Powerful organizations on the Left created and helped sustain a nonprofit called Faith in Public Life in order to replicate the organizing power of the Religious Right, but the group announced that it will be closing its doors on Oct. 31.
Jeanné Lewis, the group’s CEO, attributed the closure to fundraising issues, saying that the organization’s leadership “chose to proactively close the organization” once funding opportunities became “inconsistent.”
While nonprofit organizations close their doors all the time, this one appears notable.
‘Organizational Anchor for the Religious Left’
As Baptist News Global reported, Faith in Public Life has its roots in the Center for American Progress, the leftist alternative to The Heritage Foundation that reportedly fed more than 70 staff into the Biden administration. The center reportedly envisioned Faith in Public Life as “a sort of organizational anchor for the Religious Left, a strategy hub that would coordinate disparate groups and develop overarching media strategies for campaigns.”
“The Center for American Progress was proud to participate in the creation of Faith in Public Life in 2005 and to support the organization and its important work,” Guthrie Graves-Fitzsimmons, a senior fellow at the center, told the Daily Signal in a statement Monday. “Faith in Public life organized faith leaders across the country to help win passage of the Affordable Care Act in 2010, and it successfully mobilized again seven years later when Congress threatened to repeal major parts of the law.”
“Faith in Public Life organized and trained diverse faith leaders to work in states and nationally to build a country of dignity, freedom, and justice for all,” Graves-Fitzsimmons added. “The legacy of Faith in Public Life is evident in the growing strength of the pro-democracy faith movement. Everywhere you look around the country today, diverse faith communities are putting their faith into action for the common good.”
Jennifer Butler, a minister in the left-leaning Presbyterian Church (USA), founded the organization in 2005 and served as its founding executive director until July 2023, according to her LinkedIn profile.
Faith in Public Life organized the 2008 Compassion Forum featuring Barack Obama.
The group helped organize support for Obamacare and Obama named Butler to an advisory council in 2015.
Early in President Joe Biden’s term, Faith in Public Life published a “Faithful Agenda Messaging Guide,” urging faith leaders to support “justice for black communities and ending systemic racism;” “justice and dignity for LGBTQ people;” and “dignity, family unity and citizenship for all immigrants.”
In 2024, Vice President Kamala Harris’ campaign hired Butler as its national faith engagement director.
The Open Society Foundations, the funding apparatus established by Hungarian American billionaire George Soros and now run by his son, gave more than $2 million to Faith in Public Life from 2017 through 2021.
The Center for American Progress and Soros supported at least one other effort to cultivate the “Religious Left.“
‘A Catholic Spring’
John Podesta, the founder of the Center for American Progress who served in three Democratic administrations, suggested that he helped to found another left-leaning Christian organization in order to launch a “Catholic Spring” similar to the Arab Spring.
Sandy Newman, president and founder of the nonprofit Voices for Progress, wrote to Podesta in February 2012 that “there needs to be a Catholic Spring, in which Catholics themselves demand the end of a middle ages dictatorship and the beginning of a little democracy and respect for gender equality in the Catholic Church.”
“We created Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good to organize for a movement like this,” he replied. Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good, which reportedly received at least $450,000 from Soros’ Open Society Institute from 2006-2010, dissolved in 2017.
“We remember the previous scandal that was revealed 10 years ago—when John Podesta wanted to create a ‘Catholic spring’ in which Catholics would revolt against the priests and bishops of their own Church,” Josh Mercer, co-founder and vice president of advocacy at Catholic Vote, told the Daily Signal. “Groups like these are not authentically Catholic but explicitly created to manipulate believers.”
“While news that Faith in Public Life is finally folding is welcome, there are still plenty of other deceitful operators out there,” he warned. “They pose as Christians to push decidedly un-Christian agendas on a well-meaning and unsuspecting faithful.”
“There is still a lot of work to do before this cottage industry posts a ‘going out of business’ sign,” Mercer concluded.
It remains unclear whether Faith in Public Life’s closure signals a decline in the Religious Left or a transition to newer organizations.
After Jennifer Butler served on the Kamala Harris campaign, she founded the organization Faith in Democracy, which aims to “resist the religious right, confront religious nationalism, and defend democracy against authoritarianism.” Faith in Democracy did not respond to the Daily Signal’s request for comment.
[Editor’s note: This story originally was published by The Daily Signal.]
