Presented by Scott D. Seligman, Author

Today’s battle over Christianity in American public schools has deep roots. In the nineteenth century it was an intramural struggle between Protestants and later-arriving Catholics. But at Christmastime in 1905, when the Presbyterian principal of a Brooklyn elementary school urged his Jewish students to be more like Jesus Christ, Jews entered the fray in a big way. It was just the trigger Jewish activist Albert Lucas had been waiting for. Fresh from battling Christian settlement houses brazen about their intent to convert Jewish children, Lucas accused the public schools of illegal proselytizing and demanded limits on religious content in the schools.

After the Board of Education declined to clarify the rules governing religion in schools, the New York Jewish community staged a boycott of the 1906 school Christmas pageants, prompting widespread student absences. The protest spurred policy changes, but the board’s concessions generated an enormous antisemitic public backlash.

Join us to discover how this early protest against Christian nationalism shaped the Jewish community’s long-term efforts to challenge religious influence in public life and trace the Christmas celebration dispute to the present day.

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