And at a Christian young adult home in Corpus Christi, police
recently took the unusual step of arresting a supervisor after
teenagers complained that they were beaten and roped to a
bed, all in the name of Christian discipline. More arrests are
anticipated, authorities say.

     These are some of the results -- expected and unexpected -- of
Gov. George W. Bush's "bold new experiment in welfare
reform." With his conviction that religious groups can
transform lives in ways government can't, Bush sponsored
laws in 1997 that allow churches to provide social services
their own way, outside the intrusive glare of the state.

     The new laws exempted faith-based drug treatment programs
from all state health and safety regulations followed by their
secular counterparts, a list contained in a rule book as thick as
a Russian novel that covers every detail from fire detectors to
frayed carpets. Counselors in religious treatment programs
now may skip the criminal background checks and hundreds of
hours of training required of their state-licensed peers.

     Faith-based groups that provide child care or operate homes
for troubled youths can opt out of state inspections and choose
to be regulated by a Christian child care agency approved by
the state.

     Since their inception, the new rules have been criticized by
traditional caretakers, who worry that Bush has placed too
little emphasis on holding religious groups accountable, and
too much on the notion that faith alone can heal addiction and
delinquency -- despite decades of research to the contrary.

     "We've worked so long and hard to combat the stigma that
substance abuse and delinquency and mental health are a
symptom of a breakdown of morality, and to convince people
they are an illness," said Bill McColl, spokesman for the
National Association of Drug and Alcohol Counselors. "This
would roll us back 60 years, right back to when people thought
you were an alcoholic merely because you didn't accept Jesus
as your personal savior."

     Traditional social service organizations say allowing
faith-based programs to regulate themselves creates a mutually
affirming atmosphere, where groups of a similar mind-set
could be reluctant to find or report abuse. The Christian
agency that oversees the juvenile homes invites the
superintendents of those homes onto its board, and facility
supervisors inspect one another's homes -- an obvious conflict
of interest.

     Perhaps more important, the critics worry that these are
precisely the types of problems that would crop up in every
state under a Bush administration, given his campaign promise
to establish an "Office of Faith-Based Action" to seed the
Texas experiment nationwide.

     Texas officials say they're only correcting years of
narrow-mindedness. The secular, post-New Deal world has
shut certain churches out of providing social services, despite
their obvious successes, they say.

     "So far, government rules have reflected a 'one size fits all'
mentality. But we have to respect the different methods," said
Don Willett, a policy adviser to Bush. "In their view, addiction
is indicative of sinful behavior; it's at root a moral problem that
requires a moral solution, as opposed to the therapeutic notion
that it's a disease."

     They also argue that the system includes sufficient checks and
balances. So far, the one Christian oversight group has set up
its own stringent criteria, and when abuse is reported the state
is empowered to step in.

     The Texas experiment began in a spirit of defiance. In 1995,
the Texas Commission on Alcohol and Drug Abuse threatened
to shut down Teen Challenge, a popular faith-based drug rehab
program, for violating a variety of state regulations, including
hiring unlicensed counselors.

     Bush sided with Teen Challenge. He convened a task force
and called faith-based providers to testify how they'd turned
around troubled lives. His staff then wrote and promoted
legislation similar to laws in Florida.

     The Texas changes took effect in September 1997, mainly
targeting child care and drug treatment. Under the new rules,
churches that once merely gave advice or pastoral care can
now advertise themselves as drug treatment programs, simply
by signing up with the state. So far, 58 churches have
registered. And next year, the state will consider funding the
faith-based groups.

     Under the child care changes, the state has so far approved
one Christian oversight agency, the Texas Association of
Christian Child Care Agencies, which oversees seven Christian
juvenile homes.

     Bush's initiative was called "Faith in Action: A New Vision for
Church-State Cooperation." In fact, the rules embodied the
opposite philosophy. The main goal was to limit contact
between church-run groups and the state as much as was
safely possible.

     "Wherever we can, we must expand their role and reach,
without changing them or corrupting them," Bush said about
church-run programs in July, when he announced a campaign
initiative modeled on the Texas experiment. "This is the next
bold step in welfare reform."

     Even before the new laws were approved, Texas had no
shortage of church-based social service groups, from Lutheran
Social Services to many Baptist and Methodist homes around
the state. But most of those traditional charities opposed the
changes, and afterward chose to stay under state regulation.

     The churches that took advantage of the new laws were
mainly from the more evangelical, independent strains of
Christianity, part of the long Protestant tradition that believes
the church is solely accountable to Jesus Christ and
government oversight infringes on God's authority.

     As a practical matter, oversight by fellow Christians instead of
government came as a great relief to the homes. Previously,
they'd been subject to the whims of state investigators. In its
two decades of existence, Victory Children's Home in Alice,
an hour west of Corpus Christi, has dealt with one investigator
who called the home a "weird cult," another who opposed any
form of corporal punishment and a third who pulled 11 girls
from the home when he decided they were too isolated.

     "We'd tell a person from the state the Lord really changed this
girl and they'd say: 'Okay, uh, next. And who's the Lord?' "
said Nancy Ruth Gill, the home administrator. "Now the
people who oversee us speak the same language. It's not that
we're trying to get away with anything. But they understand
us."

     Still, traditional social services providers have their doubts. "I
continue to be nervous about whether folks who constantly
work together will be strong in their determination to assure
protection for children," said Phil Strickland, who runs the
social service arm of the Baptist Convention and chose to
leave his homes regulated by the state.

     To these more traditional groups, the redemption-only cure
ignores reality. The Rev. Buck Griffiths, who runs Christians
Against Substance Abuse out of a Church of Christ in Corpus
Christi, still insists on working only with counselors who have
met the state's credential requirements. The first page of his
client handbook says in bold letters: "Chemical dependency is
a disease. . . . It is NOT a moral weakness."

     "Initially it's a choice, and we're responsible for our choices,
but some people are biologically or chemically disposed," said
Griffiths. "We have to be realists. Sometimes people just need
medical detox."

     Social scientists say faith-based groups make exaggerated
claims of success, long before there are any studies to back
them up. Teen Challenge, for example, claims a 90 percent
cure rate for drug addiction.

     But no evidence supports that, said John Diulio, who favors
the approach but is skeptical of some of the claims of success.
A study by one Christian researcher considered favorable to
Teen Challenge showed a success rate equal to the medical
model -- 13 percent.

     Teresa Calalay knew nothing of the statistics when she first
thought of sending her son, Justin Simons, to Roloff Homes, a
group of five juvenile and young-adult facilities in Corpus
Christi.

     She did not know that months earlier, the mother of a teenage
girl living at one of the group's juvenile homes, shut down by
regulators several years earlier but newly reopened by Bush's
laws, complained to state officials that her daughter had been
bound with rope and duct tape, an account confirmed by the
state. All she knew was that her son would be away from
home for the first time in his life.

     Reluctant as she and her husband were, they knew they had to
do something with their son. When he was a young boy,
doctors diagnosed a genetic disorder that ultimately made him
jumpy and aggressive. Nine times he was hired at fast-food
restaurants, and nine times he was fired because he couldn't
concentrate. Then came the speeding tickets and a fight with a
friend that police had to break up.

     Calalay heard of Roloff Homes through her pastor in Georgia,
who told her they had a good record with wayward teens. So
on March 10, the whole family flew to Corpus Christi to take
Justin to one of the homes for young adults.

     "I thought he would find himself putting out sweet feed and
salt lick," she said. "And that he would find God out there in a
field with a bunch of cows." She and her husband asked about
the discipline policy and were told that if the boys misbehaved,
they would be forced to run a few laps, Army style.

     What Justin, 18, says he found was something quite different.
"Every night I always heard someone getting beat and
screaming, saying 'Please help me' and 'Please stop hitting me.'
I couldn't see them but I always heard them." They never saw
the cows, or the field, but spent most of their days cleaning the
kitchen.

     "Lord, I am going crazy." he wrote one night in his Bible.
"Please help me."

     After almost a month, Justin and Aron Cavellin, 17, decided to
run away, right after laps, but both were caught. At about 6
p.m., Alan Lee Smith, a supervisor at Roloff Homes, drove
them into the woods and tied their wrists, then roped them to
each other. He took them to a 15-foot-deep sewage pit and
ordered them to dig, the boys told police.

     At about 2 a.m., Simons was told if he needed a break he
would have to jump over the pit. He tried, but was tired and
fell short. He wound up in the hospital with three toes broken,
his ankles sprained and his feet swollen into useless clumps.

     Police found enough evidence to arrest Smith, 42, and charge
him with unlawful restraint, a third-degree felony. About
one-third of the 30 young men and boys living there at the
time have since filed complaints, and the sheriff's department
expects to make at least four more arrests this week.

     David Gibbs, an attorney with the Christian Law Association,
speaking for Roloff Homes, pointed out that the program is for
older teenagers, and voluntary. He described it as "military
style," but said any punishment was "an incentive to
encourage competitive behavior."

     "As I look at the situation, I would hope law enforcement gets
an understanding of the program, and the tough discipline
involved, and sees if there are any criminal elements," Gibbs
said. "And they have to look at the veracity of who is giving
statements. Some of it is terrifically elaborate."

     Texas law allows caretakers to use reasonable force to impose
discipline and keep order, said Grant Jones, Smith's attorney.
In any case, homes designed for young men over 18 have
never been regulated by any agency. The Lighthouse, where
Simons was staying, shares property and supervisors with
Roloff's new children's home, and at least three of the
teenagers staying there were under 18, but it is not supervised
by the new Christian child care agency.

     The boys' stories were not well-received in the church
community that supports Roloff, where they are assumed to be
the tall tales of undisciplined, unsaved boys. After the arrests,
David Blaser, who runs the new Texas Association of
Christian Child Care Agencies, sent two of his inspectors to
Roloff to determine if the younger boys and girls his agency
oversees were affected.

     "These boys have a great imagination, I guess," said Blaser.
"My men were down there and found out what the situation
was. The boy claimed he was pushed and shoved and made to
jump the pit. But he did it himself. He wanted to jump the pit,
just like any boy always doing the wrong thing."

     The home's defenders note stories of former and current
residents who have told how the Lighthouse transformed them.
"When I came in here, I was worthless, into drugs and
alcohol," said Steve Summers of North Carolina, one of five
young men still left in the home. "But things have been
happening for me here. God's been blessing me here. It's like a
family," he told a reporter for the Corpus Christi Caller Times.

      Authorities plan to convene a grand jury next week. None of
the boys has a spotless record, and the homes have a long
history of litigation against people who file complaints against
them.

     The only one who seems to have found some peace is Calalay,
Justin's mother.

     "I believe God sent Justin there for a reason," she said. "So
that we could work to make these boys understand that these
people are not the face of God, that God is about love."

© 2000 The Washington Post Company