Jewish, Catholic and Protestant Groups Join to Demand Congress Pass Welfare Bill

The executive vice president of the Synagogue Council of America joined with a Catholic and a Protestant leader yesterday in recommending that the Congress pass the welfare reform bill now under its consideration. Rabbi Henry Siegman of the SCA, representing Reform, Conservative and Orthodox lay and rabbinic groups, signed the statement along with the Most Rev. Joseph Bernardin, general secretary of the United States Catholic Conference, and Dr. R. H. Edwin Espy, general secretary of the National Council of Churches, the Protestant and Eastern Orthodox organization. The three had agreed last year to consider major issues jointly. The statement said the bill provided “important steps toward making the (welfare) system more responsive to human needs and more equitable” and “should help shatter the myth that the aspirations and ambitions of the welfare recipients somehow differ from those of the rest of society.” The three religious leaders cited as one “shortcoming” of the bill the exclusion of individuals and childless couples. They called the current welfare system “repugnant to our Judaeo-Christian heritage.”