Here's a great example of everything that's wrong with religious charities, from the Miami Herald: Army chaplain offers baptisms, baths. The guy, Llano, has a big pool of water, and if you're a soldier and want a bath, which you can't get very easily in Iraq right now, you have to get baptized. Fair enough; if you're starving to death and the guy with the apples is a devout worshipper of Sol Invictus, you scream, "Long live the sun," and get an apple. You don't have to do much of anything for it, and you don't have to mean it. However, before your baptism/bath, you have to sit through an hour-and-a-half long sermon. Then, the baptism itself is an hour of Bible quotations. This is the main problem with government funding of religious charities. In principle, charities are charities, and they should all get money if they legally qualify as charities. The snag is that when the money comes from the government and the aid is accompanied by sermons and proselytizing, the First Amendment is effectively shat upon. If religious charities had a track record of being able to resist trying to convert transients before or while they're feeding them, they should be able to get government funds. They do not have this track record. I didn't really intend this post to be another tirade against the Bush admin's "faith-based" initiative, but it sort of turned out that way. Like so many of the Bush regime's policies, it's extraordinary because they have all but admitted that its stated purpose is a ruse. Bush clearly wants to give government money to religious charities as a way to fund anti-abortion rights groups. He said so to that bunch of priests, when the mic was turned on, but before the event had begun. (Remember that? A couple years ago?) Several people called him on it. He ignored them. And his position hasn't changed. One other thing: the chaplain from the article above, Llano, said this about his methods: ''You have to be aggressive to help people find themselves in God.'' What in the world does this mean? What's the story behind the concept of being or finding oneself "in" God or Jesus? Does it come from the Bible? What in the hell does it mean? What's the difference between being OF the Christian diety and being IN the Christian deity? Is it like being in a car? Or in a swimming pool? Or in trouble? And who cares? Chris, do you have any insight on this? I see that phrasing all the time, and I've even heard Christian-type people insist that there is a distinction being the OF and the IN, and that the latter is preferable. Perhaps your Southern Baptist background could provide more info than my Mormon one. I don't recall Mormons emphasizing the physical location of one's body in relation to the imaginary entity in question, but maybe I'm remembering incorrectly. (I'm really just trying to get all the banner ads on this site to point to Jesus-y stuff again. I love those things!)