Bill O’Reilly rails against “secular progressives” nightly, and it has become fashionable among the far-right intelligentsia to bash secularism as morally bankrupt. In this speech, Rob Boston will explain why the secular state is the only vehicle that can ensure religious and philosophical freedom for all. Boston will discuss how an official policy of government secularism, far from being hostile to religion, is in many ways the best friend faith ever had.

Robert Boston is assistant director of communications for Americans United for Separation of Church and State and the assistant editor of AU's monthly magazine Church & State.

Boston, who joined the Americans United staff in 1987, is recognized as a leading writer and researcher on church-state topics and an articulate advocate for the separation of church and state He covers the U.S. Supreme Court for Church & State and has attended oral arguments in every church-state case at the high court since 1988.

Boston is the author of three books: Close Encounters with the Religious Right: Journeys into the Twilight Zone of Religion and Politics (Prometheus Books, 2000); The Most Dangerous Man in America? Pat Robertson and the Rise of the Christian Coalition (Prometheus Books, 1996) and Why the Religious Right Is Wrong About Separation of Church and State (Prometheus Books, 1993; second edition, 2003).

DIRECTIONS TO THE SCIENCE CENTER/LAW SCHOOL PARKING LOT

From Kirkland Street turn right onto Oxford Stret. Take the entrance road on your left at the Maxwell Dworkin Building, (across from the Museum of Natural History). Take first left and follow it to the parking lot closest to Littauer and the Science Center. Parking is free for guests of the Humanist Chaplaincy.