There was celebration by some, for example, when Obama signed into law an expansion of the State Children’s Health Insurance Program, known as SCHIP, which will provide health insurance to about four million more low-income children. Former President George W. Bush had opposed similar legislation, saying it would lead to “government-run health care for every American.”
But some faith-based groups have placed health insurance for children on their lobbying agendas, along with public-policy issues they see as having moral implications, such as immigration reform, stopping the involvement of the U.S. government in torture, and reducing the number of abortions.
“We want our legislators to realize this is not a partisan type of religious effort,” said Heyward Wiggins, a pastor from Camden, N.J. who has been involved with a faith-based effort to get the SCHIP legislation passed. “We are people of faith, and we are trying to make sure the moral voice is heard.”
In a community such as his, where many families have incomes below the poverty-line, “these are the people we live with every day. We hear the pain that comes from our people. We bring that voice to Washington,” Wiggins said.
Wiggins spoke during a teleconference organized by the PICO National Network (People Improving Communities through Organizing), a network of faith-based community organizations that describes itself as “non-partisan and multi-cultural,” and as having support from more than 1,000 congregations.
PICO trains local leaders to become advocates on issues affecting their communities ranging from affordable housing to improving public schools. But it’s just one of many faith-based groups paying careful attention to the new administration, and Obama himself is trying to motivate people of faith to work together across their lines of division.
“There is no doubt that the very nature of faith means that some of our beliefs will never be the same,” Obama told the National Prayer Breakfast. “We read from different texts. We follow different edicts. … But no matter what we choose to believe, let us remember that there is no religion whose central tenet is hate. There is no God who condones taking the life of an innocent human being.”
Obama has reorganized the White House Office of Faith-based and Neighborhood Partnerships, saying that “the goal of this office will not be to favor one religious group over another, or even religious groups over secular groups. It will simply be to work on behalf of those organizations that want to work on behalf of our communities, and to do so without blurring the line that our founders wisely drew between church and state.”
He has created a new, 25-person advisory council including both secular and religious leaders from the Christian, Jewish, and Muslim traditions.
One controversial question still up in the air is whether religious groups will be allowed to discriminate in hiring. Those issues will be decided on a case-by-case basis, after legal review.
But Obama said in an executive order released Feb. 5 that the faith-based office can be a vehicle for “making community groups an integral part of our economic recovery,” and that “there is a force for good greater than government. It is an expression of faith, this yearning to give back, this hungering for a purpose greater than our own, that reveals itself not just in places of worship but in senior centers and shelters, schools and hospitals. … ”
At the national level, faith-based groups are building broader coalitions and strategizing to work for change — seeing perhaps some opportunities for movement with a new administration.
The Interfaith Immigration Coalition, for example, is holding national conference calls each month to work for immigration reform “that reflects our mandate to welcome the stranger and treat all human beings with dignity and respect.” The focus of this year’s Ecumenical Advocacy Days, a gathering from March 13-16 in Washington D.C., will be “Enough for All Creation,” with a focus on the connections between climate change, migration, and poverty.
At the grassroots, Presbyterians already are neck-deep in such faith-based work – whether or not they see eye-to-eye with Obama on particular issues. And increasingly, those local commitments are being considered in the context of what missional theology can show about where and how to get involved.
For example, the Presbyterian Global Fellowship is convening regional gatherings to “cast vision” about what it means to be a missional church.
Presbyterians for Renewal estimates about 2,500 people came to a series of events it sponsored in the last half of 2008, brainstorming about “what we need to be doing to be gospel witnesses,” said PFR’s executive director, Paul Detterman. More regional gatherings are being scheduled for this spring.
Some presbyteries, dealing with economic uncertainty and enduring disagreement within the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) on homosexuality and other contentious issues, are refining and redefining what consider their purpose to be.
Los Ranchos Presbytery, for example, states on its Web site that “as Christ’s followers in the local congregations, we are to go out (be sent) into our neighborhoods, our communities, and our places of work, business, and recreation. We are to do as Jesus did and tell the good news of God’s reconciling love and be a visible demonstration of this reality.”
The Mission Consultation — the divitation document promising to collaborate in supporting mission work – is brainstorming about ways to move ahead. That includes finding ways to raise more funding for overseas mission personnel and also considering topics around which “mission initiators” might work intentionally together, like providing clean water, addressing hunger, and supporting children at risk.
Some people of faith find public advocacy uncomfortable. For them, religion is more a private matter. But for others, the quest for justice and for a better world is integrally connected to their religious beliefs.
Susan Molina, a single mother from Denver, spoke during the teleconference about the riskiness of getting involved.
Two years ago, when she got a better job and started earning a little more money, her children no longer were eligible for medical coverage through the SCHIP program. So she got involved in faith-based efforts to expand the coverage to include more children.
“I can’t tell you how hard it has been for me as a parent for my kids not to have health care,” Molina said. “It’s been an anguish and the worst feeling, not to be able to take your kids to the doctor when they’re sick.”
When she first testified before a legislative committee, “it was scary, and it was hard to put myself out there,” Molina said. “It is hard to stand up and tell your story and let the whole world know what you’re feeling. There is some shame in there. For me, it was working so hard to better myself, but still not to be able to provide the health care my children needed. … We’re not talking about left and right there, it’s not about Democrats and Republicans. It’s about kids and what is morally right for our children.”
