On Flag Day, a historian of religions in America explains how the Pledge of Allegiance, which honors the American flag, is part of American civil religion.
The entrance at the headquarters of the Jehovah’s Witnesses Germany.
Britta Pedersen/picture alliance via Getty Images
Several members were killed March 9, 2023, in Germany. Many people hold stereotypes about Jehovah’s Witnesses but are unfamiliar with their beliefs.
Members of Jehovah’s Witnesses wait in a court room in Moscow, Russia, on April 20, 2017. Russia’s Supreme Court banned the Jehovah’s Witnesses from operating in the country.
(AP Photo/Ivan Sekretarev)
Americans have debated what it means to be Christian in politics throughout their history. Those debates continue today.
Pastors kneel in prayer in front of the Supreme Court, as a counter-protester holds a sign that says “What’s Christian About Discrimination.”
AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin
Arguments on religious freedom have taken place throughout US history and have landed in the Supreme Court as well. Interpretations have changed over time.
Samuel Brownback appears before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite
The Supreme Court appeared divided over claims of religious freedom in the case of a gay wedding. History shows how contentious religious freedom has been in America.
Jehovah’s Witnesses pray during a regional congress of Jehovah’s Witnesses in Minsk, Belarus in 2015.
Vasily Fedosenko/Reuters
There are over eight million Jehovah’s Witnesses in 240 countries worldwide. They have no political affiliations and they renounce violence. However, they have been easy targets for many governments.
Jehovah’s Witnesses are under the spotlight at the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sex Abuse.
AAP/Tracey Nearmy
Jehovah’s Witnesses do not report child abuse to authorities. Instead, they convene an in-house judicial committee, which is fraught with difficulty because they rely on a “two-witness rule”.