Should Faith-Based Groups Get Federal Funding?

by Rev. BARRY LYNN

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, February 4, 2001, page J3

Throughout the campaign and during the early days of his presidency, President Bush has expressed an unwavering commitment to public funding of religious groups. To follow through on that commitment, Bush has announced his support for the creation of an office of faith-based action.

The agency will remove barriers that prevent additional funding of religious groups and coordinate federal funding from multiple government agencies. To help it succeed, the president hopes to spend $8 billion in his first year in office on the endeavor. In other words, Bush is proposing an unprecedented program of tax support for religion, involving literally billions in public resources. His plan for social services would essentially merge church and state into a single bureaucracy that would dispense religion alongside assistance to the needy.

Simply put, Bush's new government agency would create a policy and constitutional nightmare. While some might support the notion of houses of worship playing a larger role in providing services to those in need, putting those institutions on the public dole will have a series of detrimental consequences.

First, any time tax dollars flow from the treasury to church coffers, constitutional concerns arise. But the office of faith-based action pushes this principle to new highs, or in this case, lows.

Religious groups will be providing services, with your tax dollars, in areas including after-school programs for children, job training, drug treatment, prison rehabilitation programs and abstinence programs.

When we keep church and state separate, people choose whether to give their money to a house of worship. If Bush has his way, a new government agency will open the public treasury to any religious group, forcing taxpayers to finance religious groups that many find frightening, offensive or just theologically wrong.

For example, many Americans would feel uncomfortable financing services being provided by Jerry Falwell or Louis Farrakhan. Remember, the government may not play favorites among religious groups. Groups with beliefs that are racist, anti-Semitic or far from the mainstream could demand and receive tax funding under Bush's approach.

Additionally, Bush's plan threatens the independence of the religious institutions that receive tax dollars because public funding will inevitably lead to regulation. The government properly regulates activities that it subsidizes, since it is obliged to make certain that taxpayer funds are properly spent. Once churches, temples, mosques and synagogues are being financed by the public, some of their freedom is placed in jeopardy by the almost certain regulation to follow.

Our founding fathers created a wall of separation between church and state, not a government agency designed to unite the two. The very existence of a federal office whose sole purpose is to give tax dollars to religious groups is in irreparable conflict with the religious liberties guaranteed by the First Amendment.

Religious groups have provided social services for some time and many do fine work. But we can help those in need without creating a new bureaucracy to give billions of unregulated tax dollars to churches.

Ultimately, there's nothing compassionate about this dubious scheme. Bush's office of faith-based action is a constitutional disaster and a terrible step in the wrong direction.