Happy Election Day! We’ve traveled more than 1,600 miles on The Vote is Sacred Tour and arrived at our final destination: Philadelphia. From the minute we arrived in Omaha, Nebraska, 9 days ago, we’ve felt a powerful energy resonating across diverse religious communities.
We wrapped up the tour with a block party in Philadelphia in partnership with Episcopal Community Services. We had face painting, food, and music at the corner of 60th st and Girard Ave to make one final push to get out the vote.
In addition to the tour stops, we’ve had the opportunity to share important messages from the road. Our president and CEO Rev. Paul Brandeis Raushenbush recorded a message about the need to vote for reproductive freedom as an expression of religious freedom. And we got some help from Academy Award-winning actress Laura Dern. She shared our message about reproductive freedom with her more than 1 million Instagram followers.
Faith, Freedom, and Reproductive Rights
At the heart of our democracy is the belief that individuals should be free to make decisions guided by their own conscience, values, and beliefs, especially when it comes to their health care. The growing efforts to restrict access to reproductive health care under the guise of religious or political authority is deeply concerning and recent legal challenges across the country threaten not only access to care but also the foundational principle that no single religious tradition should determine public policy for everyone.
Do No Harm: Resisting the Misuse of Religious Exemptions
When does the right to religious freedom become a justification for harm? This question is at the heart of the misuse of religious exemption laws. These laws – protections granted under the First Amendment and utilized for centuries by individuals of all faiths – have been exploited by Christian Nationalists to undermine other fundamental rights, including equality and non-discrimination.