Political Ideologies in Faith Based Non Profits
Most recently, in 2012, a branch in Vermont was accused of firing a case worker after they learned we was bisexual. Additionally, in 2012, a spokesperson for the Army, George Hood, implied that the organization views homosexual relationships as sinful by saying “A relationship between same-sex individuals is a personal choice that people have the right to make, but from a church viewpoint, we see that going against the will of God” (Del Valle).
The views of The Salvation Army are not only harmful, but they impacted how they helped community members. In 2011, a man interviewed by The New York Times claimed that the Army denied him and his boyfriend shelter in the 1990s unless they broke up and left “sinful homosexual lifestyle” behind (Del Valle). Additionally in 2017, ThinkProgress reported that a substance abuse center in New York City engaged in discriminatory practices and violated city laws by refusing to accept transgender patients, placing transgender members in rooms corresponding to their birth gender, and forcing patients to undergo physical exams to see if they were on hormone therapy or had gender reassignment surgery (Del Valle).
The continuous and long standing discriminatory practices caused The Salvation Army to lose public support and donors. Most notably, Chick-fil-A announces that they were changing their philanthropic structure and would no longer donate to organizations that we linked to anti-LGBTQ causes. This resulted in The Salvation Army losing hundreds of thousands of dollars in potential contributions. The distaste for the Salvation Army gained notice from pop-culture media when Ellie Goulding threatened to cancel her halftime show for the NFL because it coincided with the beginning of the Red Kettle Campaign for The Army (Del Valle).
Because The Army failed to adapt to the changing views of society, they lost a lot of support from the public. Although, now they promote a discrimination free world, their previous actions proved otherwise and the damage was already done. Perhaps if they had remained neutral in the situation or helped communities without discrimination, as they pledged they would, they would not have received so much negative criticism and would have been able to keep supporters. Many Americans will not to donate to organizations who harm communities that they personally support so in order to keep and grow their membership, faith based nonprofits need to show that they are allies and uplift communities, specifically in this case, the LGBT community, instead of harming them.
Read more about how The Salvation Army is trying to help the LGBT community now here.
On the other hand, the Forest Hills Presbyterian has kept a progressive viewpoint and made diversity and inclusion a priority. See how they did this and the impacts it had on their membership in our interview with Jeff Smith.
