Filed under: separation of church and state, unfaithful | Tags: Faith based groups, Obama
Obama Urges More Aid to Faith-Based Groups
By JOSH GERSTEIN, Staff Reporter of the Sun | July 2, 2008
Senator Obama is calling for an expansion of one of President Bush‘s signature domestic initiatives: a hotly debated program to deliver more federal aid through so-called faith-based groups affiliated with churches and other religious institutions.
Senator Obama talks to the Reverend Bill Briggs yesterday as he tours the East Community Ministry in Zanesville.
“While these groups are often made up of folks who’ve come together around a common faith, they’re usually working to help people of all faiths or of no faith at all and they’re particularly well-placed to offer help,” Mr. Obama said in remarks prepared for delivery at an appearance yesterday in Zanesville, Ohio. “I believe that change comes not from the top down, but from the bottom up, and few are closer to the people than our churches, synagogues, temples, and mosques.”
Mr. Obama’s embrace of the faith-based program was seen by many analysts as part of a concerted shift to the political center by the presumptive Democratic nominee, though he denied yesterday that any such shift was under way. He said the idea to solicit more involvement by religious groups had roots in the work of President Clinton and Vice President Gore, as well as Mr. Bush.
A former head of Mr. Bush’s faith-based initiative, John DiIulio Jr., lavished praise on Mr. Obama’s proposal. “Many good community-serving initiatives can be built, expanded, or sustained on the common ground that Senator Obama has staked out for us here,” Mr. DiIulio said.
Early reports from the Associated Press and elsewhere about Mr. Obama’s plan triggered a wave of concern in some quarters that he was planning to permit groups to fire and hire on the basis of religion while operating government-funded programs.
“There was a bit of panic around here when the first reports came in,” a spokesman for Americans United for Separation of Church and State, Robert Boston, said. However, the panic subsided as it became clear Mr. Obama did not intend to allow religious-based discrimination with taxpayer money. “It’s not full-blown like we first thought,” Mr. Boston said.
During a news conference following his speech yesterday, Mr. Obama was asked to clarify his stance. “If a church or a synagogue wants to hire using its own money for its own membership, they can obviously hire people of their own faith. That makes perfect sense. If they are getting federal money to run programs that are providing services to the public, then both in the provision of those services and in the hiring they have to abide by” anti-discrimination laws, he said.
Asked about hiring gays in such programs, Mr. Obama noted there is no federal law against sexual-orientation discrimination, but he said religious groups would have to abide by state laws that bar the practice.
In a written statement yesterday afternoon, the executive director of Americans United, the Reverend Barry Lynn, described Mr. Obama’s faith-based foray as misguided. “I am disappointed,” he said. “This initiative has been a failure on all counts, and it ought to be shut down, not expanded.”
However, the church-state separation activist welcomed the presumptive Democratic nominee’s talk about enforcing the anti-discrimination rules. “It is imperative that public funds not pay for proselytizing or subsidize discrimination in hiring,” Rev. Lynn said. “Obama has promised that he will not support publicly funded proselytism or discrimination in hiring, and that’s an important commitment.”
Filed under: unfaithful
New York City – Rabbi Shmuley Botech: Lubavitch Sect Diminishing Its Pride By Egoism
Published on: 06-11-08 at 08:03 AM
Shluchim in front of 770
New York City – What was it that drew me to chabad? There was, of course, the Rebbe. There was also Chabad’s commitment to educating Jews about their heritage, which drew me to the organization’s sense of mission and purpose.
But I would be lying if I did not identify a completely different reason as the principal magnet that made me want to join the movement. Quite simply, Chabad were the nicest people in the world. I said to myself, any movement that could produce people this hospitable and selfless must be in possession of a great truth. The model worked perfectly so long as the Rebbe was alive. Chabad had before its eyes an unequalled example of selfless devotion to a higher cause. There was not an ounce of materialism in the Rebbe’s life, and his devotion to people in need transcended the saintly and bordered on the angelic.
The night the Rebbe died I penned an essay called “The Colossus and Me,” where I related how the first thing I ever noticed about him were the holes on the bottoms of his shoes. The most powerful Jewish leader of the 20th century had next to no assets.
BUT WITH Chabad about to commemorate the 14th anniversary of the Rebbe’s passing, the time has come to reinforce this most central of Chabad values.
Chabad is by now the most effective Jewish educational organization in history, and no movement works harder for the Jewish people or caters to more unaffiliated Jews.
But success has brought the usual challenges. Chabad emissaries are becoming more ego-driven and territorial, too often bickering with one another. A seemingly incessant spate of court battles should serve as a wake-up call.
In Crown Heights, the official Chabad leadership seems engaged in permanent litigation with – mostly – Chabad messianic forces, for the soul of Lubavitch. Nearly all of it takes place in mainstream rather than Jewish courts, making them highly public affairs.
Now no one expected any of us in Chabad to be as selfless as the Rebbe. But there was an expectation that one be inspired by his example. Without the Rebbe as a living presence, some in Chabad are forgetting that ego is only redemptive when it is consecrated to a goal higher than oneself. Anything else runs contrary to the fundamental Chabad teaching of bitul hayesh, nullifying the self to become a tool of God’s plan.
The sharp elbows and growing nepotism Chabad is exhibiting means that some are forgetting they are merely messengers and not the message itself.
CHABAD IS facing unique challenges. A growing number of Chabad youth are leaving the fold. The Chabad dating scene is beginning to exhibit some of the shallow mores of the secular culture, with money and looks playing a not-insignificant role. And gratuitous bickering among some in its leadership are undermining the morale of the young future emissaries they are meant to inspire.
Chabad is the last great hope for the Jewish people, and we are all in its debt. But an organization whose very name means “city of love,” risks diminishing its light unless it remembers that it succeeded not only because of its rich mystical philosophy or the considerable charisma of its representatives, but because of the seeming ego-lessness of its adherents and the infinite love they bestow on all who knock on their door.
News Source: Jpost- By Rabbi Shmuley Botech-link-
Vos Iz Neias – (Yiddish:What’s News?) – http://www.vosizneias.com/
The problems with the Lubavitch 