Religious Hiring Spat: Conservative Religious Groups Push Against Employment Rules In Federal Funding

By Daniel Burke
Religion News Service

WASHINGTON (RNS) A coalition of mostly conservative religious organizations is urging Congress to amend a proposed bill that would bar them from making personnel decisions based on religion if they receive government funds to treat mental illness and substance abuse.

In a letter sent Wednesday (Aug. 25) to every member of Congress, evangelical charities, the U.S. Catholic Bishops, and Orthodox Jews say the bill "would be catastrophic" to their religious freedom and to their mission to serve the needy.

The bill, HR 5466, would reauthorize federal funding to treat substance abuse and mental illness, and was introduced in May by Rep. Patrick Kennedy, D-R.I., who has battled addiction and bipolar disorder.

The bill would outlaw any government funds or contracts with religious organizations that do not agree to "refrain from considering religion or any profession of faith" when making employment decisions.

"Stripping away the religious hiring rights of religious service providers violates the principle of religious freedom, and represents bad practice in the delivery of social services," said Anthony Picarello Jr., general counsel of U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.

World Vision, the Christian humanitarian giant, also protested the proposed bill. On Monday (Aug. 24), a federal appeals court ruled that World Vision can fire employees who do not share its theological tenets.

But government funding for religious charities that make personnel decisions based on religion is far trickier. The Obama administration has said it is weighing the issue and will make decisions on case-by-case basis until a final decision is rendered.

The religious groups protesting the proposed bill also wrote an open letter to Attorney General Eric Holder, urging him not to "dilute the right of faith-based" charities to "stay faith-based through their hiring."

They also vowed that no government funds will be used for proselytizing or any other religious activities, and that all people in need will be served, regardless of faith.

A church-state watchdog group noted the relatively thin sliver of religious groups that signed the letter. Most Jewish and mainline Protestant groups--not to mention Buddhists, Quakers, Hindus, Muslims and Mormons--did not sign the letter. Instead, many of the 100 signatories are presidents of small Christian colleges.

Comments

[George Global]

07:39 PM on 10/22/2010

Gosh, they have the same understanding of the First Amendment that Chrisis O'Donnell has...none.

[Intolerantcentrist]

10:19 PM on 09/01/2010

The Huff Po story; “Religious Hiring Spat: Conservative Religious Groups Push Against Employment Rules In Federal Funding”, touches on what could have been a solution for this issues.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/08/26/conservative-religious-gr_1_n_696228.html

This story illustrates that Congress has the power, “The Power of the Purse”. Congress can stipulate conditions upon the recipients of federal dollars. This is how the Fed’s mandate a speed limit on an Interstate Freeway; enforce “No Child Left Behind” to the states; ect. …. The list is wide and long.

In this case, the question is whether Congress can regulate First Amendment Right of corporations to make campaign contributions. The Supreme Court has determined a principle wherein Congress may condition the receipt of federal funds with respect to an acceptance of speech limitations. And in the case of Regan v. Taxation With Representation, the Court made clear that ““Congress has merely refused to pay for the lobbying out of public moneys,”.

http://supreme.justia.com/constitution/amendment-01/35-government-and-power-of-the-purse.html

Clearly, Congress could have “refused to pay for the lobbying out of public moneys”, yet they missed the opportunity to protect the public’s interests. Could be that there is a lack of money in doing the right thing.

[Intolerantcentrist]

10:31 PM on 09/01/2010

Excuse me; wrong post.

[IFany]

10:35 PM on 08/28/2010

We have books containing thousands of years of human thought, and we allow religion to hijack knowledge as a substitute, for rational thought.

[George Global]

07:41 PM on 10/22/2010

They must never have evolved.
'Cause they don't have a leg to stand on.
f&f

[IFany]

10:29 PM on 08/28/2010

Perhaps the weaning has got to happen, This primitive and archaic form of human thought is eating away at society as it is, and has no place being given deference as if it's equivalent to Einstein's theory of Relativity,

[George Global]

07:41 PM on 10/22/2010

I think it's more like Einstein's theory of relatives...ignore the religious nuts among your family.

[Dunkleberger Karl]

10:19 PM on 08/28/2010

Alienization of the evangalista,and the rapturians, Has so far only resulted in the shooting of 2 abortion doctors and a handful of bombings, if We take away their tax excempt status, we must be prepaired for a real back lash! God protect us all!

[IFany]

09:47 PM on 08/28/2010

No government money to further ignorance, Put the money now given to churches into stopping this nations slide into this abyss of the growing number of functional illiterate that are voters, Fund Schools not religion.

[IFany]

09:41 PM on 08/28/2010

No Representation without TAXATION

[Rimser]

09:20 PM on 08/28/2010

Can somebody please explain why religious organizations can claim tax exempt status but still receive federal funds? And given the fact that more and more pulpits are explicitly weighing in on state and federal elections, why do they have tax exempt status at all?

[Alexandra08]

07:45 PM on 08/28/2010

So what about "separation of church and state" do they not understand? Than CAN hire personnel based on religion; the just CANNOT expect federal funds to do it. Why is that a hard concept?

[midwestblues]

07:36 PM on 08/28/2010

Religion meddling in politics ... again. Religion will lose -- watch and see.

[Dunkleberger Karl]

10:22 PM on 08/28/2010

With Corperations looking to capitolize , These two united will be hard to defeat! So LOng Democracy!

[krummlaw]

06:52 PM on 08/28/2010

Nobody's taking away anybody's religious rights. The organizations don't need to ask for nor accept the government's money.

Anybody who asks for federal dollars that come with conditions has to meet the conditions. It's a free country; not a free ride for these conservative groupsl

[llstudent]

03:45 PM on 08/28/2010

A solution, take away the church's tax free status immediately.

[llstudent]

03:43 PM on 08/28/2010

OMG lets hope the White House doesn't cave on this issue.

[serg99]

02:32 PM on 08/28/2010

no this is about helping the needy with what they need help with opinion is not helpful some groups would be inclined to only offer help to the "godly"
and as the is pointed out the government has had people making hiring and firing decisions the Bush admin and his cabinet appointees did all they could to fill as many departments as they could with religious right wingers who would do nothing but push there ideology the law be damed.
This is what it means to be a free and equal society we cannot appose any group based on opinion or disagreement. unless they infringe on your rights then you can do nothing to stop them by the way you don't have the right to discriminate against others so that argument is stupid sorry it does not infringe on your rights seeing as you don't have that right.

[William Foley]

01:44 PM on 08/28/2010

To go by these regulations would force the churches to hire unbelievers as pastors, religious teachers, secretaries who have the responsibility of passing on info they may not understand (or worse, try to sabotage), or scoffer sextons who may not value the work they do. It's ridiculous. And to disallow the churches payment for any work they do that the seculars get paid for is discrimination. The churches are some people's (and not only believers) desperation shot at economic or mental salvation.
Personally, who needs government funding? Some smaller non-profit churches need to be tax free to survive, but for the work they do, they'd rather not have the hassles of government funding anyway.
I do not know what the other churches do to get funding, but it may be worth more than they're getting (or then again, may not be) and you don't want to leave certain desperate situations at the mercy of the scoffers or the people who haven't been coming through to pick up the need that exists.

[serg99]

02:41 PM on 08/28/2010

this is not the case teacher at parochial schools do not fall under these rules any person who's job it is to teach religion would have to teach based on the accepted standard if you teach at a public school you cannot teach religion out side an empirical historical or social context. Any religions parochial school will have a church approved curriculum i.e. if you are a non believer you still have to teach based on the approved lesson plan you cannot teach evolution in a class on faith. Plus most non believers will likely not posses the required information to teach such a class. Also actors play roles as required by there job if an atheist is qualified to teach a class on evangelicalism "which is highly unlikely they would" then he or she would need to separate there opinion from the curriculum and teach based on the lesson plan if they cant the will be fired.

[deeppeace]

06:58 PM on 08/28/2010

That's a desperate, bogus argument.

Responsible employers hire the best fit for the position. For the pulpit, hiring committees go to seminaries. Or not. Many denominations assign clergy; there is no hiring involved.

'Scoffer sextons?!" That sounds like a British sitcom. You do not need to be a believer to trim the hedges or hire a plumber or even do the bookkeeping. Or lead the choir, for that matter.

Accusing anyone of intending to sabotage religious efforts is either ignorant or mean. I'll believe both.

[William Foley]

03:48 PM on 09/09/2010

you must belong to one of those fundamentalist churches where everyone is a die hard, yes? It isn't necessarily so in other churches.