The Associated Press reported Sunday 3/12/2006, that Ohio governor candidate Ken Blackwell, who is currently the Ohio Secretary of State, met with Rev. Russell Johnson and Rod Parsley or their churches 27 times from January 2004 through March of this year. Since the records search noted 75 meetings of a religious nature, the actual context of those meetings are being hidden by Blackwell.
Tag: church and state
I was one of two to guest for the hour. The other guest was Eddie Tabash. He is a constitutional lawyer, associated with the Council of Secular Humanism, American Atheists, and Americans United for the Separation of Church and State. He is a well known person in the Humanist movement. So I had to ask myself – why am I even on the show? My first radio show didn’t start out on a perfect note. I nodded off waiting for the producer to call me 10 minutes before the show so I missed the call. I woke up at 5 minutes to show time and the producer’s third call. I’m sure he started to breathe again when I answered the phone.
In response to the passage on February 24th of an outright ban on abortion from the South Dakota legislature, an Internet based church, The Church of Reality, has issued an edict that the ban violates the Religious Freedom Restoration Act and the church’s exercise of its religion. I loved the idea of using a law like the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (1993)( aka RFRA) against laws that are passed mainly to legalize someone’s religious agenda. Something, however smelled fishy.
I will be a guest on a radio show called “Interconnect” on Monday 3/6/06 from 9 AM to 10 AM eastern time. The show is hosted by WMUB at Miami University of Ohio in Oxford. Edward Tabash from CSH and Americans United will be the other guest. The topic is “Civil Rights for Atheists”
On 2/23, the ACLU reached an agreement with the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) in a case challenging federal funding of religious activities in a nationwide abstinence-only-until-marriage program, the Silver Ring Thing.
HHS agreed to stop funding the program which also proselytize to the teens.
And a recommended website that supports separation of church and state
The IRS examined 110 organizations referred to the tax agency for potentially violations, and 28 cases remain open.
Among the 82 closed cases, the IRS found prohibited politicking and sent a written warning to 55 organizations and assessed a penalty tax against one group. Those organizations included 37 churches and 19 other organizations.