Reviews: Doing Justice to Faith

January-February 1997

By Stanley W. Carlson-Thies

A new book by Center Board Member Stephen Monsma reports these surprising facts: many faith-based non-profit organizations in America receive significant amounts of government funds; most organizations that take public funds are not being pressured by government officials to secularize themselves; and many of the organizations that use public funds without government harassment are markedly religious. Monsma surveyed a large number of colleges and universities, international aid and relief agencies, and nonprofits that serve children and families. He developed an innovative scale, already receiving international attention, to measure how far organizations are actually shaped by their religious vision.

Unfortunately, as Monsma goes on to show in his path-breaking study, When Sacred & Secular Mix: Religious Nonprofit Organizations and Public Money, service in the public square by faith-based organizations is undermined rather than supported by the dominant interpretation of the First Amendment, which insists on "no aid to religion." Thus, positive. relations may at any time go bad; what's permitted to one organization may be forbidden another; if a friendly official is followed by a hostile one, secularism may be the new rule; too many Christian organizations that accept government contracts are hobbled by unjust regulations; and when it comes to K- 12 schools, there is little official inclination to accommodate faith.

Monsma proposes a better interpretation of the constitutional requirement of government neutrality and suggests how a truly evenhanded approach can be implemented. Congress, by adopting the Charitable Choice provision as part of the new federal welfare bill, has directed states to cooperate with community and faith-based organizations in serving the needy. Monsma's book shows both how extensive such cooperation already is and how important it is that a firmer constitutional and legal foundation be laid if cooperation is to flourish.

When Sacred & Secular Mix was published in hardback in 1996 by Rowman & Littlefield for $27.95. To order, call the publisher at 1-800-4626420.