A little publicized policy directive from the US Agency for International Development (USAID) is getting a closer look from religious freedom advocates and promoters of conscience protections in federal law.

Months in development, the directive offers one of the broadest and most inclusive conscience protections to faith-based organizations funded by USAID to operate AIDS treatment and prevention programs and other health care programs around the world, Catholic observers said.

Specifically, the directive bans discrimination against faith-based and other organizations that decide not to engage in activities that violate religious or moral principles, such as condom distribution and education in their use.

Advocates of religious freedom see the language in the agency’s acquisition and assistance policy directive as a model that could be implemented in all government programs, contracts and grants with minor changes depending on the programs individual agencies oversee. Such language could pertain to federal programs ranging from health care reform to assistance to human trafficking victims.

The directive implements the conscience protection mandate that was included in the Tom Lantos and Henry J. Hyde US Global Leadership Against HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria Reauthorization Act of 2008. The law authorized up to $48 billion over five years to combat malaria, tuberculosis, and AIDS. It includes funding for the widely lauded President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief program, known as PEPFAR.

The law, which expires at the end of fiscal year 2013, passed handily in both houses of Congress, both then under the control of Democrats: 308-116 in the House and 80-16 in the Senate. Pres. George W. Bush signed the bill July 30, 2008. For the record, Pres. Barack Obama, then a US senator from Illinois, did not vote on the measure.

“(The directive) we feel expresses quite well what we would have wanted to see, and we are pleased with the constructive process we went through with them and they went through with us,” said Bill O’Keefe, vice president for government relations and advocacy at Catholic Relief Services (CRS).

“It’s very important obviously because the church’s global health network is critical to addressing the problem of AIDS in many countries. That was recognized in the legislation and now is recognized explicitly in this guidance so we can at least compete fairly. We’re not asking for any preferential treatment. But as the law specified we wanted to be able to compete fairly without discrimination because of our teaching,” O’Keefe said.

He acknowledged that CRS played the leading role in the directive’s development. The agency has received hundreds of millions of dollars in federal funding for AIDS services around the world since 2004.

Faith-based agencies

While CRS was unable to provide details on how much funding it received from USAID under PEPFAR, it has received $740 million for its AIDSRelief program from the federal government since 2004. The program has provided care and treatment to nearly 700,000 people in Ethiopia, Guyana, Haiti, Kenya, Nigeria, Rwanda, South Africa, Tanzania, Uganda, and Zambia.

The directive affects not just CRS but all faith-based agencies that receive funding under PEPFAR. That includes the Catholic Medical Mission Board and its large AIDS-related programming in Kenya and Haiti.

The directive was welcomed by the US Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), which is embroiled in its own dispute with the Obama administration over religious freedom issues and conscience protections on a number of fronts, particularly health care reform.

“This (directive) incorporates the purpose of the statute into implementation,” said Richard Doerflinger, associate director of the US bishops’ Secretariat for Pro-Life Activities.

Doerflinger remained cautious, however, saying the directive is limited to specific programs funded by one government agency. He said only the fact that the law reauthorizing PEPFAR and other health services included specific conscience protections was why the directive was as broad as it was.

When the programs are up for reauthorization in 2013, faith-based groups will have to renew their push to preserve the nondiscrimination wording they support, he said.

O’Keefe said that CRS representatives expressed their desire that a strong protection for religious and moral rights be included in the directive in meetings with USAID officials that began in early 2011.

Officials at USAID did not return calls seeking comment on the drafting of the directive.

As the reauthorization law was being debated in Congress in 2008, the US bishops took a particularly active role in ensuring that the final wording included the language protecting religious freedom, explained Stephen Colecchi, director of the bishops’ Office of International Justice and Peace.

“They understood the Catholic Church and the ties with Catholic institutions, which are very significant in many countries that suffer from the epidemic,” he explained.

The language in the directive to USAID staff around the world is explicit in explaining that any organization–faith-based or otherwise, both domestic and international–that is eligible to receive funding for AIDS prevention and treatment shall not be required to adhere to all aspects of what the agency calls a comprehensive approach to combating the disease. Such an approach includes the distribution of condoms and instruction on their use.

Specifically, the directive says an organization “shall not be required, as a condition of receiving such assistance … to endorse, utilize, make a referral to, become integrated with, or otherwise participate in any program or activity to which the organization has a religious or moral objection.”

In return, an organization must notify the appropriate USAID official no later than 15 days before the deadline for an application for funding if it cannot participate in all of the requirements of the program being funded because of a religious or moral objection. Then, on its application, the organization must indicate the activities it has omitted from its proposal based on those objections.

The directive specifies that any proposal “will be evaluated based on activities for which a proposal is submitted and will not be evaluated favorably or unfavorably due to the absence of a proposal addressing the activity(ies) to which it objected and which it thus omitted.”

The directive includes a prohibition on promoting or advocating for the legalization or practice of prostitution and sex trafficking and provisions for providing medically-accurate condom information.

The directive can be read Online at www.usaid.gov/business/business_opportunities/cib/pdf/aapd12_04.pdf.

When Rosibel Mancillas Lopez meets undocumented immigrants living in the shadows of mainstream US culture, she goes into action.

She tells them they have basic rights under the law, despite their lack of citizenship. She explains Catholic teaching and its promotion of human dignity. She points them to avenues where they can advocate for changes in US immigration law.

Enrolled in the University of San Diego law school, Mancillas, 24, has taken a similar message to students on campus, where she organizes monthly trips to Tijuana, Mexico, in an effort to breach the cultural chasm.

Mancillas was honored for her advocacy work on behalf of immigrants Nov. 14 by the Catholic Campaign for Human Development, which presented her with the Cardinal Bernardin New Leadership Award during the US bishops’ fall meeting. The award honors a young adult for leadership in fighting poverty and injustice.

As Mancillas sees it, her efforts follow her desire to live the Gospel.

The fact that Mancillas and her family–mother Rosa, father Porfirio, and two brothers, Porfirio Jr., and David–lived in the shadows for eight years in the 1990s before they became US citizens also has a lot to do with what she finds has become her life’s calling.

“Something that has had a strong impact on me is Catholic social teaching, in particular the teaching on human dignity and the right of everyone to have labor and work,” said Mancillas, who plans to become an immigration attorney. “Related to this is immigration in the sense that immigrants are stripped of their human dignity just because they were born in a different part of the world.

“We tend to forget their humanness once we start judging them based on their language, based on the culture, based on the customs,” she added. “What faith does for me is bring back all of this into perspective, that yes, we’re all human, that we’re all God’s children, that we’re all meant to pursue happiness.”

Mancillas’ advocacy work started in 2009 at Holy Family Parish, which was part of the San Diego Organizing Project, a CCHD-funded community group working on immigrant rights issues. She helped build a program that educated immigrants about their rights and how to follow the path to citizenship.

The project was turned over to the parish and that’s when Mancillas began focusing on the student community at the university. The monthly trips to Tijuana include a stop at the imposing border fence to examine the barrier that separates the two countries. The stop gives participants the opportunity to look at the crosses and other memorials hung on the Mexican side of the fence recalling those who have died trying to cross into the US

The students also work with children and people with AIDS.

Bp. Jaime Soto of Sacramento, CA, chairman of the bishops’ Subcommittee on the Catholic Campaign for Human Development, commended Mancillas for her work to “create a community where the dignity of all is respected.”

“As you work to give voice to the voiceless, especially to immigrants, you give us great hope, Bp. Soto told Mancillas in presenting the award.

Mancillas told the bishops during a reception at the bishops’ conference that her work as an advocate for immigrants brings great joy to her life.

“I feel very undeserving, but receiving this award is a strong affirmation for me to continue doing the work I am doing,” she said. “I take it as God finally responding with a strong yes to the question I ask him every day: ‘Is this what you want me to do?’”

Fr. Frank Pavone, national director of Priests for Life, remains a priest in good standing in the Diocese of Amarillo, TX, said Msgr. Harold Waldow, vicar for clergy in the diocese.

Msgr. Waldow said Sept. 13 that Bp. Patrick J. Zurek only suspended Fr. Pavone’s ministry outside of the diocese because the well-known pro-life priest is needed for work in Amarillo.

Bp. Zurek in a decree Sept. 6 ordered the 52-year-old New York-born priest to return to Amarillo and announced it in a Sept. 9 letter to his fellow bishops. He pointed to “persistent questions and concerns” from clergy and laity about how the millions of dollars donated to Priests for Life are used as the reason for suspending Fr. Pavone’s ministry.

“He’s here to be obedient to the bishop and try to work with the bishop,” Msgr. Waldow said. “He’s going to have assignments, and he will be put on our payroll and given health care and other benefits like any other priest of the diocese.”

For his part, Fr. Pavone said he planned to return to Amarillo the evening of Sept. 13 from Birmingham, AL, where he had been taping programs for the Eternal Word Television Network (EWTN) for more than a week. He also planned to meet Msgr. Waldow soon after he arrived.

Both Msgr. Waldow and Fr. Pavone said no meeting was immediately scheduled with Bp. Zurek, who was leaving the diocese the afternoon of Sept. 13 for two weeks.

Fr. Pavone also said he has already explored the possibility of being incardinated in another diocese so he could resume full-time ministry with Priests for Life as soon as possible.

“I fully expect that my time in Amarillo, both in terms of this immediate trip and in terms of my affiliation with that diocese is going to be temporary,” he said.

Fr. Pavone added that he has appealed the suspension to the Congregation of the Clergy at the Vatican.

In his own letter to the bishops Sept. 12, Fr. Pavone questioned the reason for the suspension of his ministry outside of Amarillo and said that Bp. Zurek’s claim that Priests for Life has operated with no financial transparency was unfounded.

He cited a list of 41 documents detailing the finances of the organization provided to Bp. Zurek since 2005, when he was incardinated in the Amarillo Diocese by Bp. John W. Yanta, who served on the organization’s board of advisers. Fr. Pavone said the documents continued to be sent to Bp. Zurek even after Priests for Life closed a small office in Amarillo while the organization studied whether to relocate its headquarters from New York to the Texas panhandle.

No acknowledgement of the documents was ever received, the priest wrote.

“We do not presume any ill will here,” Fr. Pavone wrote. “We may just be dealing with ‘cultural’ differences. But the result has been frustrating to all of us.”

By cultural differences, Fr. Pavone said he was referring to life in New York versus life in Amarillo and how people respond to receiving information.

He said the same documents provided to Bp. Zurek also have been sent to Archbishop Timothy M. Dolan of New York as well as to the 21 prelates who serve on the organization’s board of advisers.

Fr. Pavone also noted that he has never received a salary from Priests for Life nor is he on the payroll of the Amarillo Diocese. He said Priests for Life covers the cost of a small residence–about $2,000 a month–and his expenses associated with the ministry, which he called “very small.”

Records filed with the Internal Revenue Service show that the organization’s income topped $10.8 million in 2008, the latest year tax forms were available. In 2007, Priests for Life showed income of $9.2 million.

The same records show that Fr. Pavone received no income from the organization during those years.

Bp. Zurek raised questions about the financial dealings of Priests for Life in his letter to the bishops. He said Fr. Pavone had not adequately explained whether funds were being used “prudently” by Priests for Life.

“Since he has consistently refused to subject the PFL to a transparent and complete auditing of all expenditures, I have reasons to be alarmed at the potential financial scandal that might arise if it were the result of my failure to correct Fr. Pavone’s incorrigible defiance to my legitimate authority as his bishop,” Bp. Zurek said in his letter.

Since becoming national director of Priests for Life in 1993, Fr. Pavone has become one of the country’s most visible and outspoken opponents of abortion and advocates of pro-life issues, lecturing widely, leading retreats and prayer services and producing television and radio programs.

He also holds the same position with Gospel of Life Ministries, an interdenominational effort to end abortion, which shares its headquarters with Priests for Life.

In addition, Fr. Pavone is national pastoral director of both the Silent No More Awareness Campaign and Rachel’s Vineyard, an abortion healing ministry. Both are affiliated with Priests for Life. He also is president of the National Pro-Life Religious Council.