Public Policy Advocacy

An LCMS pastor, who is a friend of mine, often says that he envisions his sermons like a father pulling up a chair to the kitchen table and saying, “Family? We need to talk about something important.” Missouri? We need to talk about In Vitro Fertilization or “IVF.”

It’s 2025, and at long last – after 30 years of hard work and struggle – we appear to have reached a tipping point in the effort to once again acknowledge parents as the primary authority in the educational lives of their children. There have been many important milestones along the way – many judicial, legislative and public opinion victories - that have led to this new and very positive circumstance. But none of these carries the promise of the recently passed Educational Choice for Children Act (ECCA).

It’s called “The Johnson Amendment,” and since 1954, it has received criticism from a wide variety of religious folks. Indeed, it has frequently served as a prime example of the degree to which the religious liberty and free speech rights of the Church and her pastors have been unconstitutionally limited.