February 24, 2003

Faith-based prison program challenged in court
___By Robert Marus
___ABP Washington Bureau
___WASHINGTON (ABP)--Should the state of Iowa continue funding a prison rehabilitation program that gives special benefits to inmates who agree to study a conversion-based Christian curriculum?
___A Washington religious-freedom group doesn't think so. On Feb. 12, Americans United for Separation of Church and State filed two lawsuits against the InnerChange program at Iowa's Newton Correctional Facility.
___The case could have significant implications for President Bush's faith-based initiatives because it deals with a program Bush has touted as a model of cooperation between government agencies and religious social-service providers.
___The suits--one on behalf of a Mormon inmate and the other on behalf of family members of other inmates--accuse Iowa state officials and InnerChange of a host of First-Amendment violations. Among other things, the plaintiffs allege:
___ That InnerChange illegally uses government funds to support religious indoctrination.
___ That InnerChange illegally discriminates against inmates who are not willing to subscribe to the tenets of fundamentalist Protestant Christianity.
___ That InnerChange illegally uses government funds to discriminate in hiring against workers who will not agree to abide by a fundamentalist Protestant statement of faith that includes an assertion that the Bible "is without error in all its teachings" and that Christ will return before his kingdom is established on Earth.
___ That InnerChange and prison officials illegally give preferential treatment to inmates who agree to be part of its program while not offering the same privileges to the general prison population.
___InnerChange is run by Prison Fellowship, the Virginia-based charity headed by popular Christian author and former Watergate figure Charles Colson. Prison Fellowship officials said in a Feb. 12 press release that the suit is off-base.
___"The InnerChange Freedom Initiative in operation in Iowa in no way violates the establishment clause of the First Amendment to the Constitution," the release said. "In fact, federal law allows a state to include religious organizations as social-service providers."
___They also pointed to studies that suggest the program is much better at rehabilitating offenders than other programs, calling it "the nation's most successful program for reducing prisoner recidivism."
___But the program's success may be irrelevant if it does not pass constitutional muster.
___For example, Americans United's complaint alleges that the program uses government money to pay for religious indoctrination. "According to InnerChange's own promotional materials, 'Biblical principles are integrated into the entire course curriculum of IFI, rather than being compartmentalized in specific classes,' and 'all programming--all day, every day--is Christ-centered.' It is therefore impossible to separate the sectarian aspects of the InnerChange program from the non-sectarian."
___Although federal courts in recent years have upheld delivery of some social services by deeply religious organizations, they have not allowed government funding to pay for indoctrination.
___In a phone interview, Prison Fellowship President Mark Earley defended his program's constitutionality.
___"Although this program is a distinctly Christ-centered program, not everything that goes on in the program has a spiritual aspect to it," Earley said. "A lot of what goes on in the program is how to get along in the outside world."
___But Americans United lawyer Alex Luchenitser said program officials are being disingenuous by simultaneously claiming the program is both thoroughly "Christ-centered" and partially secular. "There's no way you can separate the religious parts from the non-religious parts," Luchenitser said.

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