Clarification of Thought: On the Dismantling of US AID

Introducing Clarification of Thought: a series of essays on the Catholic Worker and government funding for the works of mercy at home and abroad.

Woodcut by Ade Bethune

Roundtable has invited several members of various Catholic Worker communities to submit essays on the drastic federal cuts to human services program that President Donald Trump and billionaire Elon Musk, owner of Tesla and X (formerly Twitter), have enacted over the past month, and—at press time—have maintained, in defiance of judicial orders.

One of President Trump’s slew of executive orders on January 20 included instituting a 90-day pause on foreign aid spending, and the firing of thousands at the US Agency for International Development (US AID).

Over the past 25 years, foreign aid has fluctuated between 0.5% and 1.5% of the federal budget, although polling from 2019 indicates the average American believes it costs much more.

A judge recently ordered the Trump administration to comply with a weeks-old ruling and release the billions of dollars in frozen aid by the end of this week.

But the cuts have already impacted Catholic charitable and development services, as funding continues to be withheld.

In some states, Catholic Charities’ Immigration Services have already cut jobs across the country, in response to immediate freezes in funding. Last week, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops sued the Trump administration for illegal cuts to funding for the refugee resettlement programs: resettlement programs run through the State Department that have helped U.S. allies in Vietnam and Afghanistan resettle in the United States.

Catholic Relief Services—which depends on U.S. government grants and agreements for nearly half of its $1.2 billion budget, according to the National Catholic Reporter— warned its staff it anticipated extreme layoffs over the course of the upcoming year.

Dorothy Day—a Catholic anarchist—did not believe in cooperation with the state. The Catholic Worker newspaper she founded has addressed many problems with foreign aid, and the “imperialism of money” it promotes. What do such critiques mean in light of the current events?

Although Day’s position was to look to her neighbor rather than the state for help, she would not hesitate to advocate for the poor who came to her office with their complaints of ill-treatment or stonewalling at the hands of government aid offices. Day did not depend on the state for solutions, but she demanded the state acknowledge the rights of the “least of these.”

Roundtable has asked Catholic Workers to shed light—to clarify—the problems of the current moment and to highlight solutions they suggest could be found in the tradition of the Catholic Worker.

If you are interested in submitting your own letter, essay, or thoughts on the issues of government funding, the works of mercy, the state and foreign aid, please send them to roundtable@catholicworker.org.

“The less you have of Ceasar’s, the less you have to render to Caesar.”

— Fr. Vincent McNabb, quoted in The Catholic Worker, December 1976.

We Need a Society More Than We Need the Catholic Worker Movement

by Laurie M. Johnson

While the administration’s recent grant freeze was temporarily reversed, its actions made it clear that organizations they dislike were going to see their funding dry up.

The president’s pastor Paula White has been put in charge of the new White House Faith Office, which will decide who gets grants based on political considerations. This development demonstrates two painful truths.

First, it was a mistake in 2001 to promote grants to faith-based services. Republicans wanted to strike back at the secularists. But Bush’s initiative was a Constantinian move. Once religious organizations got hooked on government funding, political priorities inevitably influenced their decisions, and government money absolved churches from directly providing for each other and their communities.

Second, the fact that this happened with the support of so many Christians indicates that, while faith-based non-profits did much good work, churches did not teach their congregants good Christian theology. Instead, congregants’ bad social attitudes were either silently passed over with pastoral platitudes, or openly pandered to. Our priests and pastors have conformed to the American ideology so much that Christians are a big reason we are threatened with regime change. The administration is using foolish pastors to fool masses of Christians so that they do not notice the crassly secular objectives of the world’s richest man.

What should Catholic Workers do? They don’t need to worry too much about losing federal funding. If they have been obtaining provisions via government-funded or tax-policy encouraged third parties, they may have to change how they get those things. Most Catholic Worker operations, even if they are non-profits, do not rely on donors for whom tax write-offs are paramount. However, they are right to be worried about how freezing government aid is going to affect their own capabilities. If this continues, there will be infinitely more people needing help.

Catholic Workers are inherently unequipped to handle this onslaught. The full Catholic Worker life is hard, and their radical commitment is inherently for the few. It is beautiful, and its example can be a guide to all people to see what love in action really looks like. But more people, including many more Christians, will be needed to help the people now at risk.

Catholic Workers have a legacy of protesting discrimination and war. Should we turn our attention to resisting these cuts through protest? The small, planned events we could muster to urge the administrative juggernaut to change its path would be ineffectual. It has fully seized the reins of power and is threatening basic constitutional principles. Catholic Workers do not have the luxury for it—the time that we spend protesting in a traditional manner is time we can’t spend adapting, changing, and increasing our services. If many Americans change their minds because the pain reaches them, then we will have a real decision to make regarding protest.

In the meantime, what our country needs is community building. Part of the reason we are in this mess is that Americans have been alienated from each other. The money economy has made even child and elder care ideally impersonal and fully paid for. It has eroded our social fabric and taken away the habits we need to make it through difficult times. Community is prior to effective protests. I urge Catholic Workers to put more of their scarce energies into extending their influence in their communities, even if it means dealing with people who are not the right brand of faith, not the right brand of politics, professionally credentialed or not, etc.

If they do that, it may be necessary to compromise on principles like voluntary poverty, full commitment to communal living, etc. To build social order, we must encourage people to take care of others in their own spheres, not where we would ideally want them to be. People should spread the movement’s spirit by coming to the aid of their local houses of hospitality. They can also, in their little way (in the spirit of St. Therese of Lisieux) begin to directly help others around them. We need to tell people that these smaller steps are also Catholic Worker steps. Indeed, for those of us who are Christians, these simply constitute Christian steps.

Direct action is at the Catholic Worker's core. It builds lasting reciprocal social relations. Currently, we need a society—true social order—more than we need the Catholic Worker movement. But the Catholic Worker movement is more important than ever because of that. It is poised to teach people the value of love in action and to encourage them to use their resources and their time for more human ends.

We should mourn the fact that funding is being eliminated for faith-based services and for aid around the world, even if it was originally a mistake. This is a disaster.

Thousands, if not millions, will suffer and lose their lives because of these changes, and we cannot as a movement begin to make up the difference. We should answer the government’s bad faith by making connections with anyone who wants to engage even a little in direct action. We should honor them as part of our movement. Our actions, and their actions, constitute resistance, the building up of an alternative that will be more obviously necessary in the coming years. When life gets tough, either society or chaos fills the void. Let’s fight chaos, and then be ready when the time is right for something more.

Laurie M. Johnson is a Professor of Political Science following the little way in support of the John Paul Catholic Worker Farm in Kansas City, MO, and the author of The Gap in God’s Country: A Longer View on Our Culture Wars (Wipf & Stock, 2024).

Thank you for reading. If you would like to join in the clarification of thought, please send your thoughts to: roundtable@catholicworker.org.

The order of the day
is to talk about the social order.
Conservatives would like
to keep it from changing
but they don’t know how.
Liberals try to patch it
and call it a New Deal.
[…]
I want a change,
and a radical change.
I want a change
from an acquisitive society
to a functional society,
from a society of go-getters
to a society of go-givers.

— Peter Maurin, October 1934 The Catholic Worker

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About us. Roundtable covers the Catholic Worker Movement. This week’s Roundtable was produced by Jerry Windley-Daoust and Renée Roden. Art by Monica Welch at DovetailInk. Roundtable is an independent publication not associated with the New York Catholic Worker or The Catholic Worker newspaper. Send inquiries to roundtable@catholicworker.org.

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