The Society for Humanistic Judaism strongly opposes federal funding of sectarian social service programs through the mechanism of charitable choice. The dangers created by these financial arrangements between church and state are many, and involve violations of the First Amendment guarantees of separation between government and religion.

• First, these programs are predicated on the presumption that theism is equal to goodness and that religious faith is a cure for the social maladies dealt with by religious service agencies.

• Second, equally threatening to the constitutional guarantee is the inevitability that under such programs federal funds will be used for worship or proselytization.

• Third, the government will be required to choose among competing and sometimes antagonistic religious organizations applying for funding.

• Fourth, recipients of government funding are necessarily subject to government regulation. This would entail entanglement of state and church prohibited by the First Amendment.

• Fifth, federally funded institutions are subject to federal laws not generally applicable to religious institutions. Federal funds should not be sent to institutions that are inherently discriminatory.

• And finally, it is historical fact that the Jeffersonian conception of separation of church and state, which became a reality in the United States only following Word War II through Supreme Court interpretations of the First Amendment, has served as a fundamental force in the elimination of anti-Semitism and in the creation of a more tolerant society generally. It is imperative that we not return to the unhappy age of combative religions.

For these reasons, the Society for Humanistic Judaism opposes government participation in faith-based action.