It’s no secret that Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) has been actively tweeting Bible verses, but an atheist group is now demanding that the Republican leader immediately cease sharing his faith on the social media platform.
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The Freedom From Religion Foundation sent a demand letter on Aug. 22 to Rubio’s office alerting the senator to a purported constitutional violation” unfolding on his Twitter account.
The activist group also appealed to Matthew 6:5-6 in an attempt to shame the politician into compliance.
“If the law and your oath to uphold the Constitution are not sufficient to convince you to stop, perhaps you might consider reading Matthew 6:5-6, in which Jesus condemns public prayer as hypocrisy in his Sermon on the Mount,” the letter read. “None of Jesus’s supposed words mentions Twitter — perhaps he wasn’t that prescient — but the condemnation of public piety is reasonably clear.”
Do not say, “As they did to me, so will I do to them;
I will repay them according to their deeds." Proverbs 24:29— Marco Rubio (@marcorubio) August 24, 2017
Despite those swipes, the letter more generally attempts to accuse Rubio of violating the U.S. Constitution by sharing messages about his official government role as well as details and verses pertaining to his private, Christian faith.
“We understand that you have been tweeting bible verses from @MarcoRubio to nearly three million followers. It appears that you began tweeting the bible in mid-May and have been doing so regularly ever since,” the letter reads. “This is not an errant bible verse or two, but more than 60 bible verses in three months. That’s enough verses to tweet the entire Book of Jude. Twice.”
While the FFRF said it has no problem with people reading or talking about the Bible, the group does take issue with the government promoting “one religious book over others” or promoting “religion over non-religion.”
When this unfolds, atheist activists argue that it poses a violation of the Establishment Clause of the Constitution. And, in the case of Rubio’s tweets, it appears the FFRF believes he crossed the line.
Your eyes behold strange sights, and your heart utters incoherent things. Proverbs 23:33
— Marco Rubio (@marcorubio) August 23, 2017
“Government officials cannot appear to endorse Christianity,” the letter reads, arguing that tweets from Rubio’s account are “government speech.” “By tying your government title to a social media page, you have intimately entwined your official position with the messages you send on that platform, creating the appearance of official endorsement.”
Read the FFRF letter in its entirety here. It doesn’t appear as though Rubio has any plans of immediately backing down, though, as Bible verses have continued to appear on his Twitter account this week.
As Faithwire previously reported, Rubio has been actively sharing scripture on his Twitter page this year. Back in July, the senator pushed back against a Politico Magazine piece proclaiming that he had been “tweeting the most Republican part of the Bible,” with Rubio quipping that Solomon, the book’s author, hadn’t yet “joined the GOP” when he wrote the scriptures.