Rashida Tlaib of liberal “squad” fame on Capitol Hill, the first Palestinian-American and one of two Muslim women in the U.S. House, won this month’s primary against the president of Detroit’s City Council and is guaranteed re-election in a heavily Democratic district.
Now the “Friendly Atheist” blog on patheos.com revealed that Tlaib has quietly joined the Congressional Freethought Caucus. Aysha Khan, Religion News Service’s Muslim specialist, quickly grabbed the report.
Lest there be misunderstanding, this doesn’t mean Tlaib is spurning Islam like, say, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, celebrated author of “Infidel.” In theory, a religious believer can back such Freethought Caucus goals as “public policy based on reason and science,” protection of government’s “secular nature” and opposition to “discrimination against atheists, agnostics, and religious seekers.”
There are dozens of these special-interest caucuses in the House (.pdf here), covering anything from Cannabis to International Religious Freedom to LGBT Equality to rugby. One of the largest is the Prayer Caucus, chaired by North Carolina Baptist Mark Walker. The House members who lead the Ahmadiyya Muslim and American Sikh Caucuses are not adherents of those faiths, only interested friends.
There are now 13 House members in the Freethought Caucus, all of them Democrats, while 18 representatives decline to list a religious identity. Another 80 label themselves generic “Protestant” without specifying any particular church affiliation. See rundown on all Congress members here (.pdf).
These facts echo the increase of religiously unaffiliated “nones,” now 26 percent of the over-all U.S. population in Pew Research surveys. If effectively organized, they should exercise growing influence in the Democratic Party — though churchgoing Catholic Joe Biden’s nominating convention featured the customary God-talk.
Three Freethought members are among those who specify no religious identity: Representatives Sean Casten of Illinois, Pramila Jayapal of Washington and Mark Pocan of Wisconsin. The other participants in addition to Tlaib are Catholic (Dan Kildee of Michigan, Jerry McNerney of California), Jewish (Steve Cohen of Tennessee), Jamie Raskin of Maryland, Susan Wild of Pennsylvania), Episcopal (non-voting D.C. Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton), Lutheran (Zoe Lofgren of California) and Buddhist (Hank Johnson of Georgia).
Then there is Jared Huffman of California (official bio here) , who came out as the only openly non-theistic member of Congress in 2017. The following year, he co-founded the Freethought Caucus alongside Kildee, McNerney and Raskin, and serves as its co-chair.
Huffman would provide a personality focus for a feature about his young caucus, noting its new celebrity recruit. His irreligion causes no political problems because he wins lopsided votes in a bright “blue” district that covers the California coast from the Oregon line down to the Golden Gate Bridge.
The best coverage of Huffman and his religion, oddly, was in Britain’s liberal standby, The Guardian, a year ago. By this account, the Congressman is not an “atheist” or a foe of religion but defines himself as a “non-religious” humanist and seeker.
There’s a second religious angle on Huffman. He was raised in Independence, Mo., and in a faith headquartered there — the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (renamed Community of Christ in 2000). It’s one of those intriguing, smaller U.S. religions that get scant media coverage. See its current credo here. This denomination originated with family members of the Prophet Joseph Smith Jr., who rejected polygamy, and largely for that reason, broke with the larger Utah branch led by Brigham Young.
Huffman’s media office is at 202-225-5187 or after hours at 202-604-3405. The contact person for the Freethought Caucus is his legislative aide Jordan Sciascia at jordan.sciascia@mail.house.gov or 202–225–5161.
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