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Christianity Today, April, 2009 |

THROWING INKWELLS

Civil Religion's Sharper Teeth

All believers welcome, so long as they aren't religious.

Mollie Ziegler Hemingway | posted 4/27/2009 10:56AM

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Soon, charities might not be able to ensure that faith motivates their employees. No word yet on whether the program will be renamed Somebody-Here-Used-to-Have-a-Faith-Based Initiative.

The late Yale church historian Jaroslav Pelikan said it was an American conviction to believe that morality can be stripped of doctrine, that it is possible to summarize the best that men everywhere have discovered about the good life.

"Biblical morality is inseparable from biblical doctrine and biblical doctrine is inseparable from the community of believers," he said.

If the previous pressure to secularize didn't give pause to religious charities seeking federal funds, it should terrify them now. Being forced into silence about one's faith and being told you can't hire fellow believers is too high a price to pay.

Related Elsewhere:

Previous columns by Mollie Ziegler Hemingway include:

California's Temper Tantrum | How the gay rights movement lost more than Proposition 8. (March 5, 2009)

In Over His Pay Grade | When science is made 'apolitical' and 'unencumbered by religion,' it's usually to hyper-politicize and hyper-sacralize it. (March 23, 2009)

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April 2009, Vol. 53, No. 4

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Howard Pepper

Posted: May 09, 2009 10:11 AM

Dawkins and Schweitzer: As to the sentence near the end of the article. Dawkins' thinking indeed may not have inspired sacrifice in service. However Dr. Schweitzer, unknown to much of our younger generation, went precisely to Africa, founded and ran a hospital, while seeking to flesh out a universal ethic of compassion and service. Not a follower of either the popular liberal German theology of his day, nor of traditional orthodoxy, early in his theological career he wrote the classic "The Quest of the Historical Jesus." Near the end of his long and accomplished life, he became a Unitaritan-Universalist. I wouldn't be surprised if there are not a number of people who might say Schweitzer and his example of sacrifice and compassion inspired them to similar service.

susan

Posted: May 08, 2009 3:48 PM

Christians have been doing the missions and sharing the gospel without the "help" of the gov't since the beginning of the church. We do not need this gov't to "give". Taxpayers are paying for everything, not the gov't. The gov't needs to get it right, and stop paying for abortions and giving aide to corrupt gov'ts that is not getting to the dear people who need basic food, water, sanitary conditions, and health and education. Let these corrupt gov'ts be subject to accountability of we, the taxpayers, who are the US gov't. First, we need to get rid of the corrupt persons who are supposed to be our representatives.

Anthony

Posted: May 07, 2009 3:42 AM


Uh...don't accept the money? I don't see what the fuss is...

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