What Difference Does Charitable Choice Make?

by Stanley W. Carlson-Thies

"We'd like to award you federal funds so you can hire someone to train other churches to work as effectively as yours does in keeping teens out of gangs and juvenile detention," the mayor of the California city told the pastor. "All you have to do is sign this form promising to ignore religion when hiring the new staffer, take down your religious posters and symbols, and run the program without any religious language or influence. Can I send you the money?"

The pastor, of course, said "No." Why expand a program if its soul first has to be ripped out?

But what should the pastor say if the government promises to respect, rather than threaten, the faith character of his program? There may still be reasons to reject the money, because collaborating with government requires great skill and particular capabilities and isn't for everyone. But there is good news. Congress is dramatically changing the rules so that officials can't demand secularism as the price for taking federal money.

Two Cheers for Charitable Choice

That dramatic change is called Charitable Choice. It is a new set of requirements that state and local governments must follow when they pay some kinds of federal funds to private groups to obtain services for poor and needy families. These new requirements are the opposite of the ones the California pastor confronted. According to Charitable Choice, a group receiving federal funds can display religious signs, does not have to suppress all talk of faith, and can choose employees based on their commitment to religious beliefs and action.

Charitable Choice isn't a free for all. There are limits, of course. Providers may not force people needing help to listen to an evangelistic message or to pray and worship. Government funds can't be used to pay for holy scriptures or a chaplain. All clients have to be helped, even if they reject religion. Groups have to keep scrupulous account of government funds and comply with reporting requirements. (The government itself has to provide a secular alternative if a person doesn't want to be helped by a faith-based program.)

Does your program fit within these requirements? If religious elements are woven through in such a way that a person cannot get help without taking part in religious study, or if you require folks to pray or listen to holy scripture before learning how to search for jobs, then your program won't fit, despite the changes. But maybe it can be reconfigured without loss so that the inherently religious activities are separate and voluntary. Under Charitable Choice, faith doesn't need to be chased out of an organization, but religious observance can't be forced. Religious groups must think carefully about these and other rules before competing for funds covered by Charitable Choice.

So this is not a federal program to buy religion for the poor, and the new requirements are not as flexible as some groups would like. But Charitable Choice goes a very long way to make government's rules for buying services hospitable instead of hostile to faith-based groups.

Charitable Choice applies only to a few federal pro-grams: Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) that replaced AFDC; the Welfare-to-Work program for hard-to-employ welfare recipients; Community Services Block Grants that fund Community Action Agencies to serve low-income neighborhoods; and some drug treatment money (SAMHSA funds). That means that much--even most--federal money that is used to buy services follows other rules, rules that are very restrictive about religion.

One Cheer for HUD

The federal Department of Housing and Urban De-velopment (HUD) has worked hard to build positive relations with houses of worship and faith-based non-profits. HUD realizes that it must work better with religious groups that do so much to provide housing and other assistance for the needy.

So HUD simplified the process of applying for its grants. And it built a bridge to the faith communities with a special Center for Community and Interfaith Partnership to provide information and technical assistance, helping faith groups navigate a complex bureaucracy.

So one cheer for HUD. But only one. Because, although it laid out the welcome mat for faith-based groups, its rules for collaborating remain the old restric-tive ones, and not the new Charitable Choice requirements. In fact, the mayor in the story was simply telling the pastor about HUD's secularizing conditions for much of its federal money.

It isn't all HUD's fault that it welcomes religious groups with one hand and enforces secularizing requirements with the other. The main problem is that Congress hasn't written liberating new laws for housing and community development spending. Congress passed Charitable Choice rules for other federal funds, but not for money HUD controls.

No Cheers for Most States

There is another problem. Charitable Choice is a federal provision that is effective in practice only when state and local governments modify their own contracting rules to bring them into line with the new federal requirements. Until they do that, officials will be as restrictive now as always when they consider who can get funds and under what conditions.

The sad reality in most states today is that, although they have warmed up to faith-based programs, the rules on their books still are secularizing. Most states still tell providers that they cannot take religion into account in hiring staff, despite Charitable Choice. And some states still won't let so-called "pervasively sectarian" groups even apply for government funds.

The Center for Public Justice in September 2000 released a Report Card on Charitable Choice compliance that gave Fs to 38 states. Only four got A's: Indiana, Ohio, Texas, and Wisconsin.

What Can You Do?

If you are located in a place that is ignoring Charitable Choice, don't be discouraged and don't give up. Some officials are just ignorant, so educate them. You may need to be persistent, asking around until you find an official who knows what the law now requires and who is eager to collaborate with faith communities. Talk to your state or federal elected representatives about Charitable Choice and ask why you are running into resistance. And you may need to talk with a lawyer who can remind officials what they are supposed to do.

Of course, if the funding you seek isn't covered by Charitable Choice, then you'll just have to work patiently and persistently to see how flexible officials can be as you demonstrate the effectiveness of your programs. And don't neglect to tell your members of Congress that you'd like to see Charitable Choice extended across the board.

In the meantime, even without any funds changing hands, you may want to collaborate with government so that you can offer your services to folks in the government programs. Or you might be able to work out a respectful subcontracting arrangement with a religious group like Salvation Army, Lutheran Social Services, Jewish Federations, or Catholic Charities. They work well with government and sometimes want to connect more closely with congregations and grassroots groups.

New Administration Promises Changes

Shortly after taking office, President George W. Bush, as he promised on the campaign trail, announced he was creating a White House Office of Faith-based and Community Initiatives to press the federal government to become as friendly as possible to religious and grassroots groups. He'll ask Congress to expand Charitable Choice to all federal social spending and have federal departments work with their state and local government partners to put Charitable Choice into practice.

Shine Like Stars

Never let government money (or funds from a big donor, a corporation, or a foundation) divert you from faithful service to the needy. If the conditions aren't right, trust God to supply funds some other way. And wherever the funds come from, be sure to provide the most effective service possible. Show full respect for those you help as people made in the image of God, with inherent dignity no matter what their beliefs are. And handle funds with care; you are accountable to God, for sure, but also to everyone who helps to pay for your program. Believers should do everything with such integrity that even those who despise religion will acknowledge that you "shine like stars in the universe" as you provide assistance (Phillipians 2:14-16).

Charitable Choice isn't perfect. But ask yourself: if your faith-based program takes government funds and you are hauled before an official who demands that you ban all religious influences and ignore the beliefs of new staff, wouldn't you rather have Charitable Choice to back you up and make him back off, instead of being subject to a law that says he is right and you must give way?

Although most states aren't complying fully with Charitable Choice, many now welcome collaboration with faith-based programs. As Amy Sherman shows, officials know that Congress gave a green light to collaboration, so they tend to be more flexible. But contracting requirements may be too restrictive. Consult a lawyer! Amy's report is The Growing Impact of Charitable Choice: A Catalogue of New Collaborations Between Government and Faith-Based Organizations in Nine States (Center for Public Justice, March 2000).