"Safeguarding the Separation of Church and State" w/ Andrew L. Seidel

Will Wright: Hey welcome back faithful politics listeners and viewers if you're watching on our YouTube channel I am your political host Will Wright and Josh your faithful host can't be here today he's dealing with stuff. Andrew L. Seidel: See you. Will Wright: So today we are talking with Andrew Seidel he's he serves as the vice president strategic communications for Americans United and is a dedicated attorney who spent over a decade defending the first amendment. He's the author of two signif

icant books, The Founding Myth, Why Christian Nationalism Is Not American, and American Crusade, How the Supreme Court is Weaponizing Religious Freedom. Also, as a senior correspondent at Religion Dispatches, he's known for his numerous op-eds and scholarly articles. He's publicly debated issues like the Johnson Amendment and contributed to the influential report, Christian Nationalism at the January 6, 2021 Insurrection, published by the BJC and the Freedom from Religion Foundation. He's an exp

ert on Christian nationalism and has Andrew L. Seidel: Hehehehe Will Wright: And there's one thing here that I gotta make sure I ask you before this is all over about your debate with Bill O'Reilly on Fox News. So, Andrew L. Seidel: Yeah, we could do that. We could talk about that. Will Wright: uh, so welcome to the show, Andrew. Andrew L. Seidel: Oh, it's my pleasure. Thank you so much for having me on. Will Wright: Okay, so let's just get this out of the way. Like, Andrew L. Seidel: Hehehe Wil

l Wright: why were you debating Bill O'Reilly? Andrew L. Seidel: Well, first of all, I think it's really important to go into those spaces and present those audiences with good arguments and real facts as opposed to alternative facts. And I kind of love getting in the mix with people I disagree with. The Bill O'Reilly one was really interesting though, because that was my first TV appearance ever. Will Wright: Hmm. Hehehe. Andrew L. Seidel: So I was a new attorney, newly doing First Amendment ch

urch state separation. and had to go on and argue against Bill O'Reilly on Fox News. And it was, it's this bizarre experience. Cause if you, if you'd ever done this, you know, people don't know how weird it is. You are looking at a camera in a studio and you just have earbuds in and Bill O'Reilly is just like in your brain. It's really disconcerting. Will Wright: Hahaha Andrew L. Seidel: Yeah. So that was my, that was my first experience both with national television and with Fox News. It was fu

n though. I enjoyed it. Will Wright: How Andrew L. Seidel: I'm Will Wright: do you... Andrew L. Seidel: sure it's on YouTube somewhere. So. Will Wright: how did you think you did? Andrew L. Seidel: I think I held my own. So I practiced beforehand because, you know, the whole shtick on Fox News is they interrupt you to try to knock you off what you wanna say. And if Will Wright: Hmm. Andrew L. Seidel: you are born and raised by anybody with manners, you know that Will Wright: Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha

ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha h

a ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha Andrew L. Seidel: it's rude to interrupt. So, you know, you actually, you kind of stop talking when Will Wright: Yeah. Andrew L. Seidel: that happens. But if you do that on Fox, you're just gonna get railroaded. You're Will Wright: Yeah. Andrew L. Seidel: gonna get overrun. So what I did... I had like an hour before I had to go to the studio and I t

urned on the TV and I found those like really terrible local commercials with like, you know, used car salesmen and stuff and I turned the volume up really loud and I just tried to not stop talking. That was how I trained myself to go onto Fox News. Will Wright: I wish I knew that because when we talked with Clay Clark the founder of the reawakened tour. I mean it was a good interview It was really difficult, but he filibustered basically the entire episode. And Andrew L. Seidel: You have? Will

Wright: I was like, I mean, I can mute him from this side, but it's like, do I want to? Like, I don't know. It just feels unprofessional. Andrew L. Seidel: Hehehehehehe Will Wright: So, all right. So, so, yeah. Tell us, like, why, why did you decide to kind of get into, you know, this whole separation of church and state thing? Like, what, like when you went to law school, like, were you thinking to yourself, you know what? area that I want to work in. Andrew L. Seidel: No, I went to law school

to save the world. I mean, literally, that's what I wanted to do. I wanted to do environmental law. And I did an environmental law concentration. I worked in the environmental law clinic. I actually won an environmental law award. And then I went on to get in LLM, which is a masters of law in international environmental law. I did a fellowship there. But when I was in law school, I was taking, after I took my first amendment class and I kind of fell in love with. this principle with this truly u

nique and original American principle, the separation of church and state. And it really is, it really is an American original. It's an American invention. And the more that I learned about that principle, the more I realized how powerful it was as an issue. And I also realized that it was something that Christian nationalists and the opponents of church state separation had realized. a long time ago, which is that having a robust separation of church and state connects to almost every other iss

ue that I care about. Seriously, I think people don't realize how important limiting the power of religion in our government is, building up that wall of separation between church and state. The only wall we need, by the way. It's almost a panacea. If you want better education or full funding for public schools instead of vouchers for private religious schools. If you want... accurate science about evolution and sex taught in our classrooms. If you want full civil and political rights for LGBTQ

people and women and minorities. If you want reproductive justice and choice to be fully realized. If you want a greener world and a healthier environment and you want to get serious about climate change, I mean this is one of the reasons I got into it. If you want access to better and universal healthcare or you want scientific research to be guided by scientists. I mean... You want to solve the problems in the Middle East, or you want our responses to pandemics to be guided by science instead

of wishful thinking. If you end Christian nationalism, if you end religious encroachments into our government, you're gonna see progress on every one of those issues. And the more I realized that, the more I was like, I can have a much bigger impact if I get into this space than I would if I became one of the thousands of environmental lawyers out there. And I was actually talking with my sister when I kind of first had the opportunity to come and work at some of the nonprofits that do this and

she was like, well, I was kind of hemming and hawing I was like, I'm not sure what I should do and she was like, well how many lawyers out there do environmental stuff versus this and you know, I know every lawyer who does church-state separation. There's like 15 of us. That's it So Will Wright: Ha ha Andrew L. Seidel: I think I've had a much bigger Will Wright: jeez. Andrew L. Seidel: impact here. Yeah Will Wright: Okay, so because we're going to be talking about Christian nationalism, you know

, at length in this conversation, Andrew L. Seidel: Mm. Will Wright: as well as the separation trick of state, maybe we can just start with just some definitions. Like, how would you define Christian nationalism? Andrew L. Seidel: I would say that Christian nationalism, it's a number of different things actually. And there are a lot of really good definitions out there. So if you ask my friends, Andrew Whitehead or Sam Perry, or even Robbie Jones, who are sociologists who study the data here, th

ey'll give you a very good scholarly synthesized definition. I think that Christian nationalism is the idea that the United States was founded as a Christian nation, that we're based on Judeo-Christian principles, and most importantly, that we have strayed from that foundation. that we've gotten away from our godly roots. And Christian nationalists use the language of return and these calls to return to those godly roots to justify this hateful, harmful, exclusionary ideology and the public poli

cy that goes along with it. Some examples from the Trump administration are the Muslim ban. I mean, that was... Christian nationalism written into the law, the child separation policy at the border. A lot of people forget that both Jeff Sessions, who was attorney general at the time, and Sarah Huckabee Sanders, the press secretary, justified that policy by pointing to the Bible, by pointing to Romans 13, which Jeff Sessions learned to do, by the way, in the White House Bible study, which Will Wr

ight: I'm sorry. Andrew L. Seidel: was a thing for a while. I think for a long time, Christian nationalism was sort of viewed as this scholarly debate about was America founded as a Christian nation or not? You know, did the founders believe this or did they not? But what we have learned and what we have seen is that it really is a harmful exclusionary ideology that's bent on seizing power in the here and now. And I think one of the best examples for that, you know, kind of ripped off its mask r

eally on January 6th and showed the world what it really was. Will Wright: Yeah, so when we talk about separation of church and state, I mean, we've spoken to a number of theologians, sociologists, what have you. some of the ones, you know, so there's one camp where people say, you know, church and state separation is somewhat absolute. It goes both ways and others say, you know, the church and state is really keeping state out of churches. So, Andrew L. Seidel: Yeah. Will Wright: like, where do

we draw the line when we think about, you know, church-state separation? Andrew L. Seidel: Yeah, the idea of a one-way wall of separation just doesn't work. Like the founders would not have chosen the wall as the metaphor if they wanted Will Wright: Hmm. Andrew L. Seidel: it to be a one-way thing. I mean, I do think it's important to note that one of the reasons we have a separation of church and state is because that is one of the best ways to protect true religious freedom. And that is someth

ing that I think often falls by the wayside in these discussions. But if the government... can coerce you, certainly you don't have religious freedom. But if the government can pressure you or suggest to you with the full power of we the people that you should pray on this day or pray in this way, you also don't have religious freedom. And to me, I think the separation of church and state, one of the ways that I have been framing it for folks lately is that violations of the separation of church

and state are abuses of power, right? What I mean by that is our government is one of limited power. It can't do everything. In fact, it's in many ways, very limited. And it has no religion to exercise, which I will elaborate on in just a second. But when government officials take that power of the office that they are temporarily occupying and the resources that are attached to that office. to promote their personal religion, they are abusing their power in very real and fundamental ways. And

we don't talk about separation of church and state like that, but I really think we should. Because when we see that line transgressed, it is an abuse of power and it violates the religious freedom of every single citizen. But the idea that our government doesn't have a religion to exercise is also really crucial. And it goes back to something I said just a minute ago when I was talking about how I fell in love with this idea, right? Because the wall of separation is an American original. It is

an American invention. The idea was floating around in the Enlightenment, Will Wright: Mm-hmm. Andrew L. Seidel: but it was first implemented in the American experiment. Will Wright: Mm. Andrew L. Seidel: Until then, no other nation in the history of the world had sought to protect the ability of its citizens to think freely by separating religion and government. And there's a lot that's wrong with our Constitution, but this is one thing that the framers got right. And in fact, most of the truly

unique and original elements of our constitution are secular. So our constitution was the first to declare that power comes from people, not gods. Right, the words we the people in there are poetic, but they're also so much more. Our constitution was the first governing document not to mention a god or a deity. Will Wright: Hmm. Andrew L. Seidel: And it was godless by choice, not by accident. There were actually a number of people in the founding generation who objected to that choice. Our cons

titution was the first to ban religious tests for public office. And it does this in article six, which was the only mention of religion in the original unamended document. And it does, it bans these religious tests in some of the most clear and emphatic language in a document that's often deliberately vague. Like everybody learned this in school, right? Like there are Will Wright: Mm-hmm. Andrew L. Seidel: parts of the constitution where the founders were just kind of like punting and kicking i

t down the road, right? You know, Will Wright: Ha Andrew L. Seidel: you remember. Will Wright: ha ha. Andrew L. Seidel: So it's often deliberately vague, but not this ban on religious tests. It says, no religious tests shall ever be required to any office or public trust, right? No, shall, ever, any. It's really clear and emphatic language. So again, a whole lot that's wrong with our Constitution. But the secular foundations are what made it unique and our genuine contributions, not just to poli

tical science and thought, but to all of humanity. Will Wright: Interesting. So it's like I can understand how some people, you know... Think that this is a Christian nation because like in the contracting world, you know, there's like scope creep Right. So like you start creeping a bunch of like little small amendments or provisions and then all Andrew L. Seidel: Mm-hmm. Will Wright: of a sudden you're like, hey We own the whole thing, you know And and it's like you've got stuff like the prayer

breakfast, you know, you've got like the congressional prayer you know and you look around you're like but Like I can kind of understand, you know, but like, what do you think most Americans probably get wrong when they think about the separation of church and state? Andrew L. Seidel: I mean, so that is the subject of my first book, The Founding Myth. I mean, in fact, both of the, the reason it's in my head is because both of the things you mentioned, the Prayer Breakfast and the Prayers Before

Congress are in that book and I explore them and I explore kind of all of those different threads where people are like, but we do this and we say we have a separation of church and state, how do we do this? And I mean, the fact is like the founders were flawed men, deeply flawed in many instances and did things that contradicted their stated principles. all the time, like in some really big and fundamental Will Wright: I'm going to go. Andrew L. Seidel: ways. And a lot of the things that we th

ink about are actually, first of all, not from that time even. So for instance, the National Prayer Breakfast Will Wright: Mm-hmm. Andrew L. Seidel: didn't start till the 1950s, which is also when you get In God We Trust is adopted as the motto, when you get Under God put in the pledge, like all like we had this wave of Christian nationalism that crashed over the country in the 1950s and left us with all of these scars of Christian nationalism. that people now turn and point to and say, see, we

were founded as a Christian nation, but it's like, no, those are actually disfiguring scars from previous waves of Christian nationalism that don't indicate that we were founded. And I just wrote an article over the 4th of July, which was, I sort of adapted from my book, The Founding Myth, about that one of those first prayers, because you hear this all the time, well, the founders prayed at the Constitutional Convention. Well, that's not true. That's actually... The opposite of what was true. B

en Franklin proposed prayer when the convention was deadlocked at one point, and there are some people who even think that maybe he was being facetious. I mean, it's Ben Franklin. It's kind Will Wright: Yeah, Andrew L. Seidel: of hard Will Wright: hmm, hmm. Andrew L. Seidel: to know, you know? But James Madison records in his notes, he says, "'The convention, except for three or four persons, thought prayer was unnecessary.'" And the fascinating thing to me about that is the convention was close

d. Right? Will Wright: Okay. Andrew L. Seidel: There was nobody outside looking in. And in fact, they took an oath of secrecy to not talk about what happened there for 50 years and not to publish anything about it. So when nobody on the outside was paying attention or could know what was happening, they didn't think they needed prayer. Will Wright: Hmm. Andrew L. Seidel: But publicly you do get some public displays of piety. One popular one that we hear about is George Washington knelt in the sn

ow at Valley Forge and prayed. No, he didn't. He didn't. In fact, the person who gave us that story is the same guy who made up the myth about Washington not being able to tell a lie after he chops down the Will Wright: Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha h

a ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha Andrew L. Seidel: cherry tree. This guy was a parson, right? He was clergy. It was named Mason Weems. And it do

esn't appear in his, you can't even call it a biography of Washington because he just did not care about facts Will Wright: What Andrew L. Seidel: or reality. Like Will Wright: the hell? Andrew L. Seidel: he just cared about selling books. It doesn't appear until like 50 year, excuse me, until like, I think it was the. 30th, somewhere around the 30th edition of the biography, right, Will Wright: Sure. Andrew L. Seidel: like he's just adding to this to try to sell. So a lot of the things that we

think of as, well, this shows that we're a Christian nation, are not true and are not reality. They are these myths that have been built up to show and betray the true founding, which is what I was just explaining about how we have this American original, this idea that this American invention of the separation of church and state. in an effort to kind of take it down. Will Wright: So as a lawyer, how do you use law to argue cases that deal with this church-state separation and or religious free

dom? I'd be curious on what's your process or is it just you consistently just saying First Amendment, First Amendment, First Amendment kind of stuff. Andrew L. Seidel: Well, that's a really, it's a question that all of us are struggling with these days. And that is because our Supreme Court has been captured. The U.S. Supreme Court, there is essentially a hostile takeover orchestrated of the U.S. Supreme Court. And that's what my second book, American Crusade, is about. And so over the last dec

ade, you see this court. really turning away from and warping both religion and the law and the separation of church and state. So in fact, one of the, I think one of the best overviews of all of the significant cases involving the separation of church and state involving religious freedom comes from Justice Sotomayor in her dissent in the Carson versus making case, which was not from last term, but the term before. And that was a case about forcing taxpayers in Maine to fund Christian schools t

hat indoctrinate children into one particular religion, and which also discriminate against LGBTQ students and families and staff. Again, all with your tax dollars. And the first line of her dissent explains that the last five to 10 years of religion and the law in the court have been, well, I have it here, hang on, let me just read it. She says, This court continues to dismantle the wall of separation between church and state that the framers fought to build. And then she ends, it's a very shor

t dissent, and then she ends and she says, she's looking back and she says, what a difference five years makes. In 2017, I feared the court was leading us to a place where separation of church and state is a constitutional slogan, not a constitutional commitment. And she's citing an opinion she wrote from 2017. And then she ends and she says, today, the court leads us to a place where separation of church and state becomes a constitutional violation. And I mean, I don't think people realize how

far we have strayed from the constitution and what is understood by both religious freedom and the separation of church and state. And that's why I wrote my second book, American Crusade. Will Wright: So what do you say to people that say, well, the separation of church and state isn't explicitly mentioned in the Constitution. It was like, you know, Danbury Baptist, Jefferson, Roger Andrew L. Seidel: Mm-hmm. Will Wright: Williams, whatever. So that Andrew L. Seidel: Yeah. Will Wright: you can't

necessarily use that argument against me. Andrew L. Seidel: Yeah, it's really, I mean, it's a very popular argument. Lauren Boebert made it recently. So did Trump's former press secretary, Kayleigh Will Wright: Mm, mac Andrew L. Seidel: McEnany, Will Wright: and eating. Andrew L. Seidel: Pete Hague said. It's like really popular on Fox Will Wright: Sure. Andrew L. Seidel: News. But the argument, as you said, right, well, the actual words separation of church and state aren't in the constitution.

And look, I gotta say, I think it's one of the most feeble arguments out there. I'm so surprised that it's still used. And as you pointed out, yes, that. phrase comes from a letter that Thomas Jefferson wrote to the Danbury Baptists on New Year's Day in 1802. And he celebrated the whole First Amendment as building that wall of separation between church and state. But the Supreme Court itself, first of all, has endorsed the view many, many times. The first time in 1878, which is not something yo

u're going to hear about from the other side. And then they did it again in 1947 and in 1948 and in 1961, three different times, and in 62 and in 63 and in 68 and in 73 and on and on and on and on. Will Wright: Ha ha. Andrew L. Seidel: And then again and again and again and again in countless, countless concurrences and dissents and lower courts opinions. Okay. And James Madison, you know, used similar language, James Madison, who we call the father of the Constitution and the father of the Bill

of Rights. He said that strongly guarded is the separation between religion and government in the Constitution of the United States, right? I mean, that's pretty darn clear. And the idea that, well, the words themselves aren't in the Constitution verbatim, well, I mean, neither is the phrase fair trial, Will Wright: Hmm. Andrew L. Seidel: but it's a phrase that we use to describe several big rights that are protected in the Bill of Rights. Will Wright: Hmm. Andrew L. Seidel: Right? So the idea

that it doesn't appear verbatim to me is just, it's kind of weak sauce, I think is how I would phrase it. Will Wright: I think that's what the kids call it. Andrew L. Seidel: That's what the kids call it. I mean, it's fun, especially again, you know, when you, when you pair it with everything that I mentioned earlier about, you know, drawing power from the people, not mentioning a God about the religious, the ban on religious tests, you know, you put all that together and it really is, it's, it'

s clear what they were trying to do. Will Wright: Yeah. So, um, so let's, let's talk kind of more, more current, like what are, what are some, you know, significant cases in the news that you're following and or maybe arguing, um, that involves separation church and state. Andrew L. Seidel: Yeah, I mean, it's everywhere. You know, Representative Matt Gaetz, just the other day or today or announced, I guess, I announced, I guess we can say, that he's going to propose a prayer bill to get prayer b

ack into public schools, Will Wright: Hahaha Andrew L. Seidel: which again, like this is like, you know, this is like, again, Will, this is like one of those myths where it's like, kids can pray in public schools. Like Will Wright: I know. Andrew L. Seidel: nothing is stopping kids from praying in public schools. This is an unnecessary Will Wright: Hmm. Andrew L. Seidel: idea. I mean, there's a really old joke that as long as there are math tests in schools, there's going to be prayer. And Will

Wright: Yeah. Andrew L. Seidel: like, nothing has ever stopped kids from praying in public schools. They have that right. They are free to have that right. And in fact, the organization I work for, Americans United for Separation of Church and State, would be first on board if that right was truly threatened to be standing against it. The fact of the matter is, it's not. That right is not under threat at all. What we are seeing with, for instance, Gates' bill is him encouraging students and teac

hers and administrators to pressure kids into prayer, or to allow that kind of pressure to happen. What we want when we're talking about the separation of church and state is, okay, you can't use the machinery of the state to impose your religion on other people's kids. And that's what kind of Gates is really trying to encourage with his Will Wright: Hmm. Andrew L. Seidel: bill. So that's just one. recent example Will Wright: Mm-mm. Andrew L. Seidel: that I was dealing with as I was rushing to g

et into this Will Wright: What? Andrew L. Seidel: podcast with you this morning with my team and I don't that Bill I mean like most of what he does you know that's more for attention rather Will Wright: soon. Andrew L. Seidel: than actual policy it's not gonna it's not gonna go anywhere certainly not gonna get through the Senate so but I mean what we have really seen it again over the last 10 years is just this crazy shift in the way that courts handle these cases Um, and- In American Crusade, I

date this to this push to warp the legal definition of religious freedom and to end church-state separation. You can go back further. But there's really, there's this 2010 case involving a cross, a Christian cross in the Mojave Desert. And the Supreme Court issues this opinion in this case. And the Supreme Court is essentially signaling the start of this crusade about what Sotomayor was writing about in that dissent that I read earlier. And You get this whole host of Christian nationalist legal

groups that make up this billion dollar shadow network. Groups like the Alliance Defending Freedom, and the American Center for Law and Justice, and the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, and Liberty Council, and First Liberty Institute. This Orwellian word salad. And they heard that message in 2010, opinion in the Mojave Desert Cross case, and the floodgates opened. and they file a lawsuit after a lawsuit and they stoke this fear of status loss and they raise billions of dollars. And what you

see is these crusading groups set these cases up and then the conservative justices on the court come and knock them down. And that accelerates once Trump took office and then packed the Supreme Court. And it really does begin to look a lot like collusion, especially Will Wright: Hmm. Andrew L. Seidel: when we find out that some of these same groups and these same donors to those groups are whining and dining the justices on private super yachts and private jets and on island hopping vacations,

you know, none of which were disclosed. And one of the things that I try to do in American Crusade is to tell the stories kind of behind these, but the numbers here are just, they're jaw dropping. Because when they set out to capture the courts, we saw some studies crunch the numbers and the studies don't. go over the last two terms. So the numbers that I'm about to recite to you are actually like more dramatic than what I'm going to tell you. So before the courts were packed, the court ruled in

favor of religion about half the time. And that's, that's what you'd expect. Like if you were Will Wright: Hmm. Andrew L. Seidel: guessing, Will Wright: Yeah. Hmm. Andrew L. Seidel: you know, you flip a coin, I don't know, you win half the time. But under John Roberts, one study found that win rate for religion jumps to 81%. Will Wright: Geez. Andrew L. Seidel: And importantly, Will, I mean, this to me was like one of the shocking points, it's not a pro-religion shift. It's a pro-Christian shif

t. Will Wright: Mm. Andrew L. Seidel: In early courts, Christianity was favored in about 44% of the cases. Again, you know, kind of what you would expect, coin flip. Under Roberts, that goes up to 85%. That's nearly doubled. Will Wright: Hmm. Andrew L. Seidel: And again, favoring mainstream Christianity. So what we are seeing is that religious freedom has become a weapon of Christian privilege. And in American Crusade, I worked to put a face on those numbers. And I think you can really see that

the guiding principle of this new Supreme Court is not the constitution or the law, but simply this, Christianity wins. And so, you know, and I'm answering your question about what is, you know, what are the things that I'm watching right now by, by reciting these statistics and pointing to this crusade, because so much is happening and things are changing so rapidly and... these crusading groups are, they feel and believe, and you can tell this in the way that they litigate and the way that the

y treat procedure and the way that they treat facts and reality, they feel entitled to take any case they want to this Supreme Court and litigate it and expect to win. before the Supreme Court when they do. And I mean, I'm happy to talk about more of the specifics. I think one of the best examples of that is the Coach Kennedy case that people remember. This was, and I won't get into Will Wright: I'm Andrew L. Seidel: it because Will Wright: out. Andrew L. Seidel: now I'm filibustering on your sh

ow and I apologize, yeah, Will Wright: That's Andrew L. Seidel: yeah. Will Wright: fine. Yeah, we'll definitely get into the Kennedy case a little bit because when we had Amanda Tyler on, we sort of talked about that ad nauseam. But it was sort of important to me because I came from Bermerton, like that's sort Andrew L. Seidel: Oh, Will Wright: of my, Andrew L. Seidel: you did? Wow. Will Wright: yeah, that's my old stuff. Andrew L. Seidel: Fascinating. Will Wright: Yeah, Andrew L. Seidel: Yeah.

Will Wright: and I lived just right down the street from the high school. Andrew L. Seidel: Fascinating. Will Wright: impacting our legal landscape for church-state separation type cases. But can you discuss certain cases, ones that maybe weren't necessarily in news as much, Andrew L. Seidel: Mmm. Will Wright: like the Espinosa v. Montana Andrew L. Seidel: Oh yeah. Will Wright: or the Fulton v. Philadelphia? Andrew L. Seidel: Yeah, the Espan... the Fulton's a little dicier to discuss because the

way the court decided it, it was sort of this really strange, legal, esoteric kind of question that they ended up settling on. But the Espanosa v. Montana Department of Revenue case is really fascinating case. And most people, you're right, don't know about it. And so the Montana Constitution protects the religious freedom of every taxpayer by declaring that... the state cannot make any direct or indirect payment from any public fund or money to, and then they will have a whole list of things t

hat say basically for any sectarian purpose or church or religious school, and then kind of every different synonym for school, that's controlled in whole or part by a church or a sect or a denomination, okay? So there's, and that's called a no aid clause. And it's this really important principle that again, it protects the religious freedom of every taxpayer because if the government can use its coercive taxing power to take money out of your pocket and then turn around and give it to a religio

n that's not your own, which may even say, you know, you're going to hell for all eternity or something like that, it's violating your religious freedom, right? I mean, another way to think of that is it's in government enforced tithing. And Will Wright: Hmm. Andrew L. Seidel: this is one of the things that the founders really, really against. Thomas Jefferson said that it was quote, sinful and tyrannical for the government to use its taxing power to support religion. It was one of the things th

at really motivated a lot of the founders to separate church and state. And yet in Montana, the state legislature, and I think it was 2015, adopted a scheme that would funnel public money to Christian schools. And now vouchers, are sort of this ever evolving hydra. Will Wright: Hehehehe Andrew L. Seidel: It's crazy to try to fight them, but the core point of any kind of voucher is that it relies on the government's taxing power to fund private education. And that private education is overwhelmin

gly religious and Christian, often well over 90%, sometimes 100% Christian schools are getting this. And so using the taxing power is the hallmark of vouchers and it's the problem with vouchers, okay? And that's precisely what Montana did. And this neo voucher scheme that they created, it was this, it was like a bizarre shell game. Will Wright: Hmm. Andrew L. Seidel: Okay, again, it depended entirely on the state's taxing power. So here's how, this is a little oversimplified. Taxpayers owe Monta

na money. And instead of paying the state, Montana said, taxpayers, you can divert that money off and put it in a private scholarship fund that will pay for private, again, mostly religious, education and then the state in return forgives that debt. Okay Will Wright: Hmm. Andrew L. Seidel: so it's a it's one dollar sent to the private school scholarship fund is one dollar off your taxes and the scholarships could only be used for private schools. Only one only one scholarship fund was created of

all the schools to receive eligible scholarships all but one so all of them all but three of the scholarships. So 94% of the scholarships went to Christian schools. Will Wright: Mm. Andrew L. Seidel: And really the scholarship fund is just, it's this financial waypoint. It's an empty husk of an organization. It was actually run by a single volunteer because it required like no effort at all. It's money laundering. Will Wright: Sure. Andrew L. Seidel: We're talking about money laundering by anot

her name. So the Montana Department of Revenue is tasked with sort of managing this program and it has to create these rules and it's looking at it. And the law that created the program says that it has to be administered in compliance with the Constitution. So the Montana Department of Revenue is like, well, what are we supposed to do here? Because you have this whole program that says it has to be administered with the Constitution. The Constitution says the whole program is unconstitutional.

So the Montana Department of Revenue crafts this rule that says, okay, we're going to try to do this, but that means that the public money, these scholarships can't go to a school that's run by a church. And so you get one of those crusader groups that I mentioned earlier, the Institute for Justice sues over this rule. And this is a group that is just fueled by coke money. The Institute for Justice lost repeatedly. In fact, the Montana Supreme Court looked at this program, this neo voucher schem

e, and it said, we're throwing the whole thing out. Like, not just the part with religion, the entire program has got to go. And that's because one of the things that the state constitution does, is also protect and fund public education in addition to that religious freedom stuff. And during the constitutional convention, the delegates explained that if you divert any money from public funds or a public school system, it weakens that system. And especially when you do it in favor of schools tha

t are established for private or religious purposes. Okay, so you can't do that. But six months after Brett Kavanaugh's concern, the Institute for Justice asked the Supreme Court to take the case. and the justices just leap at this chance to attack the separation of church and state. So Justice Roberts writes this five to four majority opinion with Thomas Alito, Gorsuch and Kavanaugh all joining him. And they effectively gutted that compelled support principle, that sinful and tyrannical princip

le in the Montana constitution, right? That protect, that principle that protects us from government enforced tithing. And Roberts essentially, It's a really remarkable and disturbing opinion in many ways. He ignores these huge swaths of American law and American history. And again, ignores our constitution's truly original contributions to the world. And he disposes of all of it in one sentence. And he says, we do not see how that, that compelled support principle in the Montana constitution pr

omotes religious freedom. We don't see how it promotes religious freedom. That's it. Will Wright: Hmm. Andrew L. Seidel: 200 years of legal principles just swatted aside in one willfully blind sentence. And what he really does is he says, Robert says effectively that state church separation is discrimination. So he bastardizes a principle that protects equality into a tool for Christian privilege. And he pulls off that magic trick by focusing in his opinion only on Christians and ignoring everyb

ody else. So, again, it gets to those studies, those data points that I was reciting to you earlier, right? This is one of the cases in those data points where you get the doubling of Christian wins before the Supreme Court. This is one of those examples. Will Wright: You know, how, kind of relatedly, like, so how does the government... Or how does the public maybe accept the fact that, you know, when Congress approves the whatever 800 billion, you know, bit of money for like the NDA, that some

of that money goes towards chaplains and the building of churches and stuff like that. I've always wondered like, like taxpayers are already paying for, you know, salaries of clergy and building of churches. So how does that work? work. Andrew L. Seidel: It's even crazier when you think about it, because I mean, the chaplains in Congress make obscene salaries, and they actually have staff. I mean, we spend a huge chunk of money on the chaplains for members of Congress. And if you look at how man

y houses of worship there are in DC, it becomes even more ridiculous. It's such an unnecessary and wasteful spending. But anyway, that's a side point. James Madison thought that military chaplains were unconstitutional. He wrote about that. He thought that they were a palpable violation of equal protection. And I think there's a really good argument to be made that they are. What you've identified is one of those problems that we talked about earlier, where the founders were not always true to t

heir principles. Now, what we have said in the modern era about chaplains is When the government puts a burden on your religious freedom, the government can sometimes step in and alleviate that burden. And so the military is a good example for us to think about this. And so I'm glad you chose that because like, imagine you are a soldier serving overseas and you are a Christian and you're in the Middle East. And maybe it's very difficult for you to find a church where you can safely worship, Will

Wright: Yeah, and Andrew L. Seidel: okay? Will Wright: just so you know, like, I, that was, I was a Christian. Andrew L. Seidel: That was you. Okay. Will Wright: I deployed to Iraq and we did have a chaplain. Andrew L. Seidel: Okay, so there you go. You, you, good example then. Like, and, and in that instance, right, we have said, okay, well, this is a pretty big burden on somebody's religious freedom. We're gonna say that the government can alleviate that burden. And one of the things that the

y can do then is have a chaplain to alleviate that burden. The problem that we're seeing now is that people are like, oh, well chaplains are okay without thinking through that. government-imposed burden analysis. And so you see chaplains starting to crop up all over the place. And one of the things you asked me about earlier was what are some of the things I'm watching. One of the things I'm watching is Texas, passed a law this past legislative session, that allows school districts to replace gu

idance counselors with chaplains, which is just a disaster waiting to happen, right? And there's no government-imposed burden on... the free exercise of students' religion, right? They're not in school 24 hours a day, seven days a week. They're not boarding there. They're not far from their home churches, right? They're going to a local school just like they would go to a local church. They can freely worship as much or as little as they want. That's not what this law is designed to do. The Texa

s law is designed to use the machinery of the state to impose that religion on a captive audience of school children. That's what it is designed to do. And it's pretty clear that's what it's designed to do. And this is something that the organization I work for, Americans United for Separation of Church and State, is going to be watching really, really closely. We're already in contact with a lot of folks in Texas over this law. But that to me is clearly unconstitutional, where you have a harder

argument against the chaplains who might be serving members of our military. But even in that case, and I wonder if you've experienced this at all in your service, is that... We often see that the chaplains overstep their bounds in military service, or the military itself maybe not doing the best job of actually alleviating everybody's burdens on their religious freedom. So not doing a good job. Christian chaplains are way over representative compared to Christians in the military itself. There

are minority religious chaplains as well, but the military has also refused to allow humanist chaplains to come in and serve the humanist members of the military, which are probably upwards of a quarter of the folks in the military now. So there's still a whole lot of problems that surround that in addition to the funding issues. Will Wright: Hmm. Interesting. So, um, so when we had Amanda on the, on the show, one of her concerns was, um, the fate of the lemon test, especially after the Kennedy

Andrew L. Seidel: Oh yeah. Will Wright: v. Bremerton. Um, so, so can you, number one, just, you know, describe what, what the lemon test is and, Andrew L. Seidel: I Will Wright: and Andrew L. Seidel: would Will Wright: then, Andrew L. Seidel: love Will Wright: and Andrew L. Seidel: to. I'd love to. Will Wright: then, and then like, well, you know, what, what its implications are if it's, if it's, you know, dissolved or whatever. Andrew L. Seidel: Yes, yes. So the Lemon test comes from a 1971 Su

preme Court case, Lemon versus Kurtzman, which was also about money flowing to private religious schools that were segregated, which is not something you often hear about when you hear about the Lemon test. And actually Alton Lemon, the guy who gives this case its name, he was this really interesting guy. He served in the army, he graduated from Morehouse College with a mathematics degree. There's a little story I love about him playing basketball with Martin Luther King Jr. He was a government

employee and he was a black humanist. And Pennsylvania, where he was living, passed a law that propped up religious schools with taxpayer money. Again, I mentioned vouchers being this sort of hydra. This is sort of like a vouchers for teachers scheme. So the state would pay. for teachers to teach at religious schools if they weren't teaching religion classes. Basically vouchers for teacher salaries instead of for student tuition. And the state had paid out I think about $5 million by the time th

at Alton Lemon challenged the program. And it was combined with another case, the Pennsylvania case was combined with another case from Rhode Island. It was basically the same case. And all 250 or so of the teachers under that program. that were paid were at Catholic schools. And so, so Alt Lemon argues that in the Pennsylvania case, the non-public schools are segregated by race and religion. And that the new program that has created this voucher program perpetuates and promotes the segregation

of the races, right? And the end result was the state promoting, and I have the quote here, it was promoting two... systems in Pennsylvania, a public school system predominantly black, poor, and inferior, and a private subsidized school system predominantly white, affluent, and superior. Will Wright: Hmm. Andrew L. Seidel: Now that's again, that's not something you often hear about in the discussion of the Lemon case that this was really also about race, and it goes back to what I was trying to

talk about earlier where we, I really do believe that separation of church and state connects to every other issue out there in ways that people just fundamentally miss. Now the lower courts sort of winnowed out those, the race issues and the Supreme Court actively was like, okay, we won't touch that. And instead what the court does in that case was it strikes down that program as a violation of the separation of church and state correctly. And to me, the fascinating thing about the case is that

the court, if you pay attention to the people who don't like the lemon test, the crusaders, and people who are opposed to separation of church and state. They act like the Supreme Court just created this test out of whole cloth. That's a phrase you'll Will Wright: Hehehe Andrew L. Seidel: often hear. People love this whole cloth. And that's not true. What the court did was survey all of the cases that it had decided over like two centuries that involved religion and the law colliding. And then

it synthesized from all of those cases this simple three-part test to determine when a government action crosses that line. when a government action violates separation of church and state. And basically Will Wright: Mm-hmm. Andrew L. Seidel: what it asks is, it's a three-pronged test. It says, does the challenge government action, one, does it have a secular purpose? Two, does it have a primary effect that neither advances nor inhibits religion? And three, does it foster excessive government en

tanglement with religion? I always have a hard time getting that one out. Will Wright: Thanks for watching! Andrew L. Seidel: Excessive government entanglement with religion. And if the government action fails any one of those three, then it violates the constitution. And again, the thing that I think is crucial, which has been now a theme of our conversation, Will, is that the concurring justices, when they struck down this program, they did it to enhance religious freedom because when you defe

nd the separation of church and state, you are defending true religious freedom. And what they said was that when taxpayers of many faiths are required to contribute, money for the propagation of one faith, the free exercise clause is infringed. So this is a test that was strong precedent, right? It was an eight to one decision. It was older than Roe versus Wade, and it was built on all of these earlier cases. But because the Lemon Test enforces the separation of church and state, it becomes thi

s serious barrier. to the crusade that I detail in American Crusade in the book. Will Wright: Hmm. Andrew L. Seidel: So finally, to answer your question, I mean, I think what the court did in the Kennedy decision with Lemon was actually worse in some ways than what it did with Roe versus Wade and Dobbs. Right, so people will remember in the Dobbs decision, the court says Roe versus Wade is overturned and it's flat and it's clear and it's awful and it's a terrible impact. But in the Kennedy decis

ion, It says something a little different. And again, Roe was not as this strong old precedent synthesizing an entire body of law that was overturned the way it was here. And what the court uses in this case is the word abandoned. The majority says that Lemon was abandoned Will Wright: Hmm. Andrew L. Seidel: and essentially says, look, judges, you should have known that we abandoned this test long ago. They recognize that it was dead. They didn't explicitly overturn it. They just said, you shoul

d have known it was overturned a long time ago because it has been pretty heavily criticized. And I actually think in a way that that's more dangerous. Will Wright: Hmm. Andrew L. Seidel: And the reason I think it's more dangerous is because if you're a lower court judge and you read that, you're thinking, oh, well, I know of other things that I don't like Will Wright: Hahaha Andrew L. Seidel: that have been criticized and therefore must have been abandoned a long time ago. Like it's a green lig

ht. for these Trump judges and these judges in the fifth circuit and these judges who are handling the Mifepristo in case, right? Will Wright: Mm-hmm. Andrew L. Seidel: That are come right out of some of those groups like First Liberty Institute that I mentioned earlier. It's a green light for them to go crazy and ignore precedent and claim that it has been abandoned if they don't like it. All they have to do is find a little bit of criticism of it somewhere and they can make that argument credi

bly in their opinions. So I actually think it was a really alarming. opinion and the fact that it came in the Kennedy versus Bremerton decision is just a double whammy. Will Wright: Yeah, I mean, so how do they or how will they judge religious liberty Andrew L. Seidel: Haha, Will Wright: type cases going Andrew L. Seidel: such Will Wright: forward? Andrew L. Seidel: a good question. It's such a good question because how do you do it when the lemon test didn't just get created out of a whole clot

h, right? It did synthesize all of these principles and it's really fascinating to watch judges and courts struggle with this because all of the principles still exist even if you don't give them the name, the lemon test. So you have all these judges who are handling these cases since that opinion came down, they're like, guess we don't do lemon, but there's still coercion, there's still like the problem that it doesn't have a secular purpose, and it definitely advances religion, but like, and i

t's like, well, what do we do? Because the principles are all still there. And one of the things that the Supreme Court is trying to push for, and that these crusader groups are trying to push for, is forget all of that and just focus on history and tradition. Will Wright: Hmm, yeah. Andrew L. Seidel: That's what they want. And... That's a terrible argument for a whole number of reasons, but not the least of which is the fact that they don't get history and tradition right. You know, this goes t

o what we were talking about earlier. This is why I wrote the first book, The Founding Myth, because a lot of what they rely on is flat out wrong. George Washington didn't pray in the snow at Valley Forge, right? The founding fathers did not pray at the constitutional convention and rejected the suggestion that they should. Um, you know, it's all of those things that they rely on. that are fundamentally flawed. And so you really see that in the Dobbs opinion also, the Samuelito's opinion over tu

rning rovers is Wade, he talks about the history and tradition all the time and just gets it so breathtakingly wrong. Just like so much of the history in that opinion is just bad history, Will Wright: Hmm. Andrew L. Seidel: right? That these are not historians. They are lawyers and politicians trying to make an argument. and then sort of defend it after the fact by pointing to history. Will Wright: Wow, you know, so... We spoke with this one Bible scholar who does Bible interpretations and all k

inds of other stuff. And he wrote a book called The Bible and the Ballot. And we had him on the show, talked to him about all kinds of stuff. And, you know, one of the questions we had asked him was about religious persecution. You know, Andrew L. Seidel: Mm. Will Wright: I mean, like, I'm a Christian. I don't necessarily think like my religious liberties are being affected. You know, I go to church, I do all the Christian things, you know, but like, I don't feel like I'm under And what the scho

lar said is something that has always stuck with me He basically said Christians weren't about being persecuted, you know, basically have forgotten that throughout history Like Christians were persecuted and that was just that was just sort of like the thing you sign up for, you know You're like you got a kid. You got to carry your cross with you So, you know he had he had a hard time understanding Why there's all this emphasis on us being persecuted, which we're not, but you know in his mind is

even if you were you just might turn the other cheek and you know like to obey the laws of the land. But I want to ask you just two more questions. The first one, sometimes when we think about church-state separation or religious liberty, it's always, at least for me, it always seems like it's in the context of believers and non-believers. You know non-believers Andrew L. Seidel: Mm-hmm. Will Wright: don't want the Bible shoved down their throat, you know, but rarely do I about minority religio

ns and how some of this stuff actually affects them. So like what's your thought or opinion or do you have any experience with you know other sort of minority religions that aren't necessarily being talked about? Andrew L. Seidel: Yeah, I mean, again, I think that's one of the things that's really truly beautiful about the separation of church and state is that it does protect everybody and it protects all religions. It doesn't matter whether they have a majority or a minority, it really protect

s absolutely everybody. And that's what it was designed to do. You know, there's this quote of Thomas you know, everybody from, and he gets, you know, it's antiquated, it talks about it protecting Hindus, which he spells with two O's, Mohammedans, and the infidel of every stripe, right? And I think the fundamental right to be treated equally under the law depends upon the separation of church and state, right? Because... This is a principle that ensures that we can all live as ourselves and beli

eve as we choose, so long as we're not hurting others. And what we're seeing right now is that religious extremists and Christian nationalists and their lawmaker allies are trying to force everyone else to live by their beliefs and to use religion as a license to harm others. They're threatening our freedom to live as ourselves. And that widens inequality in our communities and our countries. Again, so our nation promises... the freedom to believe as they want, but our laws cannot allow anyone e

lse to use their religious beliefs to harm others. And so this is one of the reasons that I just absolutely love working at Americans United for a Separation of Church and State, because we bring together people of all religions and none. I mean, in a lot of our cases involve Christians and atheists and humanists and Hindus and Jews and people from all over the religious spectrum and the non-religious spectrum to fight in the courts. and the legislatures and the public square for freedom without

favor and equality without exception. And one of the ways that you prevent that persecution from happening is having that robust separation of church and state. And shielding our laws from any religion's influence frees us to come together as equals and build a stronger democracy. Will Wright: Now, last question, and this is sort of a, I don't know, like a worst-case scenario, but like, what's, how do you see, you know, this church state evolving? you know, in the next, I don't know, 100 years

or so, like if we keep on the same trajectory that we're going on. And then maybe a sort of sub bullet point is, you know, and I wish Josh was here because I think he'd really benefit, I mean, he'll listen to this episode anyways, but like what role, you know, do religious leaders play, you know, Andrew L. Seidel: Oh yeah. Will Wright: and helping with, you know, the work that you do. Andrew L. Seidel: Well, another thing that I think is really unique about Americans United for Separation of Chu

rch and State, and that is one of the reasons I wanted to work for them, is that in a lot of the lawsuits that we bring to defend the separation of church and state, religious leaders and clergy are front and center as plaintiffs. So for instance, in the abortion lawsuit that we brought in Missouri, which challenges the state abortion ban as a violation of the separation of church and state, all of our plaintiffs are clergy. We have 13 different clergy from eight different denominations in that

lawsuit who are challenging the abortion ban, which turns two narratives from the other side completely on its head that the idea that, you know, abortion is this sacred issue that only goes one way and that separation of church and state is anti-religious. And the same thing in the lawsuit that we just filed in Oklahoma over the first religious public school in the nation. And yet you heard that right. It's religious public school. We're talking about a Catholic public school, which you know, l

ike our brains just can't comprehend. It's a charter school, but Will Wright: Yes. Andrew L. Seidel: that's Will Wright: Sure. Andrew L. Seidel: a public school. We have three different members of the clergy who are on board in that lawsuit along with a whole host of other people including parents and families, etc. And they are clergy out there defending the separation of church and state, you know, that the Kennedy versus Bremerton case, the one that we've talked about a couple times, right? A

mericans United litigated that case at the Supreme Court and every local clergy that got involved in that case got involved on our side to defend the separation of church and state and came out against the coach that wanted to use his power over other people's children to force his prayer on them. Will Wright: Mm-hmm. Andrew L. Seidel: So I mean I think that it's incumbent upon religious leaders in this country to explain why the separation of church and state is what Without that separation, th

e government's going to be in there telling them what's okay and what's not. Will Wright: Mm-hmm. Andrew L. Seidel: That is what protects their religious freedom as well as ours. It's absolutely crucial for that. This is something that every American benefits from and every American really ought to be defending. So I think there's absolutely a role in terms of the future. My predictions 100 years down the road, I genuinely don't know. I do worry that we are in a spot where we are quickly losing

this principle if it's not already gone and that people need to stand up and fight back. And that's one of the reasons I do the work that I do every day at Americans United. And if you want to join up, it's au.org. We'd love to get some more support. Will Wright: Well, that's awesome. And well, I really appreciate your insight, Andrew. This has been much too short conversation, at least for me anyways. But like how... Andrew L. Seidel: I'll Will Wright: That's Andrew L. Seidel: come back on if y

ou want. I love talking about this stuff if you can't tell. Will Wright: good. How can people get a hold of you or even get a hold of your books? Andrew L. Seidel: So my books are available at fine bookstores everywhere. Will Wright: Hahaha. Andrew L. Seidel: American Crusade, How the Supreme Court is Weaponizing Religious Freedom, and The Founding Myth, Why Christian Nationalism is Un-American. If you need an endorsement of that one, Pastor Greg Locke, who's sort of this really right-wing preac

her with Will Wright: Hehehe Andrew L. Seidel: ties to the Proud Boys, took a blowtorch and filmed himself burning the founding myth. So Will Wright: Oh, fuck. Andrew L. Seidel: there's that. I work with AmericansUnitedAU.org, we'd love to have your support there. And then if you want to find me personally, I'm Andrew L. Seidel, S-E-I-D-E-L, on all of the social things. Will Wright: So Twitter or X or whatever you want to call it Andrew L. Seidel: Twitter Will Wright: today. Andrew L. Seidel: sl

ash X, yeah, Instagram, TikTok, I'm on them all. Yeah, if you've got a follow-up question from this, definitely find me and ask me, I'm happy to answer there. Will Wright: Awesome. Well, thanks again, Andrew, for everything. We really appreciate your expertise. And yeah, and we will see our listeners and viewers next week. Take care. Andrew L. Seidel: Thank you so much. Will Wright: Alright, thanks Andrew, that was awesome. Um, Andrew L. Seidel: My Will Wright: let's Andrew L. Seidel: pleasure.

Will Wright: see, uh, let's see here... I stopped it... it should tell me... Andrew L. Seidel: Your point about the persecution stuff is really interesting too. And I talk about it a little bit in American Crusade. But, you know, there's, in a way it's almost like, I think this is what I said in the book, that the Crusaders are...