Americans for Community and Faith-Centered Enterprise

Founded in 2001 by then-Bradley Foundation head Michael Joyce at the behest of Karl Rove, George W. Bush's personal adviser, Americans for Community and Faith-Centered Enterprise (together with its sister organization, the Foundation for Community and Faith-Centered Enterprise) was created to push for the president's faith-based initiatives.

According to a June 25, 2001 Washington Post article, "Michael S. Joyce, a proponent of school choice who has been developing the intellectual framework for faith-based efforts for 12 years, said Bush asked him at a Rose Garden ceremony May 10, 'Did Karl call you yet?' Joyce said Karl Rove, Bush's senior adviser, phoned later that day and asked Joyce 'to undertake a private initiative to help get this legislation through. Joyce said that he insisted on independence from the White House and that the specifics were left up to him. On June 1, Joyce opened Americans for Community and Faith-Centered Enterprise with a stable of consultants and lobbyists and an office on Pennsylvania Avenue. ... 'For a lot of people, this conjures images of serpent-handlers and speaking in tongues,' Joyce said. 'We're busy convincing centrist Democrats that allowing equal access to public resources is not establishing a religion.'" (1)

According to the foundation's web site: "Our nation is ready to renew civil society.  This foundation stands ready to help make it happen--to help repair the damage inflicted upon our country by failed, top-down, Great Society style bureaucratic programs, and to dramatically assist in beginning to heal our communities, neighborhoods, families and citizens. We stand ready to remind citizens of what is truly unique about our self-governing republic. Achieving this goal, requires an effort to energize the private sector. President George W. Bush made this point forcefully in his commencement speech at Notre Dame, in May 2001, when he stated that: 'The War on Poverty (has) also turned too many citizens into bystanders, convinced that compassion had become the work of government alone.'” (3)

(2) Mediatransparency: Recipients: Americans for Community and Faith-Centered Enterprise
http://www.mediatransparency.org/recipients/acfce.htm

(3) Foundation for Community and Faith-Centered Enterprise
http://www.fcfe.org/

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