New GOP speaker: Separation of church and state is only a 'shield for people of faith'

Experts are digging into the background of the new speaker of the House, Mike Johnson of Louisiana, a little-known backbencher who has never headed a congressional committee but rose to become the third most-powerful elected official in the U.S. government Wednesday after two other Republicans failed to garner enough votes to win the gavel.

MSNBC’s Sarah Posner calls Johnson, “The most unabashedly Christian nationalist speaker in history.” His Christian nationalism, previously known to few, is coming to light, especially after he told members of Congress in his first remarks after being elected Speaker that “Scripture is very clear” that they were “ordained” by God.

In a September, 2022 episode of his weekly podcast with his wife, “Truth Be Told With Mike and Kelly Johnson,” now-speaker Johnson claimed there is no wall to separate church and state, but rather, the Constitution erects a wall to protect religious people from the state.

The First Amendment, Johnson said, was “intended to create a shield for people of faith.”

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“But the sad irony is that over the last 60, 70, 80 years, radical progressives and leftists and atheist organizations have twisted the meaning of it,” Johnson continued.

“And now they regard the First Amendment as a weapon to be wielded against the people of faith when it was supposed to be their shield.”

“See, the majority of the founders, having personally witnessed the abuses of the Church of England, were determined to prevent the official establishment of any single national denomination of religion. However, they very deliberately listed religious liberty, the free exercise of religion of course, as the first freedom protected by the Bill of Rights, and here’s the key: They did that because they wanted everyone to really live out their faith as that would ensure a robust presence, moral virtue in the public square, and the free marketplace of ideas.”

Johnson also said, “If anybody tries to convince you that your biblical beliefs or your religious viewpoint needs to be separated from public affairs, you should politely remind them to review their history. And importantly, you should not back down.”

A 2021 Pew Research poll found, “Even among white evangelical Protestants and highly religious Christians, fewer than half say the U.S. should abandon its adherence to the separation of church and state (34% and 31%, respectively) or declare the country a Christian nation (35% and 29%).”

Still, the claim that the wall of separation exists only to protect people of faith is not new for Johnson.

In a 2016 broadcast of the “Disciple’s Voice of Hope with Alex T. Ray,” Johnson made very similar remarks.

“What’s happened, Alex, over the last 60, 70 years, is that our generation has been convinced that there’s a separation of church and state. You heard that term all the time. And most people think that that’s part of the Constitution, but it’s not – remember, I’m a … constitutional lawyer.”

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“Now, what we always point out is that the phrase comes from a letter, it was a private letter Thomas Jefferson wrote to the Danbury Baptist Association in Connecticut, 1801. They write a letter and they say, ‘Mr. President, we’re so concerned that the government is going to come in and encroach upon our religious freedom, our freedom in the church to worship and to pray and to share the gospel, to share the truth as we understand and live in accordance with the dictates of our own conscience. Mr. President, what can you tell us? Is this a legitimate concern?’

“So he writes back and he says, ‘Oh, listen, listen, my friends, my fellow countrymen, you have no concern, because we’ve given you the Bill of Rights. The Bill of Rights begins with religious freedom as the first and most fundamental liberty that we acknowledge that was granted by God, the right of conscience, the right to believe what you will, and to worship and pass it on to your children.'”

“He says, ‘Don’t worry there’s an impregnable wall of separation between church and state.’ In other words, the government is not going to encroach on the church and tell you what to believe or how to worship or take away your property or your rights or your right to get together and do and perpetuate your faith. And so he says, ‘Don’t worry, the First Amendment is like a shield to protect people of faith.’ But here’s what’s happened over the last several decades, that shield has been turned into a weapon to be used against people of faith.”

Johnson then portrays those who support the separation of church as condescending, and says, “so now they’ve convinced our generation because they say it enough, people begin to believe it and say, ‘Oh, no, there’s a difference between your religious life and real life,’ right? So they say, ‘on Sunday mornings, you guys get together, y’all go you know, go pray, you worship, you go to your little church building there. You get in your safe four walls, and you do your warm, fuzzy religious thing. You do your touchy-feely, emotional, all the hand-raising and praising – you do all that stuff on Sunday. But don’t bring those ideas into the public square. Don’t bring those ideas Monday morning to the workplace at the water-cooler, don’t do that because you got to keep that separate over here,’ having heard separation of church and state.”

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“Well, now wait a minute, the founders said religion and morality are the indispensable support to the whole Republic. Now you’re telling me I can’t even bring it in just one argument in the public policy arena? That’s crazy. It’s anathema. It’s, it’s opposite. It’s the opposite of how we were founded as a country and I’m telling you we’re losing those foundations at our peril.”