State removes pastor from payroll

As of Sept. 7, the Indiana Family and Social Services Administration terminated all payment and benefits to the department’s former chaplain Rev. Michael L. Latham.\nLatham was at the center of a controversy surrounding an Indiana program that placed a minister on the state payroll, a move some said violated the separation of church and state. The Freedom from Religion Foundation filed a lawsuit last May on behalf of several Indiana taxpayers, but the termination of the program had nothing to do with the case, said Marcus Barlow, director of communications and media for the Family and Social Services Administration. \nLatham, a Baptist minister formerly living in Fort Wayne, was hired in 2006 as chaplain to the administration, according to the Roundtable on Religion and Social Welfare Policy Web site. \nBarlow said an agency-wide chaplain was a new idea within the department, and Latham’s position was part of a new program that did not meet expectations. \nThe cancellation of the program occurred simultaneously with the foundation’s lawsuit, filed May 2. The Freedom From Religion Foundation is made up of more than 10,000 atheists and agnostics who work to promote free thought and to defend the separation of church and state, according to the organization’s Web site.\nDan Barker, co-president of the foundation, said several Indiana members and taxpayers brought the issue to the foundation’s attention. \n“Apparently Latham was speaking about ‘moral values’ at a meeting and made attendees very uncomfortable,” Barker said. “A man called us and said he was made uncomfortable by the expressions of homophobia and the right-wing Christian views being expressed.” \nBarlow said he had no knowledge of these particular complaints, but one of the objectives of the chaplain program was to have volunteer chaplains from different religions and with different viewpoints. He said the program simply did not work out the way the department planned. \nBarlow said the lawsuit had no influence on the state’s decision to end the program. \n“It was a pilot program,” Barlow said. “It didn’t live up to the goals we set up.” \nBarlow said the state was in constant evaluation of the program. He said Latham and the other employees in the program were supposed to be setting up volunteer chaplains and planning regular chaplain training sessions, neither of which occurred, and after a year of running the program the state decided to terminate it. \n“Whether it was because of (Latham), or because we set up a program that couldn’t be successful, I don’t know,” Barlow said. \nBarker disagrees with Barlow and the state’s claims regarding the impact the Freedom From Religion Foundation’s lawsuit had on the decision to end the program. \n“Of course the suit had an influence,” Barker said. “There was no publicity on this issue until we filed a lawsuit. The public awareness came about due to our lawsuit. Even if it is not to our credit, we are glad that it stopped.” \nIra C. Lupu and Robert W. Tuttle, co-directors of legal research for the Roundtable, wrote an analysis for how they think the case would have turned out had it gone to court. They concluded that the most likely complaint to hold in court would be the foundation’s claim that the state violated the Establishment Clause in the Constitution, which calls for the separation of church and state. \nBarker said with the exception of a military or hospital setting, the foundation sees no reason for any government agency to have a chaplain on payroll. He said the foundation would not challenge chaplains within the military, because they are present for people in need of the resource, which may be in short-supply depending on where the military unit is located. \n“Indiana isn’t a wilderness,” Barker said. “Any person who feels the need for clergy assistance has a church on every corner.” \nBarker said the foundation is happy with the state’s final decision, and that it does not care if it isn’t receiving credit for helping to influence that decision. \n“The awareness of state, church separation is important no matter what,” Barker said. “We don’t care who gets the credit. It’s not a battle.”