Today in a five to four decision, the Supreme Court blocks ordinary taxpayers from challenging the legality of the faith-based initiative program. The ruling does not stop the Court itself or Congress challenging the legality of the program. So for now, religious based charities can and will continue to compete for federal monies.

Some time in the near future I intend to post on the religious portion of the First Amendment, but it will probably be HUGE and time consuming. I haven’t the time today for that major of a post. I would like to comment on the particulars of this matter though.

I wasn’t going to post any major articles until after I switch to a new hosting company until I saw the comments to this post at The Peoria Chronicle. Also, I have been having discussions with a coworker about the justification of the police shooting suspects which, I believe tie into the same discussion. First and foremost, this post is only to discuss the subject from a Christian perspective and not a societal perspective.

With all of the hubbub surrounding the “Bob Manning Incident”, and the cries of a possible hate crime had been committed, I thought I would take a closer look at “hate crimes”.
 

Hate Crime – any of various crimes (as assault or defacement of property) when motivated by hostility to the victim as a member of a group (as one based on color, creed, gender, or sexual orientation) Websters Dictionary

I was commenting on a post over at Merle Widmers site on a post titled Humanists.  Merle, another commenter Ben, and I were having a discussion about Humanism vs. Religion.  When Merle bowed out, I asked Ben if he would like to continue the discussion to do it on my site.  Here is Merle’s original post: