Dear Editor, Post-Dispatch, St. Louis, MO

Churches to become federally controlled? Will your church get government aid so it can be more "charitable"? Follow the money. Whoever OKs the check to the church becomes the boss. Federal aid is always followed by federal dependency and control. Beware of President Bush's plan to send tax money to churches, whatever the contrived excuse.

The Supreme Court has declared the federal government has not only the authority but the requirement to control and supervise how tax money is used. That means the federal government would be required to control church activities. If a church becomes a distributing agent for tax-paid "charity" does that mean the church pastor has become an agent for the government? A federal agent? Could federal money to churches become a political weapon to reward compliant and subservient pastors and punish those not politically correct?

Can you show me any federal spending program over the past hundred years that has not been corrupted by tax money, bureaucrats or false promises? How many government spending programs really solve problems? How many actually create worse problems?

A good example of this is our public school system which has already been effectively federalized with megabillions in tax money each year. Mr. Bush wants to increase it. And now, Junior Bush wants to "help" the churches and other "qualified" organizations. When the government agent knocks at your church door and says, "I am only here to help you", what will you do?

If churches accept federal money to be followed by regulations, guidelines, warnings, sanctions, disapprovals, restrictions, conditions, controls, obligations, specifications, directives, requirements, quotas, obedience, federal police power, intimidation, rules, prohibitions, mandates, and possible penalties with fines, does that mean pastors will be free from the fear and dependency of a government-controlled church?

I can hear it now, "That might happen in your church, but not in mine". The solution: completely separate government from the church. Congress needs to hear from you now to stop Mr. Bush's entire socialist scheme. Stay tuned at www.thenewamerican.com.

E-Mail Don Crowell

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