"The same Constitution that refuses to privilege any religion, including Christianity, protects the rights of Christians to proclaim the gospel to all who will listen. As a result, paradoxically enough, we are a nation of Christians because we are not a Christian nation."Because I haven't ranted about church-state separation in awhile....
The always dead-on Brent Walker had some great things to say speaking in Texas last week. The above quote comes from the stories (one and two) on his lectures from The Baptist Standard.
And there's a very interesting interview with Stanley Carlson-Thies, who was the first director of the Office of Faith-Based Initiatives. I got to meet Dr. Carlson-Thies in December 2002 at a conference in Atlanta and spent a good bit of New Year's Eve arguing, I mean, discussing the issues with him. What it came down to for me was that he freely admitted that there was no way to respond to my criticism that I don't want my tax dollars supporting Mormon drug treatment programs, no matter how effective they are. This is the basic problem with using government money to fund faith-based entities - if they're going to be allowed to use that money to preach their faith, you have to be fair to everyone. Dr. Carlson-Thies is a very intelligent guy, and he's well aware of the problems surrounding what he honestly believes to be a good idea.
Meanwhile, oh, to have been a fly on the wall for this one!
