By Cherilyn Crowe
The Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty and more than 100 other organizations are supporting a bill that would prohibit the use of religious litmus tests to ban people from entering the United States.
On May 11, Rep. Don Beyer, D-Va., introduced the Freedom of Religion Act, which would bar the use of religion as a way to deny refugees, immigrants and international visitors from entering the United States.
“We cannot allow fear and paranoia to drive our public policy, especially when it comes to the defining values of our country,” Beyer said. “Our Founding Fathers guaranteed religious freedom for all in the First Amendment to our Constitution. People all around the world look to us as the standard for freedom,
liberty, and tolerance.”
The Baptist Joint Committee’s Holly Hollman and Jennifer Hawks joined Beyer and a few of the 70 congressional co-sponsors on stage at the announcement to show support for the bipartisan bill. The BJC also signed a letter with 30 religious groups that calls on all members of Congress to support the legislation.
From the May 2016 edition of Report from the Capital. Click here to view the issue as a PDF document.
