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This Week's Show:    Godless America

At a time when House Majority Leader Tom Delay calls for enacting a "Biblical worldview" in government, when Christians are asserting their ideals in the selection of judges, in public school science classes and elsewhere, This American Life spends an hour trying to remember why anyone liked the separation of church and state in the first place. Julia Sweeney, among others, gives a full-throated defense of godlessness. Julia's faith began to crack after reading Biblical passages like the one pictured here, of Abraham about to cut the throat of his beloved son, Isaac. Broadcast the weekend of June 3-5 in most places, or available via RealAudio next week.

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Vision America is trying to recruit and mobilize thousands of "patriot pastors" in national politics. The Ohio Restoration Project is doing the same in Ohio. Disagreeing with their vision of the country is Americans United for Separation of Church and State . Each side has its own historical research:  Wallbuilders sells books and DVDs arguing that the separation of church and state is a myth;  On the other side is the book The Godless Constitution: The Case Against Religious Correctness, by Isaac Kramnick and R. Laurence Moore.

Last Week

Animals Stories about the animalness of animals, the irreducible ways in which they are not human. Includes an original radio drama by David Sedaris in which animals talk and hold their own "animal court." Also, Paul Tough visits Catherine Chalmers. She raises small animals and insects in her apartment, feeds them to each other, and photographs them eating each other (as pictured).