New White House Rules Would Prevent Religious Charities from Preaching with Taxpayer Money

If you haven't figured it out I really do like Hemant Mehta's "reporting".  Some how, he and his crew over at Friendly Atheist are able to keep up will current events and issues much better than I.  They break the issues down nicely and explain how things effect those of us in the secular community and why things are good, bad or indifferent.

The following is another example of an issue that I can't add anything of value to, other than to share:

One of the problems with President Obama‘s Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships is that it helps the government give money to religious groups that do charity work (1) even if they proselytize along the way and (2) even if they discriminate against LGBT people in their hiring.

The latter issue is still a source of controversy, but there may finally be a fix for the former.

Last week, director Melissa Rogers (below) announced a proposed rule change affecting nine different federal agencies (out of the 14 that partner with her office). The new rule would prevent grant-receiving groups from preaching while using taxpayer funds:

The proposed rules clarify the principle that organizations offering explicitly religious activities may not subsidize those activities with direct federal financial assistance and must separate such activities in time or location from programs supported with direct federal financial assistance. For example, if a faith-based provider offers a Bible study as well as a federally supported job training program, the Bible study must be privately funded and separated in time or location from the job training program.

If you want to get more specific about it, the grant rules used to prevent “inherently religious activities” (a vague phrase), but the new rules would prevent “explicitly religious activities.”

The rules would also make clear to all groups that they cannot discriminate against beneficiaries on the basis of their faith, meaning that job training program could not have a “Christian-only” requirement.

New White House Rules Would Prevent Religious Charities from Preaching with Taxpayer Money