Obama backs faith-based funding

2008-07-01 21:34

Chicago - Reaching out to evangelical voters, Barack Obama is announcing plans on Tuesday that would expand President George W Bush's programme steering federal social service dollars towards religious groups.

But Obama's support for letting religious charities receive federal funding was likely to invite a storm of protest from those who view such faith requirements as discrimination.

The Democratic presidential candidate was unveiling his approach to getting religious charities more involved in government anti-poverty programmes during a tour on Tuesday at Eastside Community Ministry in Zanesville, Ohio.

The arm of the Central Presbyterian Church operates a food bank, provides clothes, has a youth ministry and provides other services in its impoverished community.

"The challenges we face today, from putting people back to work to improving our schools, from saving our planet to combating HIV/Aids to ending genocide, are simply too big for government to solve alone," Obama was to say, according to a prepared text of his remarks obtained by The Associated Press. "We need all hands on deck."

Question of commitment

David Kuo, a conservative Christian who was deputy director of Bush's Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives until 2003 and later became a critic of the Republican's commitment to the cause, called Obama's approach smart, impressive and well thought-out. But he took a wait-and-see attitude about whether it would deliver.

"When it comes to promises to help the poor, promises are easy," said Kuo, who wrote a 2006 book describing his frustration at what he called Bush's lacklustre enthusiasm for the programme. "The question is commitment."

Obama proposes to elevate the program to a "moral centre" of his administration, by renaming it the Office of Community and Faith-Based Partnerships, and changing training from occasional huge conferences to empowering larger religious charities to mentor smaller ones in their communities.

Like Bush, Obama was arguing that religious organisations can and should play a bigger role in serving the poor and meeting other social needs. But while Bush argued that the strength of religious charities lies primarily in shared religious identity between workers and recipients, Obama was to tout the benefits of their "bottom-up" approach.

Close to the people

"Because they're so close to the people, they're well-placed to offer help," he was to say.

Obama does not see a need to push for a law to make this programme work as Bush did, said a senior adviser to the campaign, who spoke on condition of anonymity to more freely describe the new policy.

Obama does not support requiring religious tests for recipients of aid nor using federal money to proselytise. He also only supports letting religious institutions hire and fire based on faith in the non-taxypayer funded portions of their activities, said a senior adviser.

Reverend Barry Lynn, executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, criticised Obama's proposed expansion of a programme he said has undermined civil rights and civil liberties.

"I am disappointed that any presidential candidate would want to continue a failed policy of the Bush administration," he said. "It ought to be shut down, not continued."

- AP