North Texas Coalition
Who are we?
BJC and the Christians Against Christian Nationalism campaign brought together people in the North Texas area for a pilot project, addressing the pressing problems in the Dallas/Fort Worth area and developing a counter-witness alongside our strong existing partner churches and organizations. This created a coalition – which continues to evolve and grow – pushing back against Christian nationalism in our local contexts. We are continuing to develop deeper roots and new connections with others as we work together to counter the harmful impact of the ideology in the area.
Our coalition provides a faithful response from Christian communities in partnership with our neighbors of many different faiths and of no faith. Lisa Jacob serves as the organizer of this North Texas Coalition.
Learn more about our work on this page, and connect with us if you are in our area!
What do we do?
Change happens through awareness, advocacy, and local organizing. As a coalition, these elements are incorporated in each area of our work, which includes a focus on three areas:
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One area of focus for the North Texas coalition is the intersection of Christian nationalism and immigration. The exertion of power to enforce borders is often based on the myth that the United States was, is, and should be a “Christian nation.” This corresponds with multiple academic, nationwide studies that also show a correlation between Christian nationalism and anti-immigrant sentiment.
In response, North Texans are discerning how to engage in advocacy initiatives regarding:
Education for undocumented students
Mass deportation orders
Deputization of state agencies to enforce immigration policy
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One area of focus for the North Texas coalition is the intersection of Christian nationalism and education. Through generations, the work to limit access to education to the privileged few speaks to the power that can be built through an educated community.
North Texans are supporting initiatives to:
Fight back against school vouchers, which lead to taxpayer funding of religion and often deny access and funding towards a high-quality public education.
Inspire school leaders to reject the new Bible-based curriculum in public schools, which infringes on the religious liberty of students and parents.
Monitor problematic book bans or pushes to add “chaplains” in public schools (read more about our work on that issue later on this page).
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As a faith-rooted coalition, another focus area is in developing awareness about Christian nationalism within faith communities. Congregations can be either the biggest proponents of disseminating Christian nationalism or the biggest barriers in spreading this toxic ideology.
Every community makes a choice, so the North Texas coalition is committed to helping congregations identify the roots of Christian nationalism in their communities and help churches discern their role in undoing the harm. As such, the coalition is committed to:
Training and working alongside faith leaders
Equipping lay leaders to spur on this work
Resourcing communities to discern and address impact
Join us
Do you live in North Texas and want to be part of this work? We’d love to connect. Click below to get in touch and join us!
Don’t live in North Texas? Check out our other regional groups or let us know more about your interest.
Our work in action
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The Christians Against Christian Nationalism campaign joined other faith-based groups, including BJC, Interfaith Alliance, ADL, Texas Impact and Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism, to combat Senate Bill 763 in Texas, which granted school systems the right to use hired or volunteer chaplains as long as school boards voted by March 1, 2024, to participate. The largest 25 school districts in Texas all rejected creating a new chaplain program, transcending partisan divides.
Permitting untrained and unlicensed adults into schools represents a danger to the spiritual well-being of children, said the Rev. Deborah Reeves, a board-certified chaplain at a press conference in February 2024 after the largest school districts chose not to participate in the program. “It also violates the rights of parents and guardians to choose the religious leaders who influence their child’s spiritual journey. A law that allows school districts to create chaplain programs ignores the reality of religious diversity among public school students and assumes a religious role that public schools do not have.”
The Rev. Reeves was not alone in that perspective. She and more than 170 other chaplains across Texas signed a letter organized by BJC with their concerns.
“When we raise our voices as one community of faith here in Texas, we win,” said Emily Bourgeois, Texas director for the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism. “Let this be a lesson to all of the states where this battle is still in front of them. When we raise our voices together against the spread of this legislation, we will win. And if we can win in Texas, we can win anywhere,” she said.
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The Texas State Board of Education proposed a new curriculum in 2024 that infuses Bible stories into language arts lessons, and we raised concerns about its use of biblical teachings and presentations of faith claims as fact. It also is troubling for Texans who believe that public schools should be welcoming to all students, regardless of religious belief, and that religious instruction is best left to families and houses of worship. Despite bipartisan opposition to it, the curriculum was approved by one vote, and our work is now shifting to the local school districts in Texas who are faced with the choice of whether to adopt this problematic curriculum.
BJC and Christians Against Christian Nationalism worked in partnership with Texas Freedom Network, Texas Impact, ADL Texas and Shalom Austin to defeat or rework the K-5 curriculum under consideration by state education officials, hosting webinars and trainings to empower Texans with the tools they need to make their comments known throughout 2024.
The proposed curriculum changes sparked significant concern from many people of faith and nonreligious people across Texas, who argued that these changes threaten the separation of church and state and infringe upon the religious freedom of Texas students and their families.
“Public education should provide a space where children from all backgrounds can learn without religious influence being imposed upon them,” said Amanda Tyler, executive director of BJC and lead organizer of Christians Against Christian Nationalism.
In August 2024, the Texas Education Agency and the State Board of Education were deluged with written comments overwhelmingly opposed to the curriculum. On Sept. 10, 2024, people from across Texas convened in Austin to share comments directly with the Texas State Board of Education during a Public Comment Period, including members of the BJC staff and volunteers committed to the cause.
“I love my state and I love my faith tradition,” said Lisa Jacob, the North Texas Organizer for the Christians Against Christian Nationalism Campaign during her public testimony. “But believing and valuing my faith does not give me license to institutionalize my religion above others, as is the case with this OER curriculum.” She noted that teaching about religion is not an issue, but that is not the case with this proposed curriculum.
Tyler and Jacob also joined others in Austin in November to again testify at a public hearing to share their concerns.
“While I am pleased that some of the factual errors have been corrected in the revised version of these instructional materials, the systemic issues of incorporating Bible stories into the reading and language arts curriculum in ways that are neither age- nor subject-matter-appropriate remain,” Tyler said during her November testimony
In November 2024, the Texas State Board of Education narrowly approved the use of a troubling school curriculum that infuses Bible stories into language arts lessons, despite bipartisan opposition to it. Now advocacy in 2025 to protect religious freedom in public schools is shifting to the more than 1,200 school districts in Texas.
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Leading up to Election Day 2024, the North Texas Organizing Project of the Christians Against Christian Nationalism Campaign joined with the BJC Center for Faith, Justice and Reconciliation to spotlight voter engagement initiatives and get involved.
In September 2024, the two groups hosted a screening of the documentary “Suppressed and Sabotaged 2024: The Fight to Vote” and held a panel discussion afterward to examine the intersection of voter suppression and Christian nationalism.
In October 2024, members of the North Texas Coalition engaged in advocacy by writing letters to hundreds of low-turnout voters in Texas, encouraging them to make their voices heard at the ballot box. Members of the coalition also participated in training with the Legal Defense Fund to be poll monitors for Election Day.
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In summer 2024, we launched a pastoral cohort, bringing together pastors to learn together and with us about what it means to lead others through discerning our public witness as faith communities. We gathered for intentional conversation and engagement to address some central questions, including:
How do we distinguish between the kind of action that is building a “Christian nation” and one that is building a more equitable, just, fair world as informed by our faith?
How can we be engaged politically as congregations and as Christians without being involved in Christian nationalism?
Is political theology biblical? And if so, how does the Bible shape our theology of public witness? And what, practically, does a political theology look like?
Throughout several guided sessions, the cohort engaged with various resources and frameworks on political theology and reflected on their personal experiences, developing solidarity as faith leaders and beginning the process of building tangible resources for the future.