WASHINGTON (ABP) – A unanimous U.S. Supreme Court ruled Jan. 11 that churches can fire their ministers for reasons that for other employers would be job discrimination.

The decision marks the first time the high court has recognized a “ministerial exception” in laws banning employment discrimination. Justices said the Constitution’s religion clauses bar the government from interfering in the employment relationship between a religious institution and its ministers.

“Requiring a church to accept or retain an unwanted minister, or punishing a church for failing to do so, intrudes upon more than a mere employment decision,” Chief Justice John Roberts wrote in the opinion. “Such action interferes with the internal governance of the church, depriving the church of control over the selection of those who will personify its beliefs.”

The court said requiring a Lutheran school to reinstate a school teacher fired in a dispute related to medical issues would violate both the First Amendment’s Free Exercise Clause, which protects a religious group’s right to select its own leaders, and the Establishment Clause, which prohibits government involvement in church-governance decisions.

The 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati had ruled against Hosanna-Tabor Evangelical Lutheran Church and School in Redford, Mich. While recognizing a ministerial exception, the appeals court found it did not apply to former teacher, Cheryl Perich, because her primary role was to teach about secular subjects and not religion.

The Supreme Court reversed that decision. While declining to adopt “a rigid formula for deciding when an employee qualifies as a minister,” justices said the facts of Perich’s case were enough to prevent her from suing her employer under the ministerial exception.

The Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty, which filed a brief in the case describing the ministerial exception as a “clear and crucial implication of religious liberty,” welcomed the ruling.

“It is a helpful decision explaining the important and unique way that the Constitution protects religious organizations in matters of internal governance,” said BJC General Counsel Hollyn Hollman.

Americans United for Separation of Church and State, meanwhile, voiced disappointment over a decision they said takes the ministerial exception too far.

“Blatant discrimination is a social evil we have worked hard to eradicate in the United States,” said Barry Lynn, executive director of Americans United. “I’m afraid the court’s ruling today will make it harder to combat.”

Americans United also filed a friend-of-the-court brief noting that religious organizations have the right to limit employment to people who share their theology, but it should not extend to reasons unrelated to religion. Under the Supreme Court ruling, for example, AU argued that a pastor who objected to sexual harassment could be fired without any legal recourse for raising the issue.

–Bob Allen is managing editor of Associated Baptist Press.

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WASHINGTON (ABP) – The National Association of Evangelicals released a document Dec. 14 about changes to the environment and how they affect the poor.

The 56-page discussion paper, “Loving the Least of These: Addressing a Changing Environment,” explores why evangelicals should consider environmental change, what science says about climate change and how changes in the environment worsen the effects of poverty. Finally, lead author Dorothy Boorse of Gordon College discusses “what our role as evangelicals should be and what, if anything, we can do to turn the tide for the sake of the poor.”

“While others debate the science and politics of climate change, my thoughts go to the poor people who are neither scientists nor politicians,” NAE President Leith Anderson said in the preface. “They will never study carbon dioxide in the air or acidification of the ocean. But they will suffer from dry wells in the Sahel of Africa and floods along the coasts of Bangladesh. Their crops will fail while our supermarkets are full. They will suffer while we study.”

The resource intended to “serve as a discussion starter among evangelicals who share common concern for the poor and a desire to consider the global topic of climate change” comes on the heels of the U.N. climate talks in Durban, South Africa. The compromise Durban “roadmap” calls for negotiation of a new global agreement by 2015. Changes will not take effect until 2020, a deadline critics pointing to current climate data say is much too late. 

The development agency Christian Aid called the deal a “betrayal of people across the world.”

“By giving themselves until 2015 to agree on a new deal which only takes effect in 2020, governments are delaying desperately needed action and condemning us all to dangerous warming of much more than 2 degrees,” said Christian Aid climate expert Mohamed Adow.

Quoted in the Christian News Today, Adow warned that deadly floods and droughts witnessed in parts of Africa and Asia will only get worse, and people living in impoverished communities will be affected most.

The NAE document says that whatever their views on the causes of climate change, most Americans can make lifestyle changes that will reduce their energy requirements. They include using energy more efficiently, switching to renewable energy sources and supporting energy policy reforms.

“Evangelicals have a long history of caring for the poor,” the document’s closing paragraphs concluded. “It was deep concern for the poor that prompted the NAE to study the potential impact of climate changes on the poor.

“This is not an issue one person can solve, but together, by God’s grace, we can make a difference. It would be easy to feel overwhelmed. We could throw up our hands in despair. Our faith, however, encourages us to persist: “Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up” (Galatians 6:9).

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (ABP) – A Tennessee school district has settled a lawsuit over the proper role of religion in public schools. The Sumner County Board of Education voted Dec 6 to accept an agreement with the American Civil Liberties Union of Tennessee ending a lawsuit filed against school officials May 2.

The ACLU alleged a pattern of unconstitutional religious activity dating back at least five years in the county’s schools. Alleged Establishment Clause violations included distributing Bibles in elementary schools, invocations at school board meetings, prayer over loudspeakers led by members of a student Bible club, teacher endorsement of religion and holding graduations and other school events in churches.

Filed on behalf of nine students attending five schools, the lawsuit also objected to busing of students to a Southern Baptist church for activities like a celebration of the completion of comprehensive testing without permission from their parents and allowing a youth minister from the church, Long Hollow Baptist Church, to join students at a middle school for lunch at least once a week.

A “consent decree” filed in United States District Court for the Middle District of Tennessee agrees that in the future school events would only be held in religious venues if no comparable secular alternative to accommodate them is readily available. School officials are no longer allowed to promote their personal religious views in the classroom, and lunch-room visitors will be limited to family members.

“We are pleased that the Sumner County School Board ultimately recognized its obligation to ensure the religious freedom of its students by preventing school officials from promoting their personal religious beliefs,” said George Barrett, cooperating attorney for ACLU of Tennessee.

The school board said the settlement “fully preserves the constitutional rights of students and teachers and looks forward to the school district’s continued success in its mission of educating students by preparing graduates, engaging minds and developing character.”

David French, senior counsel for the American Center for Law and Justice who represented the school board, said terms of the agreement allow students “the full range of constitutional rights” in areas like forming religious clubs, organizing See You at the Pole prayer events and praying in the end zone after football games.

Regarding teacher rights, French said, the settlement “clarifies the distinction between official and personal conduct” in using taxpayer-funded positions for educational aims.

The settlement marks the third time in three years the Tennessee ACLU has managed to change school policies on religious activities. In 2010, Cheatham County schools agreed to a court order requiring that religious practices at the school halt and in 2008 a federal judge ordered the Wilson County schools to end their endorsement of religion.

–Bob Allen is managing editor of Associated Baptist Press.

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School district sued over religious activity

WASHINGTON (RNS)—An advocacy organization for persecuted Christians has asked the 2012 presidential candidates to sign a pledge stating they would make religious freedom a priority in the United States and overseas if they win the White House.

Open Doors USA joined with religious freedom activist Tom Farr of Georgetown University to draft the pledge. Former U.S. Sen. Rick Santorum, R-Pa., was the initial sole signatory among the candidates.

"The right of religious freedom must be applied equally to all religious communities in America, including Christians, Muslims, Jews, Hindus, Buddhists and others," the pledge states.

"At the same time, religious freedom does not mandate belief but protects the right not to believe."

The pledge, endorsed by prominent conservative organizations and individuals, defends the right to use religious arguments when debating laws about abortion and traditional marriage. It also supports "religiously motivated" charitable work.

"Tens of millions of human beings are subject to violent persecution because of their beliefs or those of their tormentors," Farr said in a statement. "Whoever wins the presidency in 2012 should make religious freedom, at home and abroad, a high priority."

The pledge calls for the candidate, should he or she become president, to nominate federal judges who support religious liberty. It also asks candidates to make religious freedom promotion a foreign policy priority and urges the appointment of a religious freedom ambassador "who is a person of stature, experienced in matters of religious freedom and diplomacy."

Suzan Johnson Cook, a former New York minister, became ambassador last spring. When she was nominated, Farr said, he was troubled the post would not be filled with "an expert in international religious freedom with experience in foreign affairs."

WASHINGTON (RNS)—A star-studded array of political and religious leaders — from President Obama to rock legend Bono to AIDS activist Kay Warren — came together Dec. 1 for World AIDS Day to call for an entirely AIDS-free generation by 2015.

The speakers at the event, called "The Beginning of the End of AIDS," said that the science and medicine needed to eliminate AIDS already exists; all that is needed is for governments and individuals to fully commit themselves to that goal.   

"Make no mistake, we are going to win this fight," Obama said to the crowd at The George Washington University.

The event was sponsored by ONE and (RED), two anti-AIDS organizations co- founded by U2 frontman Bono. The activist rock star said he started the organizations after seeing how people in Africa, simply because of where they lived, could not get the AIDS treatment they needed.   

"To me, I felt it was a justice issue, and it challenged the very idea of equality and civilization," Bono said.   

Warren, wife of California megachurch pastor Rick Warren, called on religious congregations to do more in the fight against AIDS.   

"Every church can care and support. Every church can help with HIV testing. … Every church can unleash volunteers to serve," she said.  

Warren founded the HIV/AIDS Initiative at Saddleback Church, one of the first programs of its kind at an evangelical church. In the last seven years, she said, it has become a model for other churches to follow.   

"It's not even like this is an add-on, or it's nice, or it's something that people can just do if they have time — this is the mission of the church. That's why we don't turn it over to anybody else," Warren said.

Also present was Dan Haseltine, lead singer of the Christian rock band Jars of Clay, who founded Blood: Water Mission, a campaign to fight the AIDS and clean water crises in Africa. Haseltine acknowledged that churches have not always been at the forefront of AIDS activism, noting a 2002 poll that showed only 3 percent of the evangelical community was willing to donate money to support children orphaned by AIDS. Nevertheless, he thinks evangelicals are warming up to the idea of helping people with AIDS.

"At an event like this, the fact that the faith community has even been invited shows that they're becoming a very formidable part of the process of real change," Haseltine said.

WASHINGTON (RNS)—The abuse allegations at Penn State seem unthinkable—revered assistant coach and prominent community activist Jerry Sandusky preying on eight children. But such abuses of trust play out across the country over and over again.

Experts say respected people who set up charitable or social groups for children, only to be implicated in some form of child sexual abuse, are a frightening reality.

"I call them 'institutions of trust,'" said Portland, Ore., attorney Kelly Clark, who has represented more than 300 sex abuse victims.

Some predators are so tacitly trusted "that when something like this happens, the instinctive reaction is: 'That can't happen here. We can't allow the mission to be compromised,'" he said.

Abuse experts say the common denominators in many such crimes are parents willing to allow noted people to have unrestricted access to their kids. Among recent cases:

• A Utah judge recently sentenced a 70-year-old orphanage co-founder to three consecutive terms of five years to life in prison after he pleaded guilty to three counts of abuse. Lon Kennard originally faced 43 counts dating to 1995, but most charges were drop-ped as part of a plea deal. Kennard's victims were among six children adopted from Ethiopia, where he and his wife helped establish an orphanage.

• A Miami jury returned a $100 million verdict against a retired Roman Catholic priest ac-cused of sexually abusing dozens of boys since the 1980s in the city's Little Haiti neighborhood. More than 20 people say Neil Doherty, 68, trolled for victims wearing his priest's collar.

• In Portland, Ore., last year, a jury awarded a 38-year-old former Boy Scout $1.4 million, finding the national Boy Scouts of America and a local council negligent in a sex abuse case involving an assistant scoutmaster and convicted pedophile.

"A pedophile is going to go where they have access to children," said Richard Serbin, an Altoona, Pa., attorney who has represented 150 clergy sex abuse victims statewide since 1987. He said the Penn State allegations parallel the Catholic Church scandals—a trusted institution playing host to a pedophile. In each case, he said, the institution unwittingly lent predators access and respectability.

Washington, D.C., journalist Patrick Boyle, author of the 1994 book Scout's Honor: Sexual Abuse in America's Most Trusted Institution, said reaction to the Catholic Church's sex abuse complaints and those against the Boy Scouts of America were similar.

"In both cases, there was a lot of willful ignorance among the higher-ups," he said. "They almost tried not to know things."

Penn State head football Coach Joe Paterno's response to sex abuse suspicions was "disappointing," Serbin said. Paterno allegedly reported the incident to a supervisor without summoning the police or pursuing the matter further.

"It appears to me that no one wanted to ask the pertinent questions," Serbin said.

Clark also sees similarities to the sex abuse complaints against the Boy Scouts—he estimates that about 50 to 60 involving Scouts are pending in courts nationwide.

"I call it 'borrowed credibility,'" Clark said. "If it was Smilin' Joe's Day Care Center, I might not leave my kid there. But it's the Boy Scouts, so I'm going to let my kid go with this troop and three or four or five adult men, some of whom I don't know. I might not trust them, but I trust the Boy Scouts."

Boy Scouts of America spokesman Deron Smith said that in 101 years, 150 million young men have been Scouts.

Smith said the organization takes abuse seriously. Since 1990, he said, the Boy Scouts have included a pamphlet titled "How to Protect Your Children" in every handbook, and adult leaders regularly are required to take youth protection training.

"Before they ever get into the program and certainly after they're in the program, we want this to be a point of discussion," Smith said.

Since 2003, the Boy Scouts of America has required criminal background checks of all new volunteers; it also requires at least two adults to supervise all activities.

It also requires mandatory reporting—to the police and local Scouting council—of "any reasonable suspicion of inappropriate conduct with youth."

In the Penn State case, Boyle said, "everybody seems to have done the minimum, instead of doing the maximum or more, which is what we'd expect of these institutions."

"If you can give 110 percent on the field, why can't you give 110 percent for the victims?"

WASHINGTON (ABP) – An advocate for the separation of church and state told a House panel Oct. 26 that what some Americans regard as imminent threats to religious liberty are in fact attempts to maintain a favored status for the majority.

“We have a dizzying level of religious freedom in this country, even more so if you are a member of a well-established or majority faith,” Barry Lynn of Americans United for the Separation of Church and State , testified before the Constitution subcommittee of the House Committee on the Judiciary.

Barry Lynn

“There is no war against Christianity being waged by elected officials or by the courts,” said Lynn, an ordained minister in the United Church of Christ. “In truth the real threats to religious freedom come from those who seek special government blessings for those in favored faiths, and conversely, the treatment of members of other faiths as second class citizens.”

Lynn was one of three witnesses for a hearing on the state of religious liberty in the United States by the subcommittee tasked with responsibility for areas including constitutional amendments and constitutional rights. Two witnesses, Bishop William Lori of the United States Conference on Catholic Bishops and Colby May of the American Center for Law and Justice, both gave examples of laws and court decisions they claimed restrict the free exercise of religion.

May, senior counsel and director of the ACLJ’s Washington office, said some of the most controversial examples are going on in public schools and universities “where the effects of recent decisions on the young minds of our nation may adversely impact religious liberties in the future.”

May said university speech codes, intended to permit free exchange of ideas free from intimidation and harassment, have in fact been used to prevent religious students from sharing beliefs with other students out of fear of being charged with harassment. Other policies, he said, deter students from espousing beliefs on issues of public concern such as the definition of marriage in ways that “significantly burden religious expression in venues that should be open to the expression of the widest variety of ideas.”

Lynn, however, said in his day-to-day work the most serious threats to religious liberty he sees involve adherents of less-popular faiths and non-believers, like Muslims wanting to build a mosque in Murfreesboro, Tenn., who were sued in a case arguing Islam is not a “true religion” and members of the community in Katy, Texas, who protested the construction of a mosque by staging pig races next door to the property.

“Let us not be fooled,” Lynn said in his testimony. “You may hear holy horror stories with at most a scintilla of truth. You may hear claims of ‘rights’ being violated that do not exist with remedies proposed that are merely an excuse for obtaining special treatment. You will hear biblical tenets used to justify legislation where the real basis for decision-making must be not any holy scripture as interpreted by one group, but by the constitutional values shared by all of us.”

—Bob Allen is managing editor of Associated Baptist Press.

WASHINGTON (RNS)—As a prominent evangelical pastor and supporter of Texas Gov. Rick Perry is taking heat for calling Mormonism a "cult," a newly released poll says most Protestant pastors in U.S. agree Mormons are not Christians.

Three out of four pastors surveyed by Southern Baptist-affiliated LifeWay Research said they disagreed with the statement that Mormons are Christians. The poll was conducted in October 2010 but was not released until Oct. 9.

The poll of 1,000 Protestant clergy reflects a continuing a challenge for former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, a Mormon, in connecting with evangelicals, who are a key GOP constituency.

Responses to the poll differed somewhat by denomination, with two-thirds (67 percent) of evangelicals strongly disagreeing that Mormons are Christians, compared to only 48 percent of mainline Protestants.

Robert Jeffress, senior pastor of First Baptist Church of Dallas, on Oct. 8 called Mormonism a "theological cult," and told Fox News that evangelicals "ought to give preference to a Christian instead of someone who doesn't embrace historical Christianity."

Mark DeMoss, a leading evangelical publicist who's supporting Romney, said voters should look primarily at a candidate's values and qualifications, not his or her faith.

"There's a theological distinction that's fairly obvious (between Mormonism and mainstream Christianity) … but I think it's largely irrelevant in a political context," he said.

DeMoss noted Jeffress said he would still support Romney over Obama if Romney clinches the GOP nomination.

"Even he can ultimately separate a theological difference from a political decision," DeMoss said. "If he can do that, as critical as he has been, I suspect the average voter in the pew will have no problem doing that."

Todd Mitchell, a 41-year-old Alabama pastor and regional strategist for the American Fellowship of Cowboy Churches, is the organization's new executive director.

Officers and directors of the fellowship elected Mitchell in a special called meeting during the summer, and he presided over the group's annual cowboy gathering in Alvarado last month.

A native of Alabama, Mitchell is a graduate of Auburn University. He and his wife, Nikki, have two sons, John and Cain.

He led in starting the Cowboy Church of Marshall County in Albertville, Ala., in 2006 and has served as a regional strategist for the national fellowship in the southeastern United States. Alabama now has 14 cowboy churches, and the American Fellowship of Cowboy Churches has grown to include 200 congregations in 15 states.

Mitchell credited his journey to the fellowship's leadership to God and the efforts of the officers and directors of the Fellowship. He did not apply for the position but was asked by the search committee to submit his name for consideration and was elected unanimously.

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. (ABP) – Fred Shuttlesworth, the last of the “Big Three” of the civil rights movement with Ralph Abernathy and Martin Luther King Jr., died Oct. 5. He was 89.

Among the general public Shuttlesworth was the least well known of the three co-founders of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference in 1957, but few advanced its agenda of non-violent resistance at greater risk. By his own count Shuttlesworth was bombed twice, beaten into unconsciousness and jailed more than 35 times.

“Fred Shuttlesworth did not become a martyr, and it was not for lack of trying,” biographer Andrew Manis said in the Birmingham News.

Manis, a professor at Macon State University, first met Shuttlesworth when his uncle was owner of the construction company that built The Greater New Light Baptist Church’s new sanctuary in 1978. At the time a master of divinity student at Southern Baptist Baptist Theological Seminary, Manis arranged to have Shuttlesworth speak at the seminary in Louisville, Ky., the first time many of the predominantly white ministerial students had ever heard of him.

Manis, who went on to earn his doctorate at Southern, interviewed Shuttlesworth many times and wrote the acclaimed biography, A Fire You Can’t Put Out: The Civil Rights Life of Birmingham’s Reverend Fred Shuttlesworth.

Born March 18, 1922, in Montgomery County, Ala., Shuttlesworth moved to Birmingham at age 3, where he lived with his mother and stepfather. He studied for the ministry at Selma University and by 1949 was preaching at Selma's First Baptist Church for $10 a week.

In 1953 he took over as pastor of Bethel Baptist Church in Birmingham. He became an activist in the city, calling for the hiring of African-American police officers and joining voter registration efforts of the NAACP.

He became known as chief nemesis of Bull Connor, Birmingham's racist police chief whose use of police dogs and fire hoses on protesters in the early 1960s helped build public support for the civil rights movement and inspired other similar campaigns.

Shuttlesworth compared himself to Daniel in the Lion’s Den and said the only reason he could think of that he survived the civil rights struggle while others like King and Medger Evers were assassinated was God’s protection.

President Obama, who once pushed Shuttlesworth’s wheelchair across the Edmund Pettus Bridge near Selma, Ala., to commemorate a march for voter rights in 1965, voiced sadness at news of his death.

“As one of the founders of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, Reverend Shuttlesworth dedicated his life to advancing the cause of justice for all Americans,” Obama said. “He was a testament to the strength of the human spirit. And today we stand on his shoulders, and the shoulders of all those who marched and sat and lifted their voices to help perfect our union."

WASHINGTON (ABP) – The U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments Oct. 5 in a closely watched case involving a church’s right to hire or fire ministers for reasons like religious doctrine that in other settings would be job discrimination.

“The churches do not set the criteria for selecting or removing the officers of government, and government does not set the criteria for selecting and removing officers of the church,” attorney Douglas Laycock argued on behalf of petitioners in Hosanna-Tabor Evangelical Lutheran Church and School v. EEOC, et al.

The case involves a former fourth-grade teacher and commissioned minister who tried to get her job back under the American with Disabilities Act. In a lawsuit filed on her behalf by the Equal Employment Occupation Commission, a district court said she could not be reinstated because of a “ministerial exception” to the law.

The 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals disagreed, finding the teacher’s “primary duties” were secular and not religious, so the ministerial exception did not apply.

The Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty , which filed a friend-of-the-court brief, said the case has “clear and crucial implication of religious liberty, church autonomy and the separation of church and state.”

The brief, which was also joined by the Christian Legal Society, the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the USA and the National Association of Evangelicals, said courts should not be second-guessing a church’s decision about who is fit to teach in a religious school. It says that even if a Christian school teacher’s subject is secular, like biology or math, her job is to help pass on a particular set of morals and religious beliefs to a rising generation.

Though widely accepted by lower courts as a necessary safeguard for religious liberty, the ministerial exception doctrine has never been tested by the Supreme Court. Other courts have differed in how to apply it. The BJC advocates the broader application used by the district court instead of the narrow interpretation used by the appellate court.

“In defining the ministerial exception, an approach that is too simplistic will undermine religious liberty,” said BJC General Counsel Hollyn Hollman. “The Court should put a premium on both the religious organization’s designation of ministry personnel as its religious representatives and the employees' responsibility for performing important religious functions.”

Leondra Kruger, the attorney representing the EEOC, claimed the teacher in the case was fired unjustly in retaliation for exercising her legal rights and should be reinstated.

“The freedom of religious communities to come together to express and share religious belief is a fundamental constitutional right,” Kruger said, “but it's a right that must also accommodate important governmental interests in securing the public welfare.”
 

—Bob Allen is managing editor of Associated Baptist Press. Jeff Huett of the Baptist Joint Committee contributed to this story.

WASHINGTON (ABP) – The U.S. Supreme Court has upheld a lower-court ruling that the Christian humanitarian organization World Vision can fire employees over religious doctrine.

The high court declined without comment Oct. 3 to review an August 2010 ruling by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals denying religious discrimination claims by three World Vision workers dismissed in 2006 for denying the divinity of Christ and disavowing the Trinity.

When they were hired Silvia Spencer, Ted Youngberg, and Vicki Huls all submitted required personal statements describing their “relationship with Jesus Christ” and acknowledged “agreement and compliance” with World Vision’s statement of faith.

They lodged their complaint alleging discrimination under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act. The act exempts religious corporations. They tried to argue that because it carries out secular work like economic development and disaster relief, World Vision did not qualify for the exemption. A district court ruled against them, finding that the self-described “Christian humanitarian organization” has a “purpose and character that are primarily religious.

Based in Federal Way, Wash., World Vision employs more than 40,000 staff around the world. It hires only employees who agree with the organization’s statement of faith and the Apostle’s Creed.

The case was watched closely by other corporations with similar hiring practices.

"Today's action by the U.S. Supreme Court represents a major victory for the freedom of all religious organizations to hire employees who share the same faith–whether Muslim, Buddhist, Jewish, Christian, or any other religion," World Vision U.S. president Richard Stearns said in a press release. "I am pleased, relieved and gratified with the court's action. After four years of litigation, we at World Vision U.S. may now put this matter behind us, and continue our policy of hiring Christians."

World Vision has received about $650 million in federal funding over the past decade for its anti-poverty work. Candidate Barack Obama said while campaigning in 2008 that groups that get a federal grant should not be allowed to discriminate but recently said religious organizations have “more leeway” to hire somebody of a particular faith. Fifty-six groups, including the Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty, signed a letter asking the president if he has changed his position on “government-funded religious discrimination.”