There he goes again.
Shortly after the second former high official in the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives charged the administration with basic indifference to the much-ballyhooed idea of empowering people of faith to deal with entrenched social problems, George W. Bush went out again today and made a speech on the subject. And again, he acted as though there wasn’t a whole lot he could do about inaction in the Congress, which his party controls top-to-bottom.
The bigger issue, of course, is that Bush did not bother to include the simplest and least controversial part of his original faith-based initiative–a charitable contribution deduction for non-itemizers–in his latest budget. As in past years, this tax cut got bumped from the menu of revenue goodies in favor of tax cuts aimed at high earners–you know, those folks of whom Jesus Christ said: “It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God.” (Matthew 19:24).
Now I don’t know how the 250 “religious leaders” who heard Bush’s pithy remarks today felt about them. But given the administration’s consistent unwillingness to support a relatively small tax break that could help religious charities–even as it piles up debt into the many trillions, including an end to the federal inheritence tax, which will hurt religious charities–I hope someone in the audience remembered what Jesus said just before the passage cited above. “For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.” (Matthew 19:21).
Thus endeth the evening lesson.
