UPDATED:
President Obama on Thursday signed an executive order creating a White House Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships with top priorities of easing poverty and bringing together divergent groups to reduce the need for abortion.
“No matter how much money we invest or how sensibly we design our policies, the change that Americans are looking for will not come from government alone,” Mr. Obama said after signing the order in private at the White House.
“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 larger than our own, that reveals itself not simply in places of worship, but in senior centers and shelters, schools and hospitals, and any place an American decides.”
In addition to fighting poverty and crafting ways to support young mothers and decrease teenage pregnancies, the office will help with economic recovery efforts, encouraging responsible fatherhood fostering an international interfaith dialogue.
The president stressed the office would strictly adhere to his belief in the separation of church and state.
The executive order contains provisions to make sure the leader can seek the attorney general’s advice on “difficult legal and constitutional issues.”
The office retains a similar structure to the faith-based program run by former President Bush, and will have a White House office and centers for faith-based and neighborhood partnerships within executive branch agencies. Some examples are the ex-offender re-entry program through the Department of Justice and the international HIV/AIDS efforts through USAID.
The White House said the faith office will be a substantial programming and policy arm of the government and will be the mechanism for federal agencies to connect with social services groups. In addition, the new council would help nonprofit and community groups “cut through red tape” and “make the most of what the federal government has to offer.”
Mr. Obama added a new bipartisan President’s Council made up of 25 leaders both secular and religious that will advise the faith office on policy. The White House said it will included “voices from across the political, religious and community service spectrum.” It also will expand with the formation of task forces targeting specific policy issues such as Hurricane Katrina relief and health care.
The members, including Rev. Jim Wallis of Sojourners, are appointed by the president for one-year terms.
Mr. Wallis, who has worked with former Presidents Bush and Clinton, lauded the new administration for his goals and said the faith office “indicates a shift towards a deeper and more constructive engagement with the faith-community and civil society around substantive policy issues.”
Joshua DuBois, a longtime Obama adviser who ran faith initiatives during the presidential campaign, will lead the office. Joshua understands the issues at stake, knows the people involved, and will be able to bring everyone together from both the secular and faith-based communities, from academia and politics around our common goals, Mr. Obama said.
At the National Prayer Breakfast earlier Thursday, Mr. Obama said faith can unite everyone for the “greater good” to fight poverty, seek peace and rebuild the nation in times of struggle.
The president noted that “faith has always been a guiding force in our family’s life, so we feel very much at home and look forward to keeping this tradition alive during our time here.”
The breakfast began during the Great Depression, and remains “one of the rare occasions that still brings much of the world together in a moment of peace and goodwill,” the president said.
“I raise this history because far too often, we have seen faith wielded as a tool to divide us from one another — as an excuse for prejudice and intolerance,” Mr. Obama said. “Wars have been waged. Innocents have been slaughtered. For centuries, entire religions have been persecuted, all in the name of perceived righteousness.”
He said even though a diverse group of faith leaders and lawmakers read different religious texts and follow different traditions, one law unites them all — “the Golden Rule” — the call to love one another; to understand one another; to treat with dignity and respect those with whom we share a brief moment on this Earth.”
“No matter what we choose to believe, let us remember that there is no religion whose central tenet is hate,” Mr. Obama said. “There is no God who condones taking the life of an innocent human being. This much we know.”
Mr. Obama said the goal of his faith group will be to help people in communities “without blurring the line that our founders wisely drew between church and state.”
He said he would aim to mend old rifts and forge new partnerships.
He detailed his own faith journey, from his Muslim father who became an atheist, a non-religious upbringing to becoming a Christian as a young man in Chicago.
He said he discovered God’s purpose there as a community organizer and that’s why the neighborhood group is part of that ideal to “rededicate ourselves to the mission of love and service that lies at the heart of all humanity.”
“Let us pray together on this February morning, but let us also work together in all the days and months ahead,” he said. “For it is only through common struggle and common effort, as brothers and sisters, that we fulfill our highest purpose as beloved children of God.”
The breakfast drew national leaders and included former British Prime Minister Tony Blair as the keynote speaker.
Mr. Blair said religion is sometimes corroded by extremists who use their faith as a means of excluding the other but added, “The extreme believers and aggressive nonbelievers come together in an unholy alliance.”
Should it ever be tested, I hope your faith can sustain you and your family. The public eye is not always the most congenial, Mr. Blair told Mr. Obama.
According to the White House, the faith council appointees are:
Judith N. Vredenburgh, President and Chief Executive Officer, Big Brothers / Big Sisters of America
Philadelphia, Pa.
Rabbi David N. Saperstein, Director & Counsel, Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism, and noted church/state expert
Washington, D.C.
Dr. Frank S. Page, President emeritus, Southern Baptist Convention
Taylors, S.C.
Father Larry J. Snyder, President, Catholic Charities USA
Alexandria, Va.
Rev. Otis Moss, Jr., Pastor emeritus, Olivet Institutional Baptist Church
Cleveland, Ohio
Eboo S. Patel, Founder & Executive Director, Interfaith Youth Corps
Chicago, Ill.
Fred Davie, President, Public / Private Ventures, a secular non-profit intermediary
New York, N.Y.
Dr. William J. Shaw, President, National Baptist Convention, USA
Philadelphia, Pa.
Melissa Rogers, Director, Wake Forest School of Divinity Center for Religion and Public Affairs and expert on church/state issues
Winston-Salem, N.C.
Pastor Joel C. Hunter, Senior Pastor, Northland, a Church Distributed
Lakeland, Fla.
Dr. Arturo Chavez, Ph.D., President & CEO, Mexican American Cultural Center
San Antonio, Texas
Rev. Jim Wallis, President & Executive Director, Sojourners
Washington, D.C.
Bishop Vashti M. McKenzie, Presiding Bishop, 13th Episcopal District, African Methodist Episcopal Church
Knoxville, Tenn.
Diane Baillargeon, President & CEO, Seedco, a secular national operating intermediary
New York, N.Y.
Richard Stearns, President, World Vision
Bellevue, Wash.
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