I received a few complaints about soldiers stationed at Fort Gordon, GA being forced to clean up an off-post Catholic property during the duty day. One was from a fellow foxhole atheist.

(NAME / RANK WITHHELD)

Justin – Got a question. [WITHHELD], has been tasks with cleaning/landscaping etc, a Catholic Church. This so far is not optional. You are more versed in the legality of church and state. What I see is more of an issue of having a federal employee mandated to clean private property. It would be different if it were voluntary but it is not. The church portion is just a bonus. I am pretty sure that this is not legal. Got any references for me?

*See the official FFRF / American Atheists release for the full source of this tasking.[pdf]

I sure do have some references for you. In fact I took the liberty of taking this beyond American Atheists and sought even more support from other organizations. The Freedom From Religion Foundation and American Atheists have just issued our demands to have this stopped immediately. No religious institution – interfaith or not – should ever receive mandated government workers to do their menial tasks. This is off post, during the duty day, in uniform, mandatory… yard-work.

Now that legal teams from both the FFRF and AA have looked over existing case-law, they independently confirmed that this is indeed unconstitutional. The establishment clause has repeatedly been found by the SCOTUS to “prohibit favoring one religion over another… and prohibit the government from favoring religion over non-religion”. (Wallace V. Jeffries 1987)

This is one of those times where the foxhole atheists (and other minorities) really need others to speak up for them. Please, if you have a few minutes you can really help stop this. Nothing works faster than a combination of public / media and legal pressure. FFRF and American Atheists are bringing the legal pressure, but we need your help.

How you can help

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***Text of the press release below the fold***