After the election results, FFRF is determined to keep fighting. We hear the song "Keep Marching On" from the Broadway musical "Suffs." Then, Bonnie Garmus, author of the award-winning best-selling feminist/freethought novel Lessons in Chemistry, tells the charming and funny story about how she lost her faith as a teenager in the Presbyterian Churc…

It's a scary show this week. We report on our Denver billboard saying: "Keep Freedom Alive: Stop Project 2025." Dan Barker talks about his trip to Nigeria to visit humanists and freethinkers combating superstition in that country. Annie Laurie Gaylor describes the danger to women's rights in the current election. Then, we talk with Alex Aronson, fo…

After we report on state/church news and victories in Florida, California and North Carolina, FFRF Legal Director Patrick Elliott describes FFRF's new lawsuit challenging proposed bible distribution in Oklahoma public schools. Then we hear author and journalist Katherine Stewart, accepting FFRF's "Freethought Heroine" award, warn of the dangers of …

We announce FFRF’s new lawsuit against bible-toting Oklahoma state Superintendent Ryan Walters. Producer Leo Costello interviews "Democracy in Chains" author Nancy MacLean, who is touring with "Bad Faith" documentary screenings. And veteran reporter Linda Greenhouse tells us how some justices are engaging in "grievance Christianity."…

After reporting state/church news in Oklahoma, Wisconsin, and Alaska, we devote a segment to the dangers of the proposed Christian-right authoritarian "Project 2025." Then, we hear the engaging speech by Ron Reagan (son of the former president) given at FFRF's annual convention last month, where he tells us about the authoritarian threats to our pl…

Coach Deion Sanders is at it again, and FFRF is again complaining to the University of Colorado about his mixing religion and government. We report state/church complaints and victories in Mississippi, Missouri and Texas. After we hear Roy Zimmerman's hilarious satirical song, “I Want a Marriage Like They Had in the Bible,” FFRF Senior Policy Couns…

Annie Laurie reports on religiously motivated abortion referenda in seven states around the country, as well as the repressive 19th-century Comstock Act that is still invoked today to limit women's rights as it did with Margaret Sanger. We hear Dan Barker's tribute song to Margaret Sanger called "No Gods, No Masters." Then we speak with scholar Mat…

After reporting state/church news in New York, Alabama, Mississippi, Missouri and Virginia, we hear Dan Barker's song "Life is Good!" performed by Tahira Clayton and the Godless Gospel singers. Then, we speak with Tia Levings, author of the bestselling book A Well-Trained Wife: My Escape from Christian Patriarchy.…

Margaret Downey, president of the Thomas Paine Memorial Association, tells us about an exciting celebration of the birth of the “Forgotten Founder" Thomas Paine on his Jan. 29 birthday. Then, FFRF Director of Communications Amit Pal speaks with the actor, theater director and artist-in-residence at UW-Madison Vamsi Matta, a Dalit (the most oppresse…

FFRF Legal Director Patrick Elliot and FFRF Legal Fellow Hirsh Joshi join us to talk about state-church developments in Utah, Alabama, Colorado, Missouri, Tennessee and Minnesota. Then, we speak with Michigan State University Professor Josh Cowen about his new book, The Privateers: How Billionaires Created a Culture War and Sold School Vouchers.…

After news updates, the hosts recap the "Celebrate Dissent" conference in Oslo about ex-Muslims. Annie Laurie Gaylor then interviews co-host Dan Barker about Contraduction, his new book on "the death of the Design Argument."

After summarizing secular activism and victories around the country, we talk about secularism and Hindu nationalism in India (the world's largest secular democracy) with our two guests: activist Shabnam Hashmi from India and Professor Barry A. Kosmin from here in the United States. Interspersed through the show is the music of freethinking jazz leg…

We announce FFRF's Chicago billboard saying "Keep Freedom Alive: Stop Project 2025." After reporting state/church complaints and victories in Texas, Missouri, Florida, and Arkansas, we announce FFRF Action Fund's "Secularist of the Week." Then, we take a time machine back to 2006, our first year of broadcast, to hear our first interview with philos…

After reporting on efforts to keep state and church separate in Tennessee, Indiana, Oklahoma, and Florida, we get acquainted with FFRF's new multimedia producer Leo Costello. Then, South Carolina humanist and atheist debater Herb Silverman, founder and president emeritus of the Secular Coalition for America, tells us "How to talk to Christians."…

After reporting on state/church news around the country, FFRF's Senior Counsel Sam Grover tells us about the FFRF court victory against the Texas governor that took nine years to finalize! We hear the song "Because" by Reverend Billy and the Stop Shopping Choir. Then, we speak with "Reverend Billy" (William Talen), the "pastor" of the secular Earth…

We describe our legal efforts to gain information about the attempt by the Oklahoma Superintendent of Public Education to put the bible into every classroom, and similar attempts in Tennessee to inject religion into government. We hear Rupert Brooke's poem "Heaven" (from the point of view of a fish) set to music by Dan Barker. Then we talk with Car…

Project 2025 and "divine intervention" are discussed, as well as state/church complaints and victories in Oklahoma, Louisiana, Illinois, New Jersey and Tennessee. FFRF Anne Nicol Gaylor Legal Fellow Sammi Lawrence joins us to talk about our legal victory allowing a nonreligious after-school group to meet on campus alongside the religious Good News …

Christian nationalist rhetoric is heating up, especially regarding the assassination attempt of Donald Trump. We report on a state/church victory in Tennessee and state/church complaints in New Mexico, Texas, Missouri, Kentucky and Indiana. After hearing a hilarious take on the bible by comedian Robin Williams, we speak with Cait West, author of th…

We report on FFRF's efforts to keep Christian nationalists in check around the country. Honoring the anniversary of the birth of the anti-fascist singer/songwriter Woody Guthrie, we hear the funk/soul version of "This Land is Your Land" performed by Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings. Then, FFRF's Legal Director Patrick Elliott describes our lawsuit ch…

The Christian nationalist "Project 2025" and the Ten Commandments are the focus of this week's show. We hear Dan Barker's song "We, The People," challenging the notion that we are "one nation, under God." Then, sociologist Samuel L. Perry, author of The Flag and the Cross: White Christian Nationalism and the Threat to American Democracy, describes …

We announce state/church victories and complaints in Louisiana, Idaho, North Carolina, Texas and Mississippi. FFRF Senior Counsel Sam Grover tells us about the lawsuit FFRF has filed this week with a coalition challenging Louisiana's new law requiring the posting of the Ten Commandments in all public school classrooms. Then, Tony-nominated Broadway…

We announce plans to sue the state of Louisiana over their new law requiring the posting of the Ten Commandments in all public school classrooms. We hear Congressman Jared Huffman and comedian John Oliver describe the Christian nationalist dangers of Project 2025. Then historian Bryan Mark Rigg tells us about the religious nationalism undergirding …

We celebrate the 96th birthday of the Broadway composer Charles Strouse, a lifelong atheist, by hearing the protest song he wrote for the musical "Golden Boy," "No More," sung by Sammy Davis Jr. We also reprise part of our 2009 interview with Strouse. Then we speak with Professor Anthony B. Pinn about his new book, The Black Practice of Disbelief: …

A judge ruled that our lawsuit challenging an Oklahoma religious charter school can continue. FFRF Director of Communications Amitabh Pal tells us about the national election results in India, which have weakened the threat of Hindu nationalism. Then we speak with novelist Amy Sohn about her book on Anthony Comstock, The Man Who Hated Women: Sex, C…

A theocrat and a secularist duke it out in Louisiana. We ask whether Justice Samuel Alito should recuse himself. We report state/church complaints in Minnesota, California, Tennessee and Virginia. FFRF Legal Fellow Hirsh Joshi tells us how his letter to a Missouri school district successfully stopped prayers at graduation. Then we talk with neurolo…