Much of what he saw was expected at Saturday's March for Our Lives protests, writes Jarrett Stepman of the Heritage Foundation.  The politics and organizers were predictably "left-wing," and their aim was not so much to safeguard children as to outlaw all non-government guns.

But what most surprised Mr. Stepman was how many of the protesters attacked "the act of offering prayers in the wake of shootings[.] ... [I]t was strange to see so many signs specifically aimed at condemning prayer."

One such voice was former attorney general Eric Holder, who called scornfully for radical political action instead of "the usual ... prayers."

Holder served under President Barack Obama, who as a candidate in 2008 patronizingly told a fundraiser of wealthy San Franciscans that working-class people in flyover country "cling to [their] guns or religion."

Why should we be surprised that the same arrogant elite that plans to confiscate your guns also wants to demean and destroy your religious faith?

Eric Holder once told the Women's National Democratic Club in Washington, D.C. (and the nation via CSPAN-2) that he was launching a campaign to "really brainwash people into thinking about guns in a vastly different way," as Craig R. Smith and I discussed in our book The Great Withdrawal: How the Progressives' 100-Year Debasement of America and the Dollar Ends.

The Obama administration established a mind manipulation office in the White House, as we also documented.  Gun control was one of many values they tried to change in America's mind.  They also secretly provided firearms to Mexican drug gangs in "Operation Fast and Furious" as a pretext to greatly restrict U.S. gun sales.  When this scheme was discovered, Holder refused to turn over documents and in 2012 became the first presidential Cabinet member ever to be held in criminal and civil contempt by a congressional committee.  Last Saturday continued the mind control on children.

President Obama and Mr. Holder are Progressives, members of an ideological cult that for more than two centuries has plotted to overthrow older religions.  Progressives believe that government is God, and that with enough wealth and power, they can create utopia, a new anti-individualist egalitarian Eden, a politically correct heaven on Earth in which all power – including all guns – will be held by government.

To force us to become serfs dependent on their governmentality, Progressives intend to strip us of our faith, our ability to defend or care for ourselves, and our right to own private property or to find identity and values in our religious heritage and historical achievements.  Progressives demand that America's old religion, history, and individual rights be destroyed.

It was no accident that their chosen messenger giving his demagogic speech on Saturday called anyone who defends Second Amendment rights a "child-killer."  (The rally was partly funded by your tax dollars, given to the nation's leading Progressive abortion provider, Planned Parenthood, which kills more than 300,000 babies each year.)  He raised his clenched fist in the international socialist salute, so similar to its near twin national socialist salute – both offshoots of the same Progressive collectivist pseudo-religion.

A March Pew Research Center study reported that "religiously unaffiliated voters, who made up just 8% of the electorate two decades ago, now constitute about a quarter (24%) of all registered voters."  These godless or unconnected folks "account for a third of Democratic voters, up from just 9% in 1997."  We are two nations, going under without God.

These Democrats may not be atheists or agnostics.  They are converts to the Progressive pagan religion with collectivist government as their new god.  America and individual liberty, and the guns and religion we cling to, are to be sacrificed so they can create a human-made Heaven on Earth.

Lowell Ponte is a veteran think-tank futurist and author or co-author of eight books.  His latest, co-authored with Craig R. Smith, is Money, Morality & The Machine, available free and postpaid by calling 800-630-1492.  Lowell can be reached for interviews by email at radioright@aol.com.