom advances through witness, service, truth, sacrifice, and love, not through coercion and control. The earliest Christians transformed the world without controlling the state. They cared for the poor. They welcomed strangers. They rescued abandoned infants. They crossed ethnic and social boundaries. They proclaimed Christ as Lord. They did all of this while possessing little political power. Their influence came through faithful witness, not governmental authority.

Why This Matters Today

The separation of church and state remains essential because the temptation that confronted Christians throughout history still exists.

Whenever Christianity becomes closely tied to political power, faith risks becoming a tool for preserving social status, cultural dominance, or national identity. That is exactly what we are seeing today. Christian Nationalism has accepted the temptation that Jesus rejected, to have power over the kingdoms of this world. 

A Neo-evangelical sect of Christianity that runs the Heritage Foundation, is seeking to inject its own brand of Christianity over everyone else in our nation, even over other kinds of Christians. It is seeking to not only define what is truly “American” but what is truly “Christian.” This will inevitably lead to the erosion of of both civil and religious liberties. This also opens the door for other religious groups to control high positions of power in the future. However, my hunch is the Heritage Foundation and company don’t plan on releasing the controls any time soon, so they aren’t worried about another religious group gaining power over them.

When the church fuses itself with the nationstate, it begins to ask different questions. Instead of asking, “Are we being faithful to Jesus?” It asks, “Are we winning?”

Instead of asking, “How do we love our neighbors?” It asks, “How do we maintain control?”

Instead of measuring success by loving God and our neighbors as ourselves, it measures success by influence.

History repeatedly demonstrates that when Christianity becomes fused with state power, the result is often harmful both to the church and to society. The church becomes less prophetic because it becomes invested in protecting power.

The state becomes less just because it begins favoring particular religious groups over others. Both institutions are weakened.

Separation Is Not Silence

Defending the separation of church and state does not require Christians to withdraw from public life. Christians should vote. Christians should advocate for justice. Christians should speak about moral issues. Christians should serve in public office. Christians should bring their convictions into public conversations.

The principle simply means that government should not establish, privilege, enforce, or coerce religious belief. Faith flourishes best when it is freely embraced rather than politically imposed.

A Christian Defense

Ultimately, the separation of church and state is not rooted in hostility toward Christianity. It is rooted in humility.

It recognizes that the church is at its best when it relies on the power of the Spirit rather than the power of the sword. It recognizes that authentic faith cannot be manufactured through legislation. It recognizes that governments make poor churches and churches make poor governments.

Most importantly, it recognizes that Jesus never instructed his followers to seize political power in order to build the Kingdom of God. He instructed them to take up their cross, love their neighbors, serve the vulnerable, tell the truth, and follow him. The church’s greatest strength has never been its proximity to power.

Its greatest strength has always been its faithfulness to Christ.

Now I’d like to hear from you!

Did you find this helpful? What thoughts came to your mind as you read? Feel free to respond to this email and share your thoughts with me. I look forward to reading them.

Categories Religion, Separation of church and state

Afghanistan: The Corruption of Boys’ Education

By dianeravitch
July 24, 2026 //
12

The Guardian posted a fascinating and depressing article about the “education” of boys in Afghanistan.

It is a reminder that religious education is likely to be indoctrination.

It is a reminder of the importance of separation of church and state.

It is a reminder of why public funds should not pay for religious education.

It is a reminder of the wisdom of the Founding Fathers, who guaranteed freedom of religion and prohibited the establishment of any state religion.

In the world of the Taliban, critical thinking and questioning are not permitted.

In the world of religious zealots, indoctrination is the goal of education.

In the U.S., critical thinking and questioning are necessary for our democracy to thrive.

Which path we will choose?

The Guardian reports:

Before he leaves for Kabul University each morning, Hashmat* checks his face for the beard he has been ordered to grow. Male students are required to grow their facial hair and wear traditional Afghan clothes and those who fall short are punished. Hashmat says he recently saw a classmate beaten for wearing trousers.

“They look at you before they listen to you. If your appearance is wrong, you are already in trouble before the class begins,” he says.

Five years after the ultra-conservative Islamists of the Taliban retook Afghanistan, students have described to the Guardian a collapsing education system, with women banned, lecturers leaving and teaching increasingly focused on religious subjects and discipline.

University has lost its purpose. It feels more like a … place where curiosity is banned and remaining silent ordered

Qader

Students are required to attend religious lectures and pray in public every day, sometimes for two hours at a time, says Hashmat. The lectures are about Islam, conduct and obedience. They are not optional. In some cases, he says, they are held during time that would otherwise be used for regular academic courses.

“I am missing my actual classes to sit in a lecture about obeying. That is what they [the Taliban] think education is for. Everyone talks about the girls who were banned, but nobody talks about what is happening to the boys who were allowed to stay.”

Another student studying in central Afghanistan said the problem is not only weak teaching, but also the disappearance of debate and questioning from the classroom. “We are expected to listen, not to question,” says Qader*. “Since the fall of Kabul, the university has lost its purpose. It feels more like a madrassa now — a place where curiosity is banned and remaining silent ordered.”

Hashmat studies journalism, a subject shaped by digital tools, online platforms, verification, ethics and technology, but as he listens in class, he says he wonders whether the person teaching the course understands the subject well enough to teach it.

“He is teaching us about the modern world while struggling to use PowerPoint in the class. How can you teach journalism technology if you do not understand what technology is?”

Hashmat’s account matches those of more than 20 students interviewed by phone at public and private universities in seven provinces across Afghanistan – Kabul, Kandahar, Helmand, Nangarhar, Bamiyan, Balkh and Wardak.

Teachers come to class and read from old notes they cannot explain … it feels like we are back in high school

Zalmay

Afghanistan’s higher-education sector contracted sharply between 2019 and 2024, according to Unesco, with female enrolment down to zero by 2024 and male enrolment falling from 310,369 in 2019 to 188,957 in 2024.

Kabul University still looks like a university from the outside. The buildings are open, male students still attend, exams are held and degrees are issued. But students say much of what makes it a university has been hollowed out.

Experienced professors have left the country, stopped teaching or been pushed aside. And ideologically aligned Taliban lecturers have been hired in their place. In some departments, recent graduates and even undergraduates are teaching.

*Names have been changed.

Categories History, International, Religion, Separation of church and state
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