by TChris

The Department of Health and Human Services gave The Silver Ring Thing more than a million dollars over two years to promote its abstinence program. It may have been with a wink and a nudge that HHS obtained assurances that the faith-based program would not “engage in inherently religious activities, such as worship, religious instruction, or proselytization." Three months after the ACLU filed suit, HHS suspended funding of the program, recognizing that The Silver Thing used federal funds to advance religious indoctrination.

Federal funding of the organization, which is based in suburban Pittsburgh, will be halted until the government is confident that the program is obeying department rules, said the letter from Harry Wilson, associate commissioner of the Family and Youth Services Bureau. The Silver Ring Thing has until Sept. 6 to submit a plan showing that it separates its abstinence message from its encouragement of Christian values.

Lorraine Kenny, the public education coordinator for the ACLU's Reproductive Freedom Project, argues that The Silver Ring Thing used its federal funding “to basically put on a religious road show across the country.” She plans to ask the court to stay further proceedings in the lawsuit until The Silver Ring Thing produces its plan to comply with the law.