Faith on the Blackboard , The Real Agenda Behind Ten Commandments Laws

 In this episode, Mike Smithgall examines the growing push to hang the Ten Commandments in public classrooms and the larger campaign to rewrite history under the banner of “heritage.” He explains how Christian nationalism turns nostalgia into propaganda,  and why real heritage requires facing uncomfortable truths.

Question: How should schools teach history without whitewashing or politicizing it?

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Transcript

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Thanks for tuning in. I'm Mike Smith Gall, the unelected mayor of Atheistville, and this is today's Mic Drop. Louisiana wants the Ten Commandments on every public school. They say it's about heritage, not religion, as if the difference is just a matter of timing. But here's the thing: the same crowd is also busy erasing lessons on slavery, on racial violence, and Juneteenth, because suddenly the heritage is too uncomfortable. So which is it? History or comfort? The Ten Commandments debate isn't really about faith at all. It's about power and about who gets to define what counts as American history. Today we're going to talk about why this fight over classroom posters matters far more than it seems, because when religion becomes heritage, honesty becomes optional. In 2024, Louisiana passed a law, HB 71, requiring every classroom, kindergarten through college, to display the Ten Commandments in large, legible fonts. And I'm putting that in quotes because that's what they said. Large, legible font. Supporters called it a moral compass for youth. Critics called it what it was: government endorsed scripture. A federal appeals court struck it down this summer, but the Fifth Circuit, easily one of the most conservative courts in the country, agreed to rehear it. That means it's headed to the Supreme Court. Texas and Oklahoma have nearly identical bills waiting in the wings, all modeled after talking points from Christian nationalist groups like the American Family Association. Its theology copy and pasted into a civics class. The heritage label is a shield. It lets lawmakers promote their religion while pretending they're just preserving history. And look, they're not protecting culture, they're imposing it. As I mentioned, these same legislatures are removing lessons about slavery and racial injustice from their history standards. Apparently, the parts of our heritage that challenge us, they don't count. That's not education, that's airbrushing the past. For half a century, the establishment clause kept government out of religion through a simple rule from Lemon versus Kurtzman. Policies had to serve a secular purpose and avoid advancing faith. That's gone. In 2022, the Supreme Court's Kennedy versus Bremerton decision, the praying football coach case, replaced the Lemon test with a new history and tradition test. Under this logic, if a religious practice has historic roots, it's constitutional, which is convenient because in a majority Christian nation, almost every practice has Christian roots. And just like that, the Ten Commandments became a heritage display. When courts equate history with holiness, neutrality doesn't stand a chance. And here's what they won't say out loud. When religious conservatives invoke tradition, they don't mean the messy, contradictory past. They mean the filtered one, the Norman Rockwell version, where Christianity and patriotism are indistinguishable. And while they resurrect that illusion, they suppress the parts that contradict it. Ask Florida teachers, who were told to skip lessons that make white students feel guilty with HB 71, the Stop Woke Act. Ask Arkansas why black history courses were labeled indoctrination in the Learns Act. The Kennedy decision didn't just change one case, it changed the entire framework. Instead of asking, does this advance religion? courts now ask, is this traditional? And in a country with a Christian majority, that question has a built-in answer. If we judge constitutionality by tradition, then oppression wins by default, because oppression has plenty of tradition too. The Lemon test wasn't perfect, but it forced governments to prove their policies were neutral. The history and tradition test just asks if something feels American enough. And American enough tends to mean Christian enough. That's not legal analysis, that's cultural nostalgia with a gavel. All right, so let's talk about the word heritage. It sounds noble, it sounds inclusive, it feels very good, but in practice, it's become a theological branding campaign. Lawmakers argue the Ten Commandments are foundational to our legal system. They're not. Our laws come from Enlightenment humanism and English common law, not from Exodus. Thou shalt not kill predates Moses by tens of thousands of years of human evolution. Humans figured out murder was bad long before anyone carved it on a stone tablet. But here's where the hypocrisy really stands out. If we're honoring heritage, then where's the rest of it? Slavery is our heritage, segregation is our heritage. So is Juneteenth, the day enslaved people in Texas finally learned they were free two years late. Yet those days get whitewashed because they clash with the comforting narrative of a Christian nation. And here's what just kills me: the Bible being celebrated in a classroom is the same one that was once used to defend slavery and oppose interracial marriage. Preachers quoted Ephesians 6 5, slaves be obedient to your masters, to keep people in chains. They cited Genesis 9, the so-called curse of Ham, to justify segregation and ban interracial marriages well into the 60s. That's heritage too. But suddenly, when heritage gets uncomfortable, it's too divisive to teach. Look, if the commandments were Islamic or Hindu, those same lawmakers would be screaming indoctrination. Imagine a poster quoting the Quran in a Texas classroom. You have to imagine it because you're never going to see it. It wouldn't survive a single school board meeting. That's because this isn't about faith diversity, it's about faith dominance. Christian nationalism isn't content with free exercise, it demands cultural supremacy. You can see the pattern in holiday recognition. The Trump administration resists recognizing Juneteenth as a federal holiday, claiming it was divisive. Yet those same voices insist America must honor biblical heritage. Apparently, again, some heritage is holier than others. By sanitizing history, they keep moral authority firmly in their own hands. A child can read about the Ten Commandments, but not learn about how scripture justified slavery. That's not protecting religion, that's protecting ignorance. When you cherry pick heritage, you're not teaching history, you're selling propaganda. If we're going to celebrate heritage, we have to include the uncomfortable truths too, not just the parts that make us feel good about ourselves. That'd be great if we could just do that, but that's wrong. We're not just including the verses that sound inspirational out of context. If the Bible must hang in schools as heritage, then so should Frederick Douglass's speeches, Sojourner Truth sermons, Thomas Jefferson's letters warning that kings are the servants, not the proprietors of the people. Real heritage isn't comfortable. That's the point. Otherwise, heritage becomes theocracy draped in a flag. All right, quick pause. If this conversation is landing with you, consider subscribing. Atheistville keeps growing because people like you want a place where we can talk about belief and doubt and reason without the usual noise. It's free and it helps others find us. And there's something that matters more than you might think. Leave a comment. I actually read them, all of them. Whether you agree with me or you think that I am completely wrong, I will engage you like an adult. That's the whole point. Your comments also tell the algorithm that real people care about this content, which means more people get to see it. And one last thing, if you know someone who benefit from hearing this, share the episode. Maybe it's a friend who's questioning. Maybe it's someone who's still in their faith andor someone who just values honest dialogue. Sometimes the best conversations start with, hey, I heard this thing that made me think. All right, let's get back to it. Now, some people, I can hear you out there rolling your eyes and saying, Mike, calm down, man. It's just a poster. But small breaches are exactly how walls fall. The First Amendment doesn't collapse in one dramatic moment. It erodes through loopholes, one harmless display at a time. School prayer came back as voluntary reflection. Religious funding came back as school choice. The Ten Commandments, it's returning as heritage. Each step chips away at neutrality, and to neutrality looks like hostility to faith. And that's the point to redefine secularism as the enemy of morality. But morality isn't exclusive to religion. We can teach honesty, compassion, and justice without pretending they require divine authorship. We can build character without scripture. We can encourage virtue without mandating belief. If lawmakers truly cared about moral education, they'd fund teachers, not monuments. They'd protect truth, not nostalgia, and they would teach kids to question, not just obey. The child who learns the full story, not the flattering version, is also learning morality. They're learning empathy. They're learning to question power. They're learning that right and wrong don't depend on who's in charge or what religion dominates the room. And empathy doesn't need a monument, it needs examples, it needs conversation, it needs adults willing to admit that history got it wrong. That's harder than hanging a poster, but it's also more honest. All right, that's my two cents, unblessed and unfiltered, agree or disagree. That's what I got for you today. The fight over the Ten Commandments in classrooms isn't about religion invading schools. It's about the state abandoning honesty. When we pretend that heritage means only the good parts, we don't preserve history. We erase it. If we want to teach morality, start with the truth. Truth doesn't need scripture citation, it just needs courage. All right, I'm Mike Smithgow. Thanks for tuning in, and I'll catch you on the next one.