William J. Murray, son of famed atheist, Madalyn Murray O’Hair, contends in his latest book, The Pledge: One Nation Under God, that atheistic forces, spearheaded by the ACLU and Michael Newdow, are engaging in a religious cleansing of American society. These forces seek to replace faith in God with an atheistic, secularist, and heartless philosophy that has no respect for the belief that the human race is God’s creation. Murray outlines the history of early-American settlers and their overall reliance upon God in every phase of life. He continues to trace today’s secular progression of American society and insists that war is being waged not only for religious freedom, but also for freedom itself. The protection of the “Pledge of Allegiance” and the phrase “under God” is just one battle in this overall war. Michael Newdow’s legal case to remove “under God” from the pledge will go back to the Ninth Circuit Court in spring 2007 and almost inevitably will resurface in the U.S. Supreme Court. The “Pledge of Allegiance” was first published in 1892 and was widely recited in schools soon thereafter. It has been amended several times, and the most recent revision came in 1954 with the addition of the phrase “under God” following the words “one nation.” This addition grew out of a desire to include a reference to Deity in keeping with the beliefs of America’s founding fathers. The phrase “under God” was aptly chosen because Abraham Lincoln reportedly used the expression, “this Nation under God,” in his immortal “Gettysburg Address.” For several decades, students in public schools all over America have recited the pledge with the words “under God.” Now those words are under legal attack. The Pledge: One Nation Under God teaches Americans not to regard their freedoms lightly and eloquently echoes the words of Thomas Jefferson: “THE GOD WHO GAVE US LIFE GAVE US LIBERTY.”