Editor, Gazette-Journal:

U.S. foreign aid has been used to support, build, rebuild, renovate and remodel religious structures, including mosques in various foreign countries around the world. One is hard pressed to find similar support for this kind of government aid in the United States. One must only look at a hint of supporting the building of a mosque near the Ground Zero site.

The State Department has explained that the practice of funding such projects around the world became acceptable in 2003 when the Justice Department declared that the U.S. Constitution’s Establishment Clause did not preclude federal funds from being spent to preserve religious structures if they had cultural importance.

The historical Unitarian Universalist Church in Savannah, Ga., received U.S. government funds to update its facility to reduce power consumption. Other churches and other organizations across the country have received federal grants for child care programs and some for providing and/...