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Friend,

In these trying times, it is of the utmost importance that we come together as a community. Faith-based charities are especially critical for many during these types of crises.

Recently, Emilie Kao and Andrea Jones, of the Heritage Foundation's Richard and Helen DeVos Center for Religion & Civil Society, penned an op-ed that I wanted to pass along to you. Their piece discusses the vital role that faith-based organizations are playing in helping our nation overcome the COVID-19 outbreak.

I'm sure that you'll enjoy it.
Jon Schweppe
Director of Policy and Government Affairs
American Principles Project


** Commentary: America’s Faith-based Groups: Helping Neighbors in a Time of Crisis ([link removed])
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By: Emilie Kao and Andrea Jones, The Heritage Foundation
March 25th, 2020
The Richmond Times-Dispatch


When Rev. Jay Vorhees, pastor of City Road Chapel just outside Nashville, Tenn., saw dozens of people in his community laid off as restaurants and bars were forced to close because of COVID-19, he started a fund to buy grocery store gift cards to help them get through the crisis.

Such charity, happily, is not uncommon. Across America, people of faith and religious organizations – spurred by President Donald Trump’s call to pray and act in response to this crisis – are finding innovative ways to meet the medical, financial and spiritual needs of their neighbors.

Religious organizations, long at the forefront of America’s health care system, are playing a vital role in combating COVID-19. Seventeen percent of America’s hospitals are faith-based, with Catholic hospitals hosting one in every six of the nation’s hospital beds and Seventh-Day Adventists treating over five million patients each year. As American cases of COVID-19 have surged, their services have become critical to the country’s ability to treat patients and stop the disease’s spread.

Churches and other religious communities are also finding other ways to increase the public health system’s capacity to respond to the virus. Despite having to suspend worship services, Alabama’s largest church found a new way to serve. In close coordination with the state government, Birmingham’s Church of the Highlands began hosting a drive-thru COVID-19 test site. The church has run a medical clinic since 2009 and in just two days, qualified medical personnel staff tested nearly 1,000 people.

And America’s faith-based organizations aren’t only responding to COVID-19 in the United States. Samaritan’s Purse, a North-Carolina based Christian relief organization, recently airlifted a field hospital and medical personnel to the city of Cremona in northern Italy, which is suffering from a shortage of hospital beds and medical equipment due to the virus.
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