Religious Fredom

Virginia School District Open to Canceling Christmas

Fairfax County Public Schools in Virginia are considering scheduling school on Christmas.

In response to parent frustrations over fewer full weeks of classroom instruction, parents are being surveyed and asked what holidays they’d be willing to give up as they plan the academic year calendar – including the sacred celebration of Jesus’ birth.

This is one of the questions posed to parents in the affluent suburb of Washington, D.C.:

If the school calendar required modifying one of the following, which would be the most acceptable to you?

The options for responses are:

• Winter break shorter than a full two weeks

• Eliminating holidays recognizing religious and cultural observances (e.g., Christmas, Diwali, Eid al-Fitr, Rosh Hashanah, and other observed holidays)

• No day off before Thanksgiving (school in session Monday-Wednesday)

• Spring break shorter than a full week

• Fewer federal holidays observed as days off from school

• I find all of these equally unacceptable

Like most school districts in the United States, there are 180 instructional days on the calendar in Fairfax County. But with various holidays, teacher “in-service” days, early release days, and other anomalies throughout the school year, the five-day week is becoming increasingly rare. With most parents working outside the home, the uneven and fragmented schedule is causing frustrations and challenges for moms and dads hustling to find childcare when school is out of session.

However, the Editorial Board at the Washington Examiner notes that Fairfax County has the longest school year in the United States because of its embrace of diversity, equity and inclusion:

Fairfax County Public Schools has created one of the most bloated and chaotic calendars in the country: an August-to-June school year, an unusually short summer, a long list of student holidays, and remarkably few normal five-day weeks. This helps no one, inconveniences parents, disrupts student learning, and encourages delinquency.
Before George Floyd’s death and the summer of Black Lives Matter riots, Fairfax County Public Schools had no “cultural” observance or holidays on the calendar. But in a deliberate effort to promote “values of diversity, equity, and inclusion,” the board added 15 “observance” days on which student absences would be excused, meaning schools are barred from scheduling tests, quizzes, field trips, or athletic events on those days. Although these observance days do not create a full day off, they disrupt learning because teachers are encouraged not to teach new material while some students are excused from school.

Those days include holidays you’re likely unfamiliar with, including: Bodhi Day, Dia de los Muertos, Diwali, Eid al Adha, Eid al Fitr and Theravada New Year.

Earlier this year, the Fairfax board voted to nix Veterans Day as a school holiday. The same board rejected a proposal to do the same for “Indigenous Peoples’ Day” – a.k.a. Columbus Day.

School board votes certainly offer taxpayers and the broader public a snapshot of what those serving our children prioritize.

Predictably, the proposition of eliminating Christmas and other religious holidays has sparked outrage with parents in Fairfax County. What is especially aggravating for moms and dads, though, is how school officials have lumped Christmas and Rosh Hashanah in with other days – a move no doubt calculated and motivated by a desire to be politically correct.

Public school hostility to Christians is not a new phenomenon, but officials in some districts seem committed to finding new and creative ways to offend faithful followers of Jesus. 

C.S. Lewis may not have anticipated public schools considering the cancellation of Christmas on the academic calendar, but he did anticipate the possibility when he observed:

We have not yet had to cope with a society in which the vast majority of people were educated in another religion than our own.

We can pray that parents in Fairfax County will push back against the foolishness of the current proposal – but also be forewarned that in an increasingly secularized America, any deference and respect to Christians and Christianity can no longer be taken as a given.

New Bill Protects Religious Organizations from Federal Discrimination

A bill introduced in Congress today would prevent the federal government from using funding and tax benefits to strong-arm religious organizations into compromising their beliefs on marriage and sexuality.

The Fair Treatment of Religious Organizations Act, which Utah Congressman Blake Moore introduced in the House of Representatives Friday, would prohibit the federal government from refusing religious organizations tax-exempt status or federal funding eligibility based solely on their beliefs about marriage and sexuality.

The act addresses legislative uncertainty caused by the Supreme Court’s infamous ruling in Bostock v. Clayton County, which changed the definition of “sex” in Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 to include sexual orientation and so-called gender identity.

“The Fair Treatment of Religious Organizations Act [establishes] clear, enforceable standards that protect religious beliefs and practices and prevent the government from weaponizing tax-exempt status or federal funding eligibility against these organizations,” Representative Moore explained in a press release.

Congress created Title VII to protect women from workplace discrimination. When the Supreme Court redefined sex in Title VII to include protections for sexual orientation and “gender identity,” it didn’t just undermine Congress’ original intent — it gave left-wing idealogues legal power over religious employers.

Representative Moore’s press explains:

Bostock left religious organizations in legal uncertainty — their traditional beliefs and practices on human sexuality and marriage now potentially characterized as a form of sex discrimination under federal law.

If found in violation of federal law, religious organizations can lose federal funding and their charitable tax status — financial blows which can be impossible to recover from.

Justice Neil Gorsuch explicitly acknowledged the problem Bostock posed for religious organizations in his majority opinion, writing:

We are … deeply concerned with preserving the promise of the free exercise of religion enshrined in our Constitution; that guarantee lies at the heart of our Constitution.

Though Justice Gorsuch went so far as to sketch out what religious exemptions to Bostock might look like —rooted in the First Amendment, the Religious Freedom Restoration Act and existing legal exemptions for religious employers — the protections remained theoretical, and religious organizations remained on eggshells.

For years following the 2020 Bostock ruling, federal agencies attempted to adopt Title VII’s expansive definition of “sex” as their own.

It was only this January that the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) voted to rescind its “Enforcement Guidance on Harassment in the Workplace,” which would have forced federal and private sector employers — including religious employers — to abide by Bostock’s expanded definition of sex discrimination, including forcing women to share private spaces with biological men.

“The Harassment Guidance was an unlawful document and overstepped our authority,” EEOC Chair Andrea Lucas told the Daily Citizen’s Zach Mettler in a recent interview. “There are two sexes.”

The Fair Treatment of Religious Organizations Act codifies the protections Justice Gorsuch described in the Bostock ruling so religious organizations never have to fear this specific kind of administrative overreach again.

“Religious liberty is foundational to all that makes America great and genuinely exceptional,” Tim Goeglein, Focus on the Family’s Vice President of Government and External Relations, summarized the bill’s significance, concluding:

Representative Moore’s Fair Treatment of Religious Organizations Act codifies that constitutionally protected right.
Focus on the Family is grateful for his boldness and fidelity to [America’s] first principles.

Additional Articles and Resources

EEOC Protects Women’s Spaces in Federal Workplaces

Andrea Lucas Leads the EEOC: Restoring Agency with Truth and Common Sense

Eighteen States Sue EEOC Over Workplace Mandates Endangering Women and Free Speech

EEOC Releases Major Guidance Ending Many Workplace Protections for Women

The Bostock Slippery Slope: Girls Who Think They’re Boys Must Be Allowed to Use High School Boys’ Restroom, Appeals Court Rules

‘Not Only Arrogant, But Wrong’: Justice Alito Slams SCOTUS Majority for Redefining ‘Sex’

Federal Judge Blocks Administration’s Attempt to Impose Gender Ideology on Employers, Healthcare Providers

Expect Supreme Court to Uphold Counselors and Citizen’s Free Speech

Imagine being told it’s illegal to arrange a counseling session for your sexually confused young son or daughter.

That Orwellian type of prohibition exists in more than two dozen states, including full bans in California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, Virginia, Washington and Wisconsin.

On Tuesday, the United States Supreme Court will hear arguments challenging Colorado’s version of just such a ban. Our friends at Alliance Defending Freedom are handling the case. It’s called Chiles v. Salazar and features the muzzling of Christian counselor Kaley Chiles.

Chiles has degrees in biblical studies and psychology. She graduated from Denver Seminary and currently lives and practices in Colorado Springs. For the past ten years, she’s been helping young people with various addictions, including, up until 2019, unwanted same-sex attraction and gender dysphoria.

That changed after a Colorado law banned counselors from saying or doing anything that doesn’t “affirm” a child’s sexual confusion. It’s censorship in its purest form but many radical states, despite preaching tolerance, have no problem shutting down the free speech of Christian counselors.

Chiles has boldly and courageously faced the harassment and discrimination with great poise.

“It seemed like an invasion for the state to kind of be peering into our private counseling sessions,” Chiles observed. “My speech is being censored because my clients are not able to see me and make certain goals that the state does not endorse.”

The counselor’s main lawyer agrees.

“Colorado’s law allows counselors to push kids down the path of gender transition, often leading to harmful drugs and surgeries,” stated Alliance Defending Freedom Chief Legal Counsel Jim Campbell.

Campbell will be arguing the case on Tuesday on behalf of children and parents eager for mental health therapy in line with their values.

“It doesn’t allow compassionate counselors like Kaley to talk with kids to help them accept their bodies—even when that is their express goal and they have voluntarily sought Kaley out for advice.”

He continued, “Colorado is picking sides, promoting gender ideology, and banning conversations it dislikes. We are hopeful the Supreme Court will uphold counselors’ freedom of speech and young people’s ability to set their own goals of living at peace with their bodies.”

Chiles remains hopeful and determined ahead of her hearing before the High Court.

“Colorado’s law harms kids and censors speech,” she recently said. “I’m hopeful the Supreme Court will do the right thing—for me, other counselors, and most importantly, kids everywhere.”

As written and passed, Colorado law prohibits counselors from advising patients to change their “gender expressions or to eliminate or reduce sexual or romantic attraction or feelings toward individuals of the same sex.”

In Tuesday’s oral arguments, the “right thing” involves allowing what was commonplace for generations – moms and dads guiding and directing their children to seek perspective and help from a licensed counselor who shares the family’s Christian convictions and worldview.

Chiles’ optimism in the eventual outcome is well placed. In recent years, 5-4 or 6-3 majorities have consistently upheld free speech rights, political speech and commercial speech.

Under the current Colorado law, counselors who have the audacity to counsel according to biblical truth can be fined up to $5000 and even lose their counseling license.

There’s a lot at stake on Tuesday. Please join us in praying for Kaley Chiles, ADF attorneys and a receptive Supreme Court who will find that counseling therapy is protected free speech.

Image credit: ADF