The Umbrella of Inclusion
Equity, Inclusion and Social Justice
February 8, 2017
The Umbrella of Inclusion: Obama’s Big Stand to Include Non-theists and Atheists Under Religious Protection
Last month, President Barack Obama changed forever the way that religious inclusion looks in the United States. While in the midst of protecting the environment from oil dwelling, pardoning a few hundred individuals, and trying to leave lasting legacies from his presidency, Obama signed into law an amendment to the International Religious Freedom Act to protect nonreligious atheists, humanists, and others under the religious protection act.
For those of us working in the field of religious, secular, and spiritual identities, this comes as both an important moment and something that need be better understood. Chris Stedman, author of Faitheist: How an Atheist Found Common Ground with the Religious, remarked to me “this is the big deal.” For close to a decade, Chris has been one of the most significant humanist voices in America, speaking around the country in a variety of settings, including universities, where one of his key messages is how and why nontheist and atheist groups should seek to sit under the religiously affiliated umbrella. Now, the law appears to make this a clear method for protection as a way forward.
The International Religious Protections Act, originally created in 1998, was meant to make sure that religious discrimination was clearly outlawed and that individuals across the country could be assured of their protections to practice their traditions. And with Islamaphobia so prevalent across the United States, this has obviously been important and helped to manage complex situations over the past nearly twenty years.
What had yet to be protected until last month were the rights of those who claimed no religion. Unbeknownst to many, atheism is often cited as the second most hated “religious” group in America. Atheist, skeptics, humanists, agnostics, and others have for long periods of time been ostracized and harassed especially by more conservative Christian groups and have dealt with backlash in society for as long as the country has existed, but few times more so than in the last two decades. The rise in what has come to be known as the “nones” a group that Pew research designates as those that claim “no religious tradition” is growing at steady rates over the past twenty years, thus the visibility of the aggression against this “tradition” is more pronounced.
What happens now that this bill is law remains to be seen. On college campuses, a clear legal precedent should help administrators and students to situate the campus nontheistic groups under the religiously affiliated “umbrella”. In private settings, Chaplains should pay particular attention to how to support the growing numbers of students claiming themselves as “nones” and should now utilize this law to clarify why these groups fall under their offices. Finally, in public settings, the continuum of religious protection should now be complete and comprehensive. The continuum from religious groups to spiritual identifying and now campus nontheist groups is complete and universities now have an obligation for the welfare of all students affiliating to these students. Overall, these efforts will enhance the campus climate, will promote curiosity, and will provide clarity to the university that religious, secular, and spiritual identities all matter, as the law clearly has stated such.
Sources
http://religionnews.com/2016/09/14/muslims-surpass-atheists-as-most-unpopular-group-in-us/
http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2016/08/24/why-americas-nones-left-religion-behind/