Melissa Rogers
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Melissa Rogers is an American church-state lawyer and non-resident senior fellow in Governance Studies at the
Brookings Institution The Brookings Institution, often stylized as simply Brookings, is an American research group founded in 1916. Located on Think Tank Row in Washington, D.C., the organization conducts research and education in the social sciences, primarily in ec ...
. She previously served as special assistant to President Barack Obama and executive director of the
White House Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships The White House Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships, formerly the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives (OFBCI) is an office within the White House Office that is part of the Executive Office of the President ...
. On February 14, 2021, President Joe Biden designated Rogers as executive director of the reestablished Office under his administration.


Early life and education

Rogers grew up a member of the Baptist Church. Rogers is a
Phi Beta Kappa The Phi Beta Kappa Society () is the oldest academic honor society in the United States, and the most prestigious, due in part to its long history and academic selectivity. Phi Beta Kappa aims to promote and advocate excellence in the liberal a ...
graduate of
Baylor University Baylor University is a private Baptist Christian research university in Waco, Texas. Baylor was chartered in 1845 by the last Congress of the Republic of Texas. Baylor is the oldest continuously operating university in Texas and one of the fir ...
and earned a
Juris Doctor The Juris Doctor (J.D. or JD), also known as Doctor of Jurisprudence (J.D., JD, D.Jur., or DJur), is a graduate-entry professional degree in law and one of several Doctor of Law degrees. The J.D. is the standard degree obtained to practice law ...
from the
University of Pennsylvania Law School The University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School (also known as Penn Law or Penn Carey Law) is the law school of the University of Pennsylvania, a private research university in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It is among the most selective and olde ...
.


Career

Rogers served as the director of the Center for Religion and Public Affairs at Wake Forest University Divinity School and a non-resident senior fellow at the Brooking Institution. She served as general counsel of the Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty. From 2000 to 2003, she directed the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life, a grant project of the Pew Charitable Trusts. In 2008 Rogers co-authored a casebook, ''Religious Freedom and the Supreme Court,'' published by Baylor University Press. In 2009,
President Barack Obama Barack Hussein Obama II ( ; born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who served as the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, Obama was the first Af ...
appointed Rogers to serve as the chair of his Advisory Council on Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships, a panel of faith and civic leaders from different religious and political backgrounds. In 2010, President Obama issued an
executive order In the United States, an executive order is a directive by the president of the United States that manages operations of the federal government. The legal or constitutional basis for executive orders has multiple sources. Article Two of th ...
instructing federal agencies to implement a number of the panel's recommendations. That year Rogers led a group of religious and civil rights leaders in drafting ''Religious Expression in American Public Life: A Joint Statement of Current Law'', which indicates their points of agreement with the law of church and state as it applies to religious expression in the public square. The First Freedom Center gave Rogers its First Freedom Award. In 2011 Rogers was named to a subgroup of the U.S. State Department’s Religion and Foreign Policy Working Group. Before her appointment, Rogers had been critical of the Obama administration's handling of some church-state issues in an interview with the ''
Huffington Post ''HuffPost'' (formerly ''The Huffington Post'' until 2017 and sometimes abbreviated ''HuffPo'') is an American progressive news website, with localized and international editions. The site offers news, satire, blogs, and original content, and ...
'' with respect to the
Affordable Care Act The Affordable Care Act (ACA), formally known as the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act and colloquially known as Obamacare, is a landmark U.S. federal statute enacted by the 111th United States Congress and signed into law by Presid ...
's contraception mandate. She stated that the administration erred in only exempting houses of worship from the ACA's requirement that employers include
contraception Birth control, also known as contraception, anticonception, and fertility control, is the use of methods or devices to prevent unwanted pregnancy. Birth control has been used since ancient times, but effective and safe methods of birth contr ...
coverage in their health insurance policies. Her ideas later became the basis for the administration's accommodation of the interests of a wider set of religious entities. In 2014, the Baptist Joint Committee gave Rogers its J.M. Dawson Religious Liberty Award. In 2015, Rogers continued to lead the White House Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships. After a
Sikh Sikhs ( or ; pa, ਸਿੱਖ, ' ) are people who adhere to Sikhism, Sikhism (Sikhi), a Monotheism, monotheistic religion that originated in the late 15th century in the Punjab region of the Indian subcontinent, based on the revelation of Gu ...
man in California was attacked and severely injured, Rogers represented the Obama administration at his house of worship in
Rockville, Maryland Rockville is a city that serves as the county seat of Montgomery County, Maryland, and is part of the Baltimore–Washington metropolitan area. The 2020 census tabulated Rockville's population at 67,117, making it the fifth-largest community in ...
, where she spoke out against
hate crimes A hate crime (also known as a bias-motivated crime or bias crime) is a prejudice-motivated crime which occurs when a perpetrator targets a victim because of their membership (or perceived membership) of a certain social group or racial demograph ...
. She also spoke at a commemorative service one year after the
Charleston Church Shootings On June 17, 2015, a mass shooting occurred in Charleston, South Carolina, in which nine African Americans were killed during a Bible study at the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church. Among those people who were killed was the senior past ...
."2,000 Gather for Charleston Church Shooting's 1st Anniversary; Pastor's Wife Recounts His Last Moments"
''Christian post'', Anugrah Kumar, June 18, 2016


Publications

*Ronald B. Flowers, Melissa Rogers and Steve Green, ''Religious Freedom and the Supreme Court''. Baylor University Press, 2008 *Melissa Rogers, ''Faith in American Public Life''. Baylor University Press, 2019


References


External links

*
Advisory Council on Faith-based and Neighborhood Partnerships, ''A New Era of Partnerships,''
*Melissa Rogers

''Uniting to End Anti-Semitism,'', White House blog
White House Office of Faith-based and Neighborhood Partnerships
{{DEFAULTSORT:Rogers, Melissa Year of birth missing (living people) Living people Baylor University alumni University of Pennsylvania Law School alumni 21st-century American lawyers Baptists from the United States Church and state law in the United States Obama administration personnel Biden administration personnel