Removing the barriers between church and state.

pretty scary but it has been no secret that the Bush adminstration has wooed the christian right for whatever reasons. The push for ultra-conservative judgeships, the impingement of civil liberties, the war on abotion rights, the defaming of oppositon. i suppose the pendulum will continue to swing to the right and i cannot but think that the darkest hour is just before it turns completely black.

Just another crass political move. Karl Rove probably figures they'll gain more votes than loose them.

Do you mean that the U.S. administration is going to permit discrimination on the religious grounds? Hmm, it does not sound trustworthy: there are numerous Jews holding decent positions in the administration, and no one (and surely, not President Bush) makes their conversion to Christianity a precondition for their further employment.

steissd
The money in subtle ways will be used to further the religion of the institution that receives it. Further, that institution may discriminate in hiring. This nation has always maintained the separation of church and state [any church]. Bush with his faith based initiatives is doing every thing he can to shatter that separation.
It is odd when every symbol of religion must be removed from government buildings that Bush can give tax dollars to religious institutions and vouchers to attend parochial schools.

Hmm, I always believed that religion (mainly Christian, as Christians constitute the majority of Americans) played an extremely important role in the USA. Even on the dollar bill there appears a motto "In God We Trust"...

First amendement to the US constitution:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

This dangerous (and dare I say it, un-American) idea has been one of Bush's pet projects from Day 1. It seemed for a while that it had been forgotten, but no, here it is again on a front burner.

Krugman is right about how bad an idea it is!

While I'd agree with the general sentiment of this thread you've overstated things a bit here. The original Constitution and Amendments applied only to the Federal Government - not the States. Of the original 13 states, 7 had direct support of organized religion written into their State Constitutions. South Carolina had Protestant Christianity written in as their State's official religion and in MA the state not only limited holding public office to Protestants but taxed residents for the support of Protestant Churches (and staff) in each community as well as authorizing the use of the Constable to force residents to attend Protestant services regardless of their chosen religion.

5 other states (in addition to the 7 previously mentioned) made significant references to religion in their Constitutions. Only one - New York, made no reference to religion at all. The states were free to do with Religion as they chose until the 14th Amendment was interpreted to apply the full Federal Constitution to all levels of government.

There are similar errors in the other comments you listed as well.

fishin'
You are right. I stand corrected.

This is an excellent piece by Joan Didion on 'faith-based initiatives' as promoted by Marvin Olasky, and on the influence of this fellow on President Bush...
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/13857

blatham, sitting quietly on bleachers, wondering if anyone partook of noted article.

i did and all i can say is "Houston, we have a problem"

'Finding Religion'

But Chris Horner, a senior fellow at the free-market environmental think tank Competitive Enterprise Institute, said using faith-based grants for environmental issues is contrary to President Bush's original intent.

"President Bush had the opposite in mind. He had a pro-people, pro-human agenda," Horner told CNSNews.com.

"If you look at green's agenda, it is all about suppressing economic growth, standards of living and therefore population," he explained.

"Bush is talking about social services, but the [environmentalist's] agenda is filled with a lot of loathing of the human species," Horner added.

He predicted that if the EPA is successful, there would be a rise in green advocacy groups suddenly "finding religion" in order to qualify for the grant money.

"I think it's obscene ... [Green groups] will simply add a Judeo-Christian face in order to provide themselves a deeper pocket," Horner said.

http://www.cnsnews.com/ViewNation.asp?Page=\Nation\archive\200212\NAT20021220b.html

dyslexia

That got a big laugh! You are a joy to have about.

Bill W

Your quote represents that weird corner of US Christian culture which equates faith and cadillacs. They are represented by 'think tanks' such as the CCI. And Olasky, as shown by Didion's piece, has at least one foot in this crowd. But to be fair, we don't know that Bush would agree to this guy's statements.

There is another way to view this matter too, though it isn't simple, and is beset by the problem of church and state separation, but goes someway to understanding this urge.

As DeToqueville noted, the America he saw and deeply respected had as one of its characteristics, the 'community service' ethic. I don't think that was mainly a function of religious groups, but of the necessity in a new land where social strata were greatly unformed yet, to work together and help out those who needed it. For better or worse now, that heritage and ethic is part of the appeal to many, I think, for such initiatives as Olasky proposes, even if Olasky's more fundamental goal might be evangelism.
Church groups are organized and commonly function in such a manner already, thus one can see how a well intentioned person might turn to them presently.

So, now I have to add that even with all this good intention, I'm of the opinion it only ought to be encouraged where there is NO administrative differentiation between religions or non-religious groups doing community work, and I don't think that is possible in the face of Christian evangelism as presently constituted.

blatham, I tried to get the link to work, and couldn't. Try copying the full URL into the address and going to the link. The quote is at the end, but the full story is pretty good.

BillW

I confess I am a fan of the green movement (other than the few nutty corners), so would not be unhappy to see federal monies moving in this direction.

One small question, if possible: people on the thread (and not only here) refer to different Amendments to the U.S. Constitution. Where could I get some information on the Web about these (and other) Amendments? I would highly appreciate some link to a site that contains text of the U.S. Constitution and the Amendments.

steissd

This will get you started... http://www.house.gov/Constitution/Constitution.html

For the specifics of the ammendments, you can use google, just type in 'US Constitutional Ammendments' and peek about.

steissd, There is a thread of legal resources in the "Legal" Forum here: http://www.able2know.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=137

There are several sites with information on the US Constitution, my personal favorite being "The Founder's Constitution" since it provides tons of relevant backround matarial on the dscussions held when the Constitution was being written.