Religious freedom speakers: California bill will strangle charter schools in state

‘You are here because you care. Don’t stop there.’

                                                                Lance Christensen, vice president, California Policy Center

By Valerie Schmalz

The latest fight to protect religious freedom in California does not look like it has anything to do with religion – but AB 84 is designed to “strangle” charter schools and take away parents’ rights to educate their children, a leader in citizen advocacy and religious freedom in California told a packed room at St. Raymond Parish Hall Tuesday evening.

Catholic schools and other religious schools as well as homeschool education will be adversely affected, said Lance Christensen, California Policy Center vice president of Government Affairs and Education Policy.

A coalition of secular and religious people are doing their best to ‘slow it down.’ AB 84 narrowly passed the California Assembly and there will be a hearing in the state Senate on July 16, Christensen said.

“Religious freedom is not always about worship. It’s not always about families,” Christensen said at the event in Menlo Park. “It’s about your ability to make a decision about a lot of things. We think and believe that parents should have the ability to do what they believe is best for their children. That is what we are fighting for.”

Christensen and Ryan Mayer, director of the Office of Catholic Identity Formation & Assessment, Archdiocese of San Francisco, spoke Tuesday evening in a talk titled “A Dialogue About Religious Freedom in California,” organized by the Office of Human Life & Dignity as part of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Religious Freedom Week, June 22-29.

Both speakers said the founders of the United States and those who wrote the California Constitution believed that rights are God-given and wrote it into the documents. Christensen said few Californians and likely few state lawmakers know that the California Constitution’s preamble states: “WE, the People of the State of California, grateful to Almighty God for our freedom, in order to secure and perpetuate its blessings, do establish this Constitution.”

The underpinning of the principle of religious freedom is that all our rights are given by God, Mayer said. “Once we remove the idea that rights are God-given, we reduce them to power,” Mayer said, and he gave the example of a plot line in the first season of the show “Lost,” where the storyline revolves around who has the gun, because that means power in the lawless society of the island.

But how can an average citizen effectively engage with the political process, and the legislators, in California where law after law is passed that infringes on the rights of families, of parents, and the fundamental human right to life? Christensen offered these tips:

1. Does this affect my faith, my family, and freedom?
2. Go meet your legislator. Ask him or her what they believe about faith, ask about their faith tradition. Legislators are in Sacramento Monday afternoon to Thursday morning and back in the district for much of the rest of the time. They will be in recess and at home July 18-Aug. 18.
3. Talk to your neighbors and friends. Don’t be afraid to talk about politics and religion!

“It is necessary to profess our faith in the public square,” Christensen said. Campaigning for state superintendent of education in the 2022 election, Christensen said he visited “every nook and cranny” of California. “You are not in the minority in the way you think you are,” he said.

Educating oneself is important, both speakers said. The hearings in Sacramento are livestreamed. “If you have the ability to do so, I would invite you to show up,” Christensen said.

 Mayer added a fourth item: “Learn more about Catholic social teaching.”  In fundamental areas, Catholic social doctrine offers surprising support—for instance stating that the state has the responsibility to subsidize parents’ choice of education for their children!

“Sometimes there are issues that come up that we may not realize that are connected to this issue of religious freedom,” Mayer said, highlighting the charter school bill.

“One of the important things to remember when it comes to these issues is that they apply to all people, because they are human rights,” Mayer said, and we are called to defend these rights for everyone including those of other faiths and those of no faith. “These are fundamental human issues–they are bigger than just the Catholic faith.”

More about AB 84 here and here. Recent articles by Ryan Mayer in Catholic San Francisco here and here.

California Constitution here. Compendium of Catholic Social Doctrine here.

Valerie Schmalz is director of the Office of Human Life & Dignity.