John DiIulio, head of the White House Office of Faith-Based
Initiatives, resigned his post late last week. Critics have charged
that the departure comes after the Bush Administration focused its
faith-based efforts too narrowly on evangelical Christian churches,
while leaving black churches -- whose programs DiIulio has strongly
endorsed -- out in the cold. Reverend Eugene Rivers, a prominent
black
minister who had previously endorsed Bush's faith based initiative,
lashed out at the Bush Administration, charging, "The message in
Professor DiIulio's departure is that the black and the poor in the
inner cities can go to hell. It sends a signal that the faith-based