Biden Violates Separation of Church and State
When George Bush authorized federal funds for faith partnerships who signed on the dotted line he opened a new chapter in the debate over Separation of Church and State.
Barrack Obama used the Bush model, and Donald Trump’s stab at it never got off the ground now Joe Biden has re-established a White House Office of Faith Based and Neighborhood Partnerships.
Lawyer Melissa Rogers oversees this office while also serving as senior director for faith and public policy on the White House Domestic Policy Council.
Here’s the clincher; those in charge of Biden’s initiative claim they will protect the “cherished guarantees of church-state separation and freedom for people of all faiths and none.”
Who’re they kidding; we know government using incentives to lure religion into partnership to do their bidding doesn’t end well.
Not to mention it spawns a host of lobbyist groups with money in hand clamoring to influence government policy.
The bottom line any co-option of the Church by the State is a threat to the autonomy of the faith and carries the risk of corrupting it.
Apparently health, immigration, racial justice, climate, poverty and peacemaking are the issues the Biden administration plans to address.
Bear in mind that these faith-based initiatives cover religious as well as non-religious welfare organizations including churches.
The question is; why is nobody calling this out for what it is, a violation of the Separation of Church and State.
The meaning and origins of the misunderstood term has changed over time and now it’s a case of; different strokes for different folks.
1) It first harked back to Protestant Christianity and Martin Luther’s two kingdoms; the Kingdom of God versus the Kingdom of the world ‘and never should the twain meet’.
2) Others credit its origins all the way back to the French and American Revolutions when the French traded monarchial rule and its ties with the Catholic Church for a republic and the US’s founding fathers rejected the idea of a state religion like those in other countries; Europe and the UK spring to mind.
However, both guaranteed the individual right of Freedom of Religion now challenged by the premise of Freedom from Religion.
3) Today’s secularists have turned the idea of Church State separation upside down; their take; Christianity is a threat to the state not the state a threat to Christianity.
They push the line government isn’t allowed to promote one religion over another while the religious can’t express their faith in public but must confine it to their place of worship.
The Ecumenical Connection
This initiative links the goals of the Democrat party with that of the religious left but overseer Melissa Roger’s association with certain groups is interesting.
An ex senior fellow of the Brooking Institute she also served on the Council of the Baptist Joint Committee.
Brooking is another of those elite think tanks so it’s no surprise they are pushing for this type of thing which should give pause for concern.
The Baptist Joint Committee is an interfaith non-profit but they could have saved themselves the trouble and dropped the name Baptist, yes there are those in Christian denominations who support this type of thing but why can’t they be upfront; why hide it?
What’s wrong with the interfaith movement, well the problem is this; in politics, identity groups are promoted because they fit with the strategy of Divide and Rule that pits various groups; in an all against all; or all against one, if you prefer.
When it comes to matters of religion the reverse is true; all of a sudden differences have to be rejected in favor of inclusion to fit into the big tent of interfaith because stand-alone-faith stands out.
The reason for this is twofold; first, corralling religions into one big stable makes it easier to control them and second the interfaith movement seeks to eliminate differences between faiths thus watering down the beliefs of each group to accommodate all.
It’s just not all about religions either; ever since the US Supreme Court declared atheism a religion a few years back, in an absurd political move, non-believers have been looking for a space in the interfaith movement, well before then in fact, but the move by judges accelerated it.
One secular activist summed up the interfaith movement: interfaith is tapping into people’s religious traditions to get them involved in activities that look a whole lot like real, secular pluralism; or secular religion (my emphasis)
If the interfaith movement has a motto it’s; people of all faiths and no faith.
You see the goals of the movement are a lot more involved and dare I say underhanded than just dialoging to get people to ‘accept’ atheists and Moslems like some pretend.
