LGBT Leaders Weigh Obama's Faith-Based Initiative

President Barack Obama signed an executive order last Thursday that created a White House Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships -- a 2.0 version of the Bush administration’s faith-based initiative that will seek to strike more of a balance between secular and religious organizations in bringing aid to the nation’s neediest.

“There is a force for good greater than government,” President Obama said at the signing, “that reveals itself not simply in places of worship, but in senior centers and shelters, schools and hospitals, and any place an American decides.”? 

The program, which President Obama initially outlined in a campaign speech last summer, immediately agitated LGBT activists who fear any such initiative could be problematic on several levels: Religious organizations that receive federal funding could discriminate against LGBT people in their hiring practices and they could also decline to provide services to the LGBT population; certain organizations may not qualify for funding depending on the criteria established; and individuals who receive services might be proselytized to. 

During the Bush administration, grantees were in fact permitted to select employees based on their religious principles, and organizations that did not adhere to abstinence-only teaching standards were deemed ineligible for funding. The LGBT-friendly Metropolitan Community Church, with about 225 churches nationwide, for instance, concluded that they could not receive funds based on their programming. 

Reverend Dr. Cindi Love, executive director of MCC, called on President Obama to undo President Bush's executive order 13,279, which expressly allowed faith-based and community organizations to choose employees based on their faith and creed.

"President Obama should issue executive orders that clarify that faith-based and community organizations [receiving federal funds] are governed by all applicable federal, state, and local antidiscrimination laws," she said, "and then strengthen provisions protecting beneficiaries from discrimination or proselytizing by service providers."

This action would not, as many fundamentalists claim, force religious organizations to hire LGBT people. But any programs administered with the help of federal dollars would have to adhere to nondiscriminatory hiring practices.

"We’re not trying to tell churches they can’t hire a pastor who believes in what the denomination believes," said Harry Knox, director of the Human Rights Campaign's Religion and Faith Program, "we’re simply saying that if they hire a social worker or a cook in the kitchen or a youth outreach worker, that person's beliefs and whether they’re pro-LGBT or LGBT themselves should not stand in the way of their being hired." But even with such an executive order, LGBT people are left vulnerable in many areas of the country because no federal employment laws currently protect people based on their sexual orientation or gender identity.

President Obama did not address these thorny issues directly last week, instead painting rhetorical broad-brush strokes over deep divisions.

 “Instead of driving us apart, our varied beliefs can bring us together to feed the hungry and comfort the afflicted; to make peace where there is strife and rebuild what has broken; to lift up those who have fallen on hard times,” Obama told attendees at the National Prayer Breakfast, where he mentioned the new initiative.

President Obama added that the goal of this office would “not be to favor one religious group over another -- or even religious groups over secular groups,” but rather to enable organizations that are working in the trenches to better America’s communities.

In the way of particulars, he said the funding eligibility of groups would be reviewed by the Department of Justice on a case-by-case basis and that a 25-member advisory council would be appointed to make policy recommendations. Reverend Joshua DuBois, a 26-year old Pentecostal minister who conducted faith outreach for the Obama campaign, will head the office.

Given the lack of specifics, most reporters referred back to details presented during the campaign when a similar outcry erupted. Materials sent to The Advocate stated that although no federal employment protections exist for LGBT people, “federal funding recipients -- including faith-based organizations -- should have to comply with existing federal, state and local laws, including laws prohibiting discrimination based on religion, sexual orientation, or gender identity.”

LGBT activists were heartened to find that one openly gay man, Fred Davie of the New York-based Public/Private Ventures, was one of the 15 people Obama immediately named to the advisory council. 

But in what has been a recurring theme for gay advocates thus far, that enthusiasm was tempered by the fact that other council members included people who have promoted antigay policies.