Religion & Liberty Online Archives

Poverty

August 20, 2024

Why I Slept on the Streets for a Year

Poverty has always been part of my life. First, in my own family: we were considerably poor, and I spent my entire childhood surrounded by poverty. Over the years, while pastoring a church and training new pastors at seminary, I became involved in relief projects for those who were even poorer than I was. Continue Reading...
July 19, 2023

What Good Is a Christian Alternative Without Christ?

My last entry in this series on the compassionate conservatism movement concluded with a question: Would John DiIulio, head of the George W. Bush administration’s faith-based office, insist that religion-based programs, to be eligible for federal grants, be devoid of religious teaching or evangelism? Continue Reading...
June 14, 2023

Bridging the Church-State Divide

In 2000, I didn’t realize until it was too late that my astronomically exaggerated proximity to presidential candidate George W. Bush would make me a target. For example, I had said in 1998 that women volunteers had run charitable enterprises in the 19th century, so women’s entrance into the corporate workforce had hurt the nonprofit world. Continue Reading...
April 12, 2023

The (G.W.) Bush Whisperer

’Tis a sigh that is wafted across the troubled wave, ’Tis a wail that is heard upon the shore ’Tis a dirge that is murmured around the lowly grave Oh! Hard times come again no more. Continue Reading...
March 15, 2023

Conservative Compassion Fatigue

Part 3 of my series on poverty and the welfare state ended with a brief look at two community associations in South Dallas. As the Washington welfare-reform impasse in 1995 and 1996 dragged on, I traveled the country learning and speechifying. Continue Reading...
February 15, 2023

Washington Fiddles, Texas Burns

While Washingtonians in 1995 fought welfare battles on Capitol Hill, a struggle initially below press radar began in San Antonio. The July 5 afternoon temperature was 90 degrees as James Heurich, with sleeves rolled up and tie loosened, sat at his scarred desk in the office of a Christian anti-addiction program, Teen Challenge of South Texas. Continue Reading...
September 16, 2022

Free Enterprise Is Saving African Lives

For years, Africa has dominated the podium in the “bad healthcare” Olympics. For reference, the average cost for an established patient and Medicare recipient to make one visit to a family practice in Pennsylvania (where I live) is approximately $88—the cost of less than a week’s worth of groceries. Continue Reading...