Don’t Like Christian Nationalism? We Don’t, Either. Let’s look ahead at what AHA has planned for 2025 and beyond to combat it head-on.

As the American Humanist Association looks ahead to 2025, we are preparing to counter the rising tide of Christian Nationalism and foster a powerful, inclusive humanist movement. The strategic roadmap for 2025 — dubbed “Humanism 2025: Something to Belong To, Something to Believe In, Something to Fight For” — lays out an ambitious plan to provide community, purpose, and agency to those seeking refuge from Christian Nationalism and the threats it poses to our fundamental rights and freedoms.

In an environment marked by isolation, political disillusionment, and economic strain, the need for connection, meaning, and activism is more urgent than ever. Humanism, with its emphasis on reason, compassion, and fairness, stands ready to offer an alternative.

Here’s a closer look at the AHA’s vision for the coming year, based on our latest strategy documents and plans.

At this pivotal moment, we want to revitalize the humanist movement, offering people a way to connect, believe, and take meaningful action. This includes planned initiatives offering humanists “Something to Belong To,” such as:

• Creating Online Communities: The AHA plans to develop a vibrant online platform for dialogue and community-building among humanists.
• Expanding Secular Pastoral Care: By accelerating the growth of humanist chaplains, celebrants, and community leaders, the AHA seeks to offer meaningful support for life transitions and crises.
• Strengthening Member Engagement: Investments in leadership development and chapter organizing will empower volunteer leaders and create more opportunities for policy and education programming.

These initiatives are designed to foster a sense of belonging and build a resilient humanist community capable of weathering external challenges.

In a time when people seek coherence and identity, the AHA is committed to positioning humanism as a positive, progressive belief system that provides meaning and purpose. To provide humanists “Something to Believe In,” we plan to focus on these areas in 2025:

• Launching Media Initiatives: To counteract right-wing narratives, the AHA will debut a podcast and TikTok channel featuring Executive Director Fish Stark. These platforms will explore humanist philosophy and connect personal empowerment to progressive public policies.
• Educational Programming: New offerings will include a daily humanist inspiration text and resources for humanist parenting, helping individuals connect to the movement in meaningful ways.
• Improving Messaging: An audit of the AHA’s communications will ensure that humanist values are presented in clear, accessible, and engaging ways.

By aligning humanist values with personal and collective empowerment, the AHA hopes to inspire broader engagement with its mission.

These next few years will undoubtedly present challenges to humanist values in our government and daily lives. And we want to help facilitate ways that humanists can stay aware, energized, and motivated to fight back. To provide humanists with “Something to Fight For,” we plan to introduce or reinvigorate programs to confront far-right overreach and advocate for humanist values. Some steps we’ll take include:

• Rebuilding the Humanist Legal Center: The AHA will focus on fighting housing and employment discrimination against humanists, standing firm against emboldened discriminatory practices.
• Shifting Policy Efforts to Local Levels: The policy team will prioritize state and local advocacy, mobilizing members to combat religious extremism in red states and support progressive sanctuaries in blue states. This work will complement ongoing efforts at the federal level, including support for the Congressional Freethought Caucus.
• Rapid-Response Campaigns: The AHA will launch bold, public campaigns to expose the hypocrisy of the religious right, offering members opportunities to participate in impactful actions.
• Training Humanist Candidates: A candidate training program will support humanists seeking to run for public office, amplifying the movement’s influence in governance.

These efforts aim to empower humanists to take collective action and challenge harmful Christian Nationalist ideologies and policies head-on.

The plans outlined here for 2025 build on a foundation of work already in progress, including hosting community gatherings for healing and support, launching campaigns that blend humor with activism, and equipping members with materials and resources to make a difference in their local communities.

We are focused on creating a robust operational framework to bring these strategies to life in 2025. Resources will be directed toward building a movement capable of resisting Christian Nationalist extremism and championing inclusivity, compassion, and reason.

In the face of daunting challenges, the work we have cut out for us is clear: offer people something to belong to, something to believe in, and something to fight for.