Book Review: Bound by Faith by Mark Alsip
A lightly edited version of my review was published in the Freethought Society’s January–February 2025 newsletter.
Some people aren’t content with their good fortune when they find something that leads to their success or happiness in life. Instead—convinced that whatever worked for them will work for others—they start encouraging people to follow their steps. Some can become quite energetic at this endeavor. A will few take their proselytizing to an extreme: rather than trying to persuade others to adopt their course, they insist that because it’s so important and so clearly the best (and possibly only) path, it must be forced on others.
It doesn’t require great imagination from those of us in the secular community to come up with examples. For far too long, a subsection of Christian evangelicals has been retconning our nation’s founding to support efforts to weave their religion into our government, and thereby into our civil society. Those actions run deeper than some of us may know.
Mark Aaron Alsip’s second book, Bound by Faith, succinctly reveals a major player in that effort and also weaves it into a more widely known, recent push: the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025. On the unlikely chance that some readers may be unfamiliar with it, here’s a summary: Project 2025 is an initiative to retool the federal government so that it enacts far-right ideology and strengthens presidential power at the expense of the expertise currently concentrated in the administrative state.
Alsip was raised in a fundamentalist Christian family and knows firsthand its tools and tricks. (His first book, Journey to Reason, recounts his experiences and escape from that religion.) Thus, he is very familiar with one of Project 2025’s predecessors: a company that pushes a fundamentalist educational curriculum via creating and selling K–12 “educational material” for both schools and homeschoolers to use. The Christian religion is so deeply entwined in its lessons that students cannot pass any exam—even in science courses—without reciting a memorized Bible verse.
Bound by Faith provides ample evidence of the fundamentalism permeating the curriculum. Alsip has purchased (secondhand on eBay) many of these materials and presents quotations along with incisive commentary on how they fail to truly educate students. As a former professor, I am appalled to see the fundamentals of real education—presenting facts, theories, and ideas, and leading students in critically engaging with them—supplanted by nonsense. Make no mistake: the nonsense is harmful. Alsip successfully walks the tightrope of presenting enough material from the curriculum and Project 2025 to understand what’s going on without falling into a pit of despair.
Alsip also weaves a variety of his own personal experiences into the book, so readers can fully understand why he’s speaking out against these efforts to indoctrinate children and adults alike. Providing this context not only makes for lighter reading, it helps to show how wide the harm would be to all our lives. In Bound by Faith, Mark Alsip has created an informative narrative that is easy to read, understand, and relate to.
Many US citizens and residents are probably like some of my friends: they just want to be left alone, by both religion and politics. I understand that to some degree; these are deeply personal topics. However, in aggregate they can have wide-ranging consequences for our society. And when others attempt to force their religious beliefs on an entire nation at a minimum, we who value freedom of and from religion should not close our eyes and turn away from their caustic coercion.
From its clever title to its closing words, Bound by Faith provides information and inspiration to stand firm against it. And stand firm we must, because under a fundamentalist-friendly administration, the struggle against religious tyranny will continue—and escalate.
Our best chance to thwart it is to hack at its roots. Education is a vitally important root. We know this. Mark Alsip supplies details in this space that we may not have known, and in doing so provides plenty of fodder for secularists to use in countering fundamentalist Christianity’s propaganda. More important, by widely sharing the information he provides in Bound by Faith with teachers, PTAs, school board members, and others involved in education, we can gain allies to help us excise it.
I have never wanted a book or author to go viral before. Now is the time, and Mark Aaron Alsip’s Bound by Faith is the book to provide fortification and focus for our challenges ahead.
The Amazon links to Alsip’s books are not affiliate links. For those who prefer to support independent booksellers, this Wiki list is a great resource.