The Foundation, following a tip from a Montana Foundation member, has asked Labor Secretary Robert B. Reich to halt the unconstitutional construction of a chapel by federally-funded Job Corps trainees in Anaconda, Montana.
The chapel project, being built on private land featuring “Our Lady of the Rockies,” a huge religious relic on Mt. Butte, has been shrouded in secrecy, but was approved by the Department of Labor last spring. Construction began in July involving nine Job Corps students and additional supervisors.
This is not the first time the Lady of the Rockies, on private property, has provoked a protest by the Foundation. The Foundation complained when it was revealed that Army helicopters and military and National Guard personnel helped to place the massive structure on Mt. Butte, where it has become a place of pilgrimage.
The Foundation called the Job Corps assistance an “egregious violation,” and a “misappropriation of public monies,” not only involving an unconstitutional entanglement but an unconstitutional promotion of Christianity, in particular advancing Catholicism.
The Foundation has asked Reich to “amend Job Corps guidelines to strictly exclude religious and sectarian groups from applying for any aid or assistance. The founders of our secular republic would be aghast at this blatant subsidy of religion!”
