Testimony in Opposition to HB486 - "The Charlie Kirk American Heritage Act"

Chair Fowler-Arthur, Vice Chair Odioso, Ranking Member Brennan, and Members of the Committee:

My name is the Rev. Dr. Ben Huelskamp. I serve as Executive Director of LOVEboldly and Pastor of Blue Ocean Faith Columbus. LOVEboldly is an Ohio, faith-based nonprofit working to create spaces where LGBTQIA+ people can flourish in Christianity and Blue Ocean Faith Columbus is a progressive Christian congregation. I’m submitting this testimony in my roles as a Christian pastor and minister of the Gospel. I want to express my strong opposition to House Bill 486, the so-called “Charlie Kirk American Heritage Act.”

This Bill Is Not Needed

First, and most simply, this legislation is unnecessary. Ohio teachers are already fully permitted to teach about the historical influence of Christianity and other religions on American history and culture. The Supreme Court has been clear that objective, academic instruction about religion’s role in history is constitutionally sound. Teachers can and do discuss the religious motivations of the Pilgrims, the faith (and lack thereof) of the Founders, and the role of Black churches in the Civil Rights Movement, among many other examples.

HB 486 does not expand teachers’ ability to provide quality history education. Instead, it creates a solution in search of a problem, suggesting that teachers are somehow prohibited from discussing Christianity’s historical influence, positive and negative, when no such prohibition exists.

This Bill Privileges Christianity Over Other Faiths

Second, while the bill’s language carefully avoids explicit promotion of Christianity, its intent is unmistakable. The legislation provides an extensive list of Christian historical accounts that teachers “may” include, from the Pilgrims’ church covenant to Billy Graham’s cultural impact. No similar list exists for Judaism’s influence on American law, Islam’s contributions to American culture, or the role of Indigenous spirituality in shaping early American thought.

This is not objective history education. This is a roadmap for privileging one faith tradition in our public schools, which serve students and families of all beliefs and none. Our Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, atheist, and other non-Christian neighbors deserve schools where their children are not subjected to a curriculum designed to emphasize one religion’s tenets or paint that religion as either central to the American story or its supposed superiority.

The framers of our Constitution understood that true religious freedom requires the government to remain neutral in matters of faith. HB 486 abandons that principle.

This Bill Does Not Reflect an Honest Reading of the Gospels

Finally, this bill fundamentally misrepresents the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Jesus did not come to promote religious nationalism or to align faith with political power. Quite the opposite. He came announcing good news to the poor, liberty to the captives, and the arrival of God’s kin-dom, a reality that stands in stark contrast to earthly empires and their quests for dominance (Luke 4:18-19).

When the religious and political establishment of his day sought to use faith as a tool of control and exclusion, Jesus consistently sided with the marginalized: the Samaritan, the tax collector, the woman caught in adultery, the people experiencing leprosy. He reserved his harshest words not for Rome, but for religious leaders who laid heavy burdens on others while seeking honor and recognition for themselves (Matthew 23:4-7).

The Gospel I preach and the God in whom I believe calls Christians to love our neighbors as ourselves, including neighbors who do not share our faith. It calls us to humility, not supremacy. It calls us to serve the least of these, not to use political power to assert cultural dominance.

HB 486 promotes a vision of Christianity as a foundation for American exceptionalism and political identity. This is Christian nationalism, not the Gospel of Jesus Christ. As a pastor, I cannot remain silent when legislation claims to honor my faith while fundamentally distorting its message.

Conclusion

House Bill 486 is unnecessary, unconstitutional in spirit if not in letter, and unfaithful to the Christian tradition it claims to honor.

Our public schools should teach honest, rigorous history, including the complex role of religion in American life. But they should not become venues for promoting one faith over others, and they should not be conscripted into a project of Christian nationalism that serves political interests rather than the common good.

I urge you to oppose this legislation.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

Respectfully submitted,

The Rev. Dr. Ben Huelskamp +

Executive Director, LOVEboldly

Pastor, Blue Ocean Faith Columbus