A brat summer of church-state separation

I know a fair amount about church-state separation after working at Americans United for Separation of Church and State for nearly 37 years. But as a borderline Baby Boomer-Gen Xer, even one who has Millennial and Gen Z kids and likes to think he’s keeping tabs on pop culture, I recognize there may be a thing or two I can learn from young people about how to best engage other young people in our mission. For instance, I hear we’re in the midst of a “brat summer,” but I’m not 100% clear on what that is. 

AU’s summer interns process our issues through a Gen Z lens

That’s why I appreciate the interns who join Americans United every summer. It’s been refreshing to find out what our eight summer interns know about church-state separation, hear them process our issues through a Gen Z lens and see what they discover during their time at AU. 

As editor of AU’s “Wall of Separation” blog, I’ve enjoyed reading their takes on the issues – including Development Intern Lilly Arthur’s call for unity in the fight against Christian Nationalism and Communications Intern Leland Murphy’s report on private school vouchers. Leland and fellow Communications Intern Chloe Serrano also have been creating content for our social media platforms all summer – you can see examples of their work here and here. And a third Communications Intern, Carl Omondi, has been helping with our website – our new webpage educating folks about Project 2025 was his design.

Interns’ behind-the-scenes work vital to AU’s mission

A lot of our interns’ work happens behind the scenes but is still vital to AU’s mission. Intern Mariamme Latif Estafan’s projects for the Outreach and Engagement Department included researching potential partners for AU and the Summit for Religious Freedom (SRF) and conducting intergenerational interviews to build greater understanding and collaboration between older and younger advocates.

The Legal Department benefited greatly from the efforts of interns Jillian Snyman, Siena Hohne and Chloe Rutledge. They helped draft legal briefs, assisted in preparations for oral argument in one of our cases and wrote memos evaluating potential cases in which AU might want to file friend-of the-court briefs, to name just a few projects. And Lilly helped the Development Department with foundation and major donor research projects.

Future of church-state separation depends on young people

Interacting with these bright students reinforces for me a point that President and CEO Rachel Laser has stressed repeatedly – the future of church-state separation, public education and our democracy depends on young people. That’s why Americans United devotes so much time, resources and attention to initiatives like our internships, our Legal Academy, our Youth Organizing Fellowship and our expanded Student Contest (which is now accepting submissions).

We’re committed to helping Gen Z, Gen Alpha and the generations that follow develop into champions for church-state separation who will lead AU and our movement into the future.