FaithfulAmerica.org Selects New Director
Vince Isner, former director of UMC communications, is set to begin working as the new director of Faithful America.org, the online vehicle of the National Council of Church’s “powerful new progressive faith movement.”
Isner is well posed to assume this leadership role. His list of achievements includes Communications Director for the United Methodist Board of Church and Society, and writer, director and producer for United Methodist Communications and the United Methodist Publishing House. As an independent producer, most recently he completed two DVD/Web-based study projects for Wesley Theological Seminary in D.C. (UMNS).
The NCC has been extremely active, galvanizing faith groups together in a loud outcry against the current policies of the Bush administration, and generally, at the overall downturn of the nation’s morals and values.
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Part of the NCC’s goals is to advocate against all the ills of our society today, such as poverty. The new “movement” is rooted in the teaching of every major religion: love. And “peace”, “equality”, and “unity” are all slogans used to promote the reversion to the ideal world.
www.FaithfulAmerica.org, launched in May, protests the decrepit state of the world and advocates that moral standards rooted in faith have a right to be a part of the discourse.
"We are a new voice that rejects both the fundamentalism of the right and the view on the left that faith has no place in public discourse," stated the program’s brochure. It goes on to state, “We accept the separation of church and state, [just] not the separation of moral principles from politics.”
The idea is to utilize the Internet, a communications power tool, to create a forum where people of faith, can be inspired to action by the ideals of justice inherent in their faith, said Tom Perriello, press contact for FaithfulAmerica.
One of FaithfulAmerica.org’s most striking statements is: “We reject a go-it-alone culture that reduces our politics and our personal lives to selfishness and fear.” Through this statement, it is clear that they have distinguished that today’s society is controlled by selfishness and fear, and that this effect is not only inherent in our personal lives, but also in politics, our public lives.
UMNS reports that “Members receive e-mail alerts about letter-writing campaigns, petitions and various causes; can network with one another online to organize community events; and have access to sermons and commentaries about the moral and spiritual challenges of the day.”
Thus far, the community has placed an ad on television in Arab countries showing U.S. faith leaders apologizing for torture in Iraqi prisons. Also, the site hosted a real-time news conference on atrocities occurring in Sudan, and members sent around 52,000 letters to Congress, advocating the naming of Sudan as a place of genocide.
There is a significant resurgence, a new dedication, a new energy in putting faith into action, says Perriello, and FaithfulAmerica will play a leading part in that new movement.
