"Faith Based" AIDS Research?

The Associated Press reports that "President Bush's $15 billion effort to fight AIDS has handed out nearly one-quarter [23% or roughly $3.45 Billion] of its grants to religious groups, and officials are aggressively pursuing new church partners that often emphasize disease prevention through abstinence and fidelity over condom use."

We must ask if these grants are being used to truly support AIDS prevention and research or is AIDS being deceptively used as a cover for funnelling money to politically preferred charities at the expense of fighting a devastating disease while retaining the politcal benefit of an apparently hollow claim of fighting AIDS.

At the very least, tax-payers should be questioning whether this is an efficient use of tax-payer money.

Some of the organizations receiving such grants are:

"Samaritan's Purse, which is run by [Billy] Graham's son, Franklin. It says its mission is 'meeting critical needs of victims of war, poverty, famine, disease and natural disaster while sharing the Good News of Jesus Christ.'"

"World Relief, founded by the National Association of Evangelicals. It won $9.7 million for abstinence work in four countries."

There is much, much more information in this article, please consider reading it if you are interested in what you are hearing.