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eNews for Faith-Based Organizations
March 11, 2009
Editor: Stanley Carlson-Thies
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Conscience Regulations
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The Department of Health and Human Services published in the Federal Register yesterday a proposal to abolish a regulation promulgated at the end of the Bush administration to protect health care facilities and staff who object on grounds of conscience to supporting or taking part in abortion. Comments can be submitted for a brief 30-day period.
The regulation was adopted to give practical effect to the conscience protections enacted by Congress several times. As the Center for Law and Religious Freedom of the Christian Legal Society has pointed out, some opponents of the regulation have demonstrated by their own statements in legal filings that they have not comprehended the protections in those underlying laws-thus demonstrating the need for the detailed provisions of the regulation.
The Bush regulation is discussed here.
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Eye on Congress
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ A faith-friendly Congress? If so, why attack the DC school voucher program? The House-passed omnibus bill to authorize federal spending for the current fiscal year contains language that all but dooms the DC voucher program. This pilot federal program has provided vouchers to children from poor DC families to enable them to attend a private school of their choice. That choice can include faith-based schools; for two children, the choice is Sidwell Friends, the elite school attended by the Obama daughters.
When it approved the spending bill yesterday, the Senate rejected an amendment by Sen. John Ensign (R-NV) to strip out the provision dooming the DC voucher program.
Vouchers, according to the Supreme Court (see Zelman v. Harris, 2002), are a means of government funding in which faith-infused services can participate-for example, private schools that offer chapel and a faith-shaped curriculum. In such "indirect" government funding, it is the beneficiary, not a government official, who chooses the service provider and thus a program that does (or does not) include religious activities. Other examples: Pell grants supporting students who attend religious colleges and universities, federally funded child care certificates that parents can use to pay for care by faith-infused child care programs, and the Access to Recovery federal drug treatment program that uses vouchers so that addicts can select, if they desire, faith-infused services.
A truly faith-friendly Congress (and administration) would be seeking opportunities to "voucherize" more federal services, not junk the small proportion of federal programs that use this innovative method that promotes choice and enables full participation by faith-based, as well as secular, organizations.
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Eye on the Administration
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ President Obama says he doesn't believe in big government; is a pragmatist, not an ideologue; and seeks to foster partnerships between government and private groups so that their particular strengths are fully utilized. Why then propose in his budget outline to decrease tax incentives for the very wealthy to make charitable contributions? The administration defended the proposal by saying it wouldn't take effect until after the economic crisis has abated and that any reduction in donations would be relatively minor; more important, the President may withdraw the proposal given the widespread opposition it evoked. But how does reducing incentives to give contribute to strengthening civil society's helping institutions? Much better than this budget proposal is an idea from the Poverty Forum: go one better than the Bush administration and enact into law the non-itemizer deduction so that poorer taxpayers have an added incentive to increase their giving to charities. |
Faith-based and Secular Nonprofits for Hire?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ In 1993, Steven Smith and Michael Lipsky published the path-breaking Nonprofits for Hire: The Welfare State in the Age of Contracting (Harvard Univ. Press). The book took the first thorough look at the increasingly widespread practice by which federal, state, and local agencies provide social services by paying private organizations to offer the assistance programs. By turning to secular and religiously affiliated nonprofits, government officials hope to get effective and innovative services. Yet, the book showed, the micromanaging rules that typically accompanied the government funds tended to turn the nonprofits into mere vendors rather than service partners. As one reviewer put it, the book revealed the "paradox that government funding may damage or destroy the very virtues sought through contracting with nonprofit organizations."
Just a few years later, Joseph Loconte pointed to the same danger, but with a focus on the negative effect of secularizing government rules on faith-based nonprofit social-service organizations. In Seducing the Samaritan: How Government Contracts are Reshaping the Social Services (Pioneer Institute for Public Policy Research, 1997), Loconte reviewed a range of rules that accompanied government contracts in Massachusetts, showing how these restricted the ability of the organizations to maintain distinctively religious characteristics and practices.
The faith-based and community initiative as it developed during the Clinton and Bush administrations was a determined effort to push back the wrongly restrictive rules that often accompanied government contracts and grants, replacing them with new rules (notably the Clinton-era Charitable Choice rules and the Bush administration's Equal Treatment regulations) that better respect the unique characteristics of religious and secular (especially smaller) nonprofit organizations.
The faith-based and community initiative was never about just more warmly inviting faith-based and grassroots groups to apply for federal funds. Rather, the initiative focused on reforming wrongly restrictive strings that often had accompanied those funds so that the nonprofits could receive federal grants without having to suppress their religious character and otherwise mimic government agencies.
The Obama administration has proclaimed its goal of expanding the faith-based initiative, stressing a robust partnership between government and faith-based and community-based organizations (thus the White House office has been renamed the Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships). Clearly there will be greatly expanded social spending, a great expansion of the funds that faith-based and community-based groups can apply for.
But will the rules continue to respect the distinctive identities and practices of those nonprofit organizations, the secular ones and the faith-based ones, or will new restrictions be added again, moving back in the direction of groups being "hired" to do the government's will rather than being treated as worthy partners in a common task?
The administration's stress on the importance of government action, services, and spending; the casual proposal to reduce the incentive for the rich to give; and a range of actions and plans restricting religious freedom (e.g., the proposed withdrawal of the Bush regulation to protect health-care institutions and individuals who object to abortion) all point toward an elevation of government and its ways over civil society. (Even David Brooks has become worried: "The U.S. has always had vibrant neighborhood associations. But in its very first budget, the Obama administration raises the cost of charitable giving. It punishes civic activism and expands state intervention.") That imbalance doesn't reflect a deep commitment to "partnership."
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What's in a Name?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Is it (immoral) religious job discrimination or a (proper and even necessary) mission-oriented management practice when a faith-based organization considers the religious commitments of applicants before deciding who to hire to be the next executive director, case worker, chaplain, or janitor? The religious hiring dispute is a matter of the Constitution (which protects rather than prohibits it), laws and regulations (which often permit it, despite much ill-informed opinion to the contrary)-and also of prevailing sentiment-people's sense of right and wrong (sympathy easily goes to the job applicant-but would people actually be happy if a clampdown on religious staffing forced faith-based organizations to become increasingly no different than secular nonprofits?).
Given these disputes and layered considerations, it is a notable and welcome fact that Joshua DuBois, the head of President Obama's White House Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships carefully refers to the practice as "co-religionist hiring" rather than "religious job discrimination." That terminology opens the space for discussion rather than foreclosing it with an epithet. Many thanks to Joshua DuBois.
(But no term is perfect: "co-religionist hiring" implies that the religious organization is simply trying to preserve the jobs for its own kind. Actually what is most important to most faith-based organizations is not denomination as a mere identity mark but rather heart conviction and life behavior: will this new person be committed to the beliefs that inspire us and the life style we believe is right and seek to exemplify?)
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Eye on the Council
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ It remains to be seen just how President Obama's new Council on Faith-Based and Community Partnerships will operate-who all will be appointed to it, how they will relate to each other, exactly what topics they will take up, and how they will deal with those issues. There is reason to have some qualms about this new American phenomenon of a group of official religious (and humanitarian) advisors on government policy. So it is heartening to see that some of the appointees have made it clear that they have no intention of participating in a mushy, if well-intentioned, group singing of Kumbaya but intend instead to make a clear and pointed contribution-to make their distinctive, and thus best, contribution to the discussions. Note these statements by Council members: Jim Wallis, President of Sojourners: "[I]f faith-based organizations are not allowed to hire only people who share their faith and values, they will, over time, lose their identity and mission--they will, in fact, no longer be faith-based organizations. And since most faith-based organizations don't and can't afford to have separate staff for publicly funded activities, faith-based hiring policies would be compromised and effective faith-based partnerships with government would be seriously disrupted if co-religionist hiring were no longer allowed. That is not a good thing to do at a time when 7-10 million more Americans are about to fall into poverty." Dr. Joel Hunter, Northland Church, about President Obama's plan to reverse the Bush administration's regulation protecting healthcare workers and institutions that object to supporting abortion: "This is going to be a political hit for the administration. This will be one of those things that kind of says, 'I knew it. They talk about common ground, but really what they want is their own way.'" Rev. Frank Page, former president of the Southern Baptist Convention, responding to President Obama's decision to leave intact the current rules about religious staffing by recipients of federal funds-"[T]his will allow religious groups to be true to themselves." Richard Stearns, president of World Vision: "Our Christian faith has been foundational to our organizational culture and our work since World Vision was established in 1950. We pursue our humanitarian work as a community of people sharing deeply held faith values that express themselves in our concern for and work with the poor. We are no different than other mission-driven organizations that choose to hire people who affirm and embrace their organizational identity and values. Examples include Planned Parenthood and The Nature Conservancy. If forced to choose between preserving our faith values or receiving government funds, we would have to walk away from the funding. Our mission and motivation are not for sale." |
Pressures on the Religious Identity and Practices of Faith-Based Organizations
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Faith-based organizations are prime ways that people of faith put their convictions into action out in the world: feeding the hungry, healing the sick, aiding the jobless, serving the poor, responding to disasters, and much more. Religious convictions provide the motivation, encourage volunteering and donations, shape the practices, and undergird the services. It is because of their varied religious convictions that faith-based organizations make distinctive contributions to the common good.
The faith-based initiative, now in its third phase, has drawn attention to the secularizing strings that have often been attached to government funds intended to support services for the poor, sick, and needy. Many of those mistaken restrictions have been removed, promoting flourishing partnerships between faith-based organizations and government.
Yet many other restrictions on the faith of faith-based organizations have been multiplying-restrictions that are applied as conditions of existence and operations, applied even when no government funds are received by the faith-based organization.
For example:
Freedom of Choice Act (FOCA): a bill to establish abortion as a fundamental right that cannot be inhibited by government. Among other draconian consequences, it would compel hospitals and health care professionals to perform or aid abortions, despite religious objections, thus likely forcing out of operation Catholic and other hospitals and clinics devoted to child birth rather than abortion. FOCA has been proposed in other Congresses and will likely be introduced in the current session. On the campaign trail Barack Obama said that he would sign the bill into law. See the materials provided by the US Conference of Catholic Bishops here and Michael Stokes Paulsen's legal analysis here.
Employment Non Discrimination Act (ENDA): a bill to forbid job discrimination based on sexual orientation (and probably transgender status). ENDA bills have been proposed for many years; last year ENDA was adopted by the House but not taken up by the Senate. Extensive advocacy efforts were required to get a robust religious exemption into the House bill. However, even the most sweeping religious exemption will not protect a religious business that seeks to maintain a biblical standard of sexual fidelity. Most troubling (and likely one of the main motives for the bill), adoption of ENDA as law would be interpreted as making sexual orientation nondiscrimination a matter of settled public policy in the United States. This would pave the way to overturn federal defenses in favor of traditional marriage. It would also fuel the argument that nonprofit organizations opposed to homosexual behavior are violating public policy (as are racists) and thus must be stripped of their federal tax benefits.
Non-discrimination rules applied to campus clubs: believe it or not, many colleges, universities, and law schools claim that it is illegal for a religious student group to insist that their leaders must share and exemplify the group's religious beliefs. Earlier this month, for example, Wright State University kicked off campus a Christian student group that required voting members to be Christians. Christian Legal Society student groups have been banned from several law schools because of the CLS requirement that leaders be Christian.
In a number of states, religious organizations that insist on religious employment standards have been banned from those states' combined giving campaigns-which are simply administrative programs which make it easier for state employees to give some of their own money to a charitable cause of their own choice. The Association of Faith-Based Organizations has taken several states to court to get rid of this exclusion of faith-based organizations.
Religious institutions of higher education are free under the law to require faculty and staff to belong to a particular faith, and many of them do so. Yet a petition currently circulating in the American Philosophical Association seeks to ban from the APA's job listing service any job postings by colleges or universities that have this allegedly discriminatory employment policy. As a private organization, the APA is free to adopt the petitioners' demand-yet, as a counter-petition points out, such an action would make the job listing service less useful to philosopher job candidates and would foster discrimination against religious philosophers and educational institutions. It is the counter-petition that favors true diversity in civil society.
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Culture War or Kulturkampf
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Ours is a time favoring a range of efforts to "end the culture wars" by devising new "centrist" policies: stop pushing laws to ban abortion but instead press for government spending to support pregnant women and women who have given birth, or, instead of fighting the introduction of same-sex marriage, work to strengthen exemptions that protect individuals and institutions committed to man-woman marriage. It isn't always obvious that the purported middle way will achieve what the despised "culture warriors" were seeking, or that their proposals always need to be abandoned in order to pursue the softer new approach. More than that: At the same time the mood is growing to end our "culture wars" aren't there worrying signs of a renewal of the original culture war, the "kulturkampf"? The kulturkampf was the 1870s and 80s war by Bismarck, chancellor of the German Empire, against the Catholic church-against Catholic church leaders but also against the Catholic political party (the Center party) and other Catholic social, cultural, and educational institutions. This was a battle of the state against public Catholicism, a battle of secularism against a public role for religious conviction and religious institutions. This was a bigger battle than the important fight at the root of the "culture wars." The "culture war" is a fight between different views of what moral code should be predominant in our common life (pro-life or not? pro-historic marriage or not? pro-sexual fidelity or not?). But the kulturkampf was a battle against the very institutions, the faith-based organizations or parachurch ministries, through which people of particular religious convictions preserve, develop, propagate, and exemplify those convictions in society. Many who seek through laws, regulations, public pressure, and private decisions to curtail the ability of faith-based organizations to manifest standards and practices that differ from the politically correct may have positive anti-discrimination motivations. But whatever the motivation, the "anti-discrimination" crusade has become a battle against the religious freedom of religious organizations, as Greg Baylor and Timothy Tracey show. That's the battle that has become manifest in the increasingly wide-ranging set of restrictions that curtail their freedom to be distinctive, to follow religious standards and policies. |
AFBO-Association of Faith-Based Organizations
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Faith-based organizations are defended by many expert lawyers and legal associations. There is also an organized pro-active legal effort, a systematic drive to create positive precedents that enlarge the scope of freedom for religious organizations to follow their distinctive practices and policies.
"AFBO believes that faith-based institutions preserve their religious identity by selecting leaders, employees and volunteers who agree with their faith views and can wholeheartedly promote their religious mission."
For more information and to join this positive legal initiative, go to http://www.allfaithbased.org.
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For further information:
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e-mail: info@IRFAlliance.org
website (under construction): www.IRFAlliance.org
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What is IRFA?
The Institutional Religious Freedom Alliance works to safeguard the religious identity, faith-based standards and practices, and faith-shaped services of faith-based organizations across the range of service sectors and religions, enabling them to make their distinctive and best contributions to the common good.
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