Action Alert

(Washington, September 3, 2002) Some of you may be aware of the House bill, titled, Houses of Worship Political Speech Protection Act (H.R.2357) a.k.a. Jones' Bill for its sponsor, Walter Jones, of North Carolina. This bill would allow churches and other houses of worship to engage in political campaigns. It would foster corruption of the houses of worship and turn denominations into powerful Political Action Committees.

In a Washington Times article on Sunday, September 1, Jones says, "I've got a commitment from the leadership that they would try to get this bill to the floor in the latter part of September." This means the time is now to contact your chapter members and representatives, to inform them about the bill, and the potentially devastating affects.

We have been defending First Amendment consistently against the encroachment of religion into public policy, but we have faced an uphill battle. The threat to religious liberty represented in this bill is greater than any we've seen in years. The entire community is affected by this legislation, and most of the secular and religious communities are opposed. Below is some recently collected data on what you can do to help prevent this dangerous bill from being passed.

The recent study by Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life found that 70% of respondents believe the church should not endorse political candidates. The Gallup/Interfaith Alliance Foundation discovered that 77% of the clergy oppose church involvement in electoral politics.

The AHA has been working in a coalition group of over forty organizations dedicated to defeating this bill. Self-titled as "the coalition against politicizing houses of worship" the group has been meeting for months to coordinate efforts such as action alerts, meetings with representatives, expanding the coalition, mobilizing grassroots, garnishing press attention, and other ways of informing the public and government about our concerns with the bill.

We encourage you to join this effort by contacting your representatives, writing letters to your local paper and calling the White House to let the Administration know why the public does not support the Jones bill.

Below are some helpful resources related to the bill. Please keep us posted on your progress!

http://thomas.loc.gov/ and type in HR 2357 in the bill number search field to learn more about the bill.
http://www.interfaithalliance.org/action/archive/a020814.htm action alert with sample action items for your use.
http://www.interfaithalliance.org/Initiatives/petition.rtf petition to your representative.
http://www.au.org/churchstate/cs9017.htm Article in Church and State, in September about the bill.

Contacting your Representatives:
House directory: http://clerk.house.gov/members/index.php (find your representatives, their websites and contact information)
White House Contact information: http://www.whitehouse.gov/contact/

Thank you for your attention!

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