Speaking of Heschel's faith

Heschel is at right, with beard.

"At the first conference on religion and race, the main participants were Pharaoh and Moses," Abraham Joshua Heschel began his January 14, 1963 speech "Religion and Race."

Speaking of Faith this week offers an extraordinary broadcast/podcast looking back at this "a mystic who wrote transcendent, poetic words about God. At the same time, he marched alongside Martin Luther King Jr. and organized religious leadership against the war in Vietnam, embodying the social activism of the biblical prophets he studied."

Here.

No faith-based federal aid (at all)

Susan Jacoby goes right to the core of the faith-based federal aid debate:

To require any religious institution to hire people who do not agree with and represent its principles is absurd. That is why the government should not be in the business of funneling money for social services through any faith-based organization, whatever its hiring practices.
This is not only my position as a secular civil libertarian. It is also the position of honest religious leaders, like the Rev. Albert H. Mohler, Jr., president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. For Mohler, it is unthinkable that Baptists should compromise their religious principles--such as their mission to proselytize for Christianity--in order to receive federal grants. Therefore, understandably enough, he opposes the acceptance of government aid by churches. The Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter-day Saints has taken the same position.

At issue is the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA), passed in 1993 and designed to protect religious liberty, not countenance discrimination.

U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder has been asked to reverse the “constitutionally questionable” June 2007, Bush administration memo which held that RFRA could exempt certain religious organizations from federal anti-discrimination provisions.

Not enough, Jacoby says, and not a chance more than that will be done. Ever.

Faith-based activism that works

State of Belief's Ari Geller writes:

The Washington Post has a very interesting story today about a house of worship in DC focused on faith-based activism. They provide everything from help finding jobs, to affordable housing and medical services for the homeless. It’s a good reminder that faith-based groups do just fine providing these services without the financial support – or interference – of government.

In that story the Post's Michelle Boorstein writes:

The Church of the Saviour was never a conventional church. It has no pews, no Sunday school, not even a Christmas service. Instead, for 60 years this small, unusual group based in Northwest Washington has quietly fueled a revolution in faith-based activism.

Thousands of people are served by dozens of organizations started by the church, part of the intense social justice work mandatory for members. One of its programs found jobs for 800 people last year. Another provided 325 units of affordable housing. There's Columbia Road Health Services. Christ House medical services for the homeless. Miriam's House for women with AIDS. And on and on.

Read the entire story of faith-based activism without federal largesse here.