By C1 Staff
SHERIDAN, Ore. — An Oregon inmate has filed suit against the U.S. Bureau of Prisons for not providing the same accommodations for humanism that it affords other faiths.
Oregon Live reports that Jason Michael Holden and the American Humanist Association filed suit last month, three months after the Army formally recognized humanism as a religious option.
Holden is serving time at the medium-security prison in Sheridan for armed robbery. He claims that the BOP violates his constitutional rights by refusing to allow him to form a humanist study group so that he and other atheists can share their commonly held beliefs.
The federal prison system allows inmates who identify themselves as Buddists, Christians, Hindus, Jews and Muslims to organize behind bars. Even subgroups of certain faiths, including Paganism, are recognized.
The humanism issues raised by Holden haven’t come up in Oregon’s state prisons.
The lawsuit also names the warden and the chaplain at the Federal Correctional Institute at Sheridan and accuses them of refusing to recognize humanism as an official religious assignment option.