Federal Prisons Recognize Humanism as Religion

The Federal Bureau of Prisons has agreed to give inmates who identify as humanists the same type of accommodations it provides those who practice other religions.

The settlement comes after the American Humanist Association sued the prison in 2014 on behalf of Jason Michael Holden, an inmate at the Federal Detention Center in Sheridan, Oregon.

Holden is serving a sentence for armed robbery and was seeking the right to form a humanist study group, a right afforded prisoners of other faiths.

"This settlement is a victory for all humanists in the federal prison system, who will no longer be denied the rights that religious individuals are accorded," Roy Speckhardt, executive director of the American Humanist Association, said.

The prison system said he can hold a humanist study group at his prison in Oregon and it will add a section on humanism to its manual on inmate beliefs and practices.

The move comes a year after the U.S. Army agreed to recognize humanism as a religious choice for service members.