The Salvation Army - naughty or nice?

From The San Francisco Chronicle via Stand Firm:


Phil Bronstein

Monday, December 14, 2009


The halls aren't the only thing getting decked this holiday season.

The Salvation Army, the country's biggest charity, is taking it full on the chin from a social media network mobilized against the organization's position on homosexuality and other social sins. Twitter, Facebook and gay Web sites are lit up with protest and calls for donor boycotts.

The Army's official same-sex statement suggests it's unlikely those cheery volunteers ringing bells over red kettles will be donning gay apparel anytime soon.

While homosexuals are not "blameworthy," the statement says, "Scripture forbids sexual intimacy between members of the same sex." The Army is an unabashedly evangelical, religious entity, after all, and has also resisted domestic partner benefits for its employees.

Last month, there was another stink about the Army's Houston division demanding to see Social Security cards of needy parents before providing toys for their kids. Angry protesters claimed this was discrimination against cardless illegal immigrants.

Before we take the predictable San Francisco, to-the-barricades view on all this, let's consider the Catholic concept of "proportionalism." This means (roughly, my interpretation) that bad conduct can be acceptable if a much greater good is being accomplished.

The Salvation Army served 33 million people in the United States last year. It raises about $2 billion a year and spends an impressive 89 percent of that on services - food, shelter, foster care and HIV programs.

It is a consistent and reliable disaster relief group.

"The first hand that reaches to pull you from the rubble of our next earthquake," Shea O'Neill wrote on the SFAppeal Web site last week, "will be the anti-gay hand of the Salvation Army."

There's no whitewashing their beliefs, if you oppose them, though the Army mission also is clear that its relief services are available to anyone "without regard to sexual orientation."

If you're gay and find yourself homeless and hungry, would you refuse this help? Some, who hold dear to the separation of naughty and nice, clearly would.

In the Bay Area, "a certain number of the people we attend to are gay," says Golden Gate Division PR Director Laine Hendricks, who's been catching a lot of the flak with help from her Twitter account. "I try to monitor what's being said."

Hendricks says she has "some concern" that the digital amplification of grievances "would detract people from wanting to give to the Salvation Army. Donations are down locally and 8 to 10 percent nationally, whether just from the bad economy or with help from detractors.

The Army stopped identification checking the day the story popped in the press and claimed it was a local verification process to prevent fraud. "It was naive" to assume no one would make the connection to immigration, says the Army's national community relations secretary, Maj. George Hood. "We'll find a nonthreatening way. We don't want to scare away families in need."

Especially at a troubled time when, the major says, "some of those giving last year are now looking for our help."

After weighing the moral dilemma, I'll be dropping some dough in that bucket myself.

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2009/12/14/EDCD1B0BL1.DTL#ixzz0Zx0VRn4v