Posted on 11/27/2004 2:50:54 PM PST by wagglebee
The Wisconsin-based atheist group Freedom From Religion Foundation is suing to cut off federal funding to a Christian child-mentoring program that helps troubled kids.
Last year, the federal government awarded a $225,000 contract, part of $9 million awarded to 52 Arizona groups, to Phoenix-based MentorKids USA, according to the Madison, Wisc.-based Capital Times.
The lawsuit, presided over by U.S. Judge John Shabaz, is demanding a summary judgment that federal funding of the program cease until the government "has a demonstrated plan in place to comply with its constitutional obligations," reports the Wisconsin paper.
Citing the First Amendment, the atheist foundation said, "Mentoring to convert is not a suitable social service to be provided by the government," said the report.
MentorKids USA was launched in 1997 by Orville Krieger, in partnership with Charles Colson's Prison Fellowship, "to address the needs of at-risk youth in the Phoenix, Arizona, metropolitan area by matching caring Christian adults with youth ages 8-17 who showed warning signs of becoming criminal offenders," says the Christian organization's website.
Originally called Phoenix MatchPoint, the group changed its name last January to MentorKids USA. It has a long and successful track record in mentoring children in trouble with the law, who have dysfunctional family backgrounds, have been physically or sexually abused or who are involved with drug or alcohol abuse. To date, MentorKids USA has helped over 500 kids.
In the program, mentors commit time each week to be a friend and role model for an at-risk youth. The mentors "offer concrete expressions of unconditional love and support to the mentee," says the group's website, "and the two participate in activities designed to build friendship, trust, and constructive values."
Some of the Freedom From Religion Foundation's "legal accomplishments," according to its website, include:
Winning the first federal lawsuit challenging direct funding by the government of a faith-based agency
Overturning a state Good Friday holiday
Winning a lawsuit barring direct taxpayer subsidy of religious schools
Removing Ten Commandments monuments and crosses from public land
Halting the Post Office from issuing religious cancellations
Ending 51 years years of illegal bible instruction in public schools
According to its website, the non-profit foundation was incorporated in Wisconsin in 1978 and is "a national membership association of freethinkers: atheists, agnostics and skeptics of any pedigree."
Why is it concerned with what it calls "state/church entanglement?"
"First Amendment violations are accelerating," says the group's website. "The religious right is campaigning to raid the public till and advance religion at taxpayer expense, attacking our secular public schools, the rights of nonbelievers, and the Establishment Clause.
"The Foundation recognizes that the United States was first among nations to adopt a secular Constitution. The founders who wrote the U.S. Constitution wanted citizens to be free to support the church of their choice, or no religion at all. Our Constitution was very purposefully written to be a godless document, whose only references to religion are exclusionary.
"It is vital to buttress the Jeffersonian 'wall of separation between church and state' which has served our nation so well."
But William Rehnquist, current chief justice of the United States Supreme Court, says this view put forth by the Freedom From Religion Foundation, the ACLU and similar groups is a fiction and mockery of the true meaning of the First Amendment.
The Establishment Clause, explained Rehnquist in a 1985 opinion, "forbade establishment of a national religion, and forbade preference among religious sects or denominations. … The Establishment Clause did not require government neutrality between religion and irreligion nor did it prohibit the Federal Government from providing nondiscriminatory aid to religion. There is simply no historical foundation for the proposition that the Framers intended to build the 'wall of separation' [between church and state]."
Only secular providers can be granted government contracts? Based on what emanation of which penumbra?
Problem is that faith based programs are more sucessful that's why we're even talking about using them.
Good luck at basic and thanks for serving your country.
Constituionality is the purview of the Congress. Prior to Marbury, a difference of opinion between the SCOTUS and the Congress was won by Congress.
We could change some of the words around, and we'd have a Christian Constitution.
As far as i know there is no Christian Constitution!
An American Constitution for governing but that covers the right of religion for all no matter what denomination! so its not a Christian Constitution but a law for free men to keep that which God has made free for all ! A guarantee of freedom of religion among others.
I never agreed much with Mrs. O'Hair's flamboyance, but I did agree with her desire to keep religion out of public life and especially out of public schools and politics.
I didn't used to be so hard-core about it, but then a president whom I voted for said publicly that he didn't believe that I could be a real American and and Atheist at the same time.
Anyway, what I wanted to ask you was how you think that going back to Jefferson's intent would benefit the US? I know that that's kind of broad, so feel free to cut it as short as you'd like.
P.S. I'm not trying to set you up or anything, I just really would like to know what you think.
Just what do you think justifies this violation of the free exercise clause?
A check to the family does nothing to help a troubled child. Much of the time it may go to drugs or alcohol or
gambling, not to professional help for the child.
Any foundation or organization against mentoring a child with emotional, learning or physical problems, no matter what denomination or religion does it, is definitely not in the best interest of the many children who can get help no other way.
What we need are judges with more conservative leanings than what we now have, thanks again to Bill Clinton and Arlen to name a few.
Specter
Also, by funding religious charities you open an avenue for religion to get into politics, which is never good for religion, politics, or those in the middle such as yours truly.
Summarily closing a church and arresting preachers for preaching is a violation of the free excercise clause, removing religion from public schools and politics is not.
You're forgetting that many colonies had official religions. They weren't getting away from state religions; they were getting away from religious persecution. There's a difference.
>Ms O'Hare....I agree with her desire to keep religion out of public life...<
Like it or not, this country was built on a faith in the
Almighty God. The Constitution declares freedom OF
religion, not freedom FROM religion.
You don't like it here? Tell you where you can go.
My goodness, we'd never want thee kids to be impacted by the idea that God loves them and has a plan for them. Heavens no! Stop it now. Our freedom is at stake.
The Feds shouldn't fund any program like this, the states however, should have that right.
I would respectfully disagree.96% of the American population is Christian,yet 4% are telling us that we can't use our Federal tax dollars to support our Christian institutions and beliefs.I don't think so.
I disagree. The Constitution gives you the right to worship as you see fit as well as giving me the right to not worship as I see fit.
History teaches us that mixing religion and politics almost always ends with the majority taking rights from the minority. It was true when European states declared themselves either Protestant or Catholic and persecuted whomever was on the wrong side, it was true when the Muslim Caliphs forced non-Muslims to pay a special tax, and it was true when George H. W. Bush told me that I wasn't an American.
Since the Constitution exists (in part) to protect the rights of the minority against the majority, how can you claim to be on the side of the Constitution while simultaneously claiming that my rights, being part of a minority, are not equal to your rights as part of the majority?
So would it be the stocks or the gulag for children wearing crucifixes or the Star of David to school and politicians swearing to God to uphold the Constitution?
The Constitution does not ban God or religion from the public square and the sooner the radical atheists understand that, the better we'll all get along.
Or how he directed that the Halls of Congress be used for church services!
Mentioning the ACLU in the same paragraph with our founding fathers -WASH YOUR MOUTH OUT -
>The common enemy is the extremist who wants to use law to force his opinions on others -- From either perspective<
Our laws should be passed by representatives of the people,
not reinterpreted by liberal, self important judges.
Exchange the word "God" in your post for "Allah" or "Karma" and I guarantee that you'll become as enthused as I am with the idea.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.