Prometheus 6

Courts face new challenges in faith healing cases
By ROSE FRENCH
The Associated Press
Tuesday, June 30, 2009 8:19 AM

NASHVILLE, Tenn. -- Most states have child abuse laws allowing some religious exemptions for parents who shun medicine for their sick children, but a few recent cases highlight thorny legal issues for parents following less-recognized faiths.

Existing laws have gradually accounted for more well-known and established faiths, such as Pentecostalism, Christian Science and Jehovah's Witnesses.

But recent cases in the news have judges and child care advocates dealing with parents who claim adherence to lesser-known faiths, such as the Minnesota family following an Internet-based group's American Indian beliefs, and an independent Oregon church that has been investigated in the past for the deaths of members' sick children.

Religious Devotion Does Not Impact Abortion Decisions of Young Unwed Women
Sociologist finds that factors such as grades and parents’ education are more influential than religious involvement for pregnant teens and young adults who face abortion decision

WASHINGTON, DC – Unwed pregnant teens and twenty-somethings who attend or have graduated from private religious schools are more likely to obtain abortions than their peers from public schools, according to sociological research published in the June issue of the Journal of Health and Social Behavior.

“This research suggests that young, unmarried women are confronted with a number of social, financial and health-related factors that can make it difficult for them to act according to religious values when deciding whether to keep or abort a pregnancy,” said the study’s author, sociologist Amy Adamczyk, an assistant professor at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice and the Graduate Center, City University of New York.

While previous research has investigated the link between religion and abortion attitudes, fewer studies have explored religion’s impact on abortion behavior. To fill this research gap, Adamczyk examined how personal religious involvement, schoolmate religious involvement and school type influenced the pregnancy decisions of a sample of 1,504 unmarried and never-divorced women age 26 and younger from 125 different schools. The women ranged in age from 14 to 26 at the time they discovered they were pregnant. Twenty-five percent of women in the sample reported having an abortion, a likely underestimate, according to Adamczyk.

Results revealed no significant link between a young woman’s reported decision to have an abortion and her personal religiosity, as defined by her religious involvement, frequency of prayer and perception of religion’s importance. Adamczyk said that this may be partially explained by the evidence that personal religiosity delays the timing of first sex, thereby shortening the period of time in which religious women are sexually active outside of marriage.

Religious network promises, fails to deliver the goods
Experts say S.C. made costly mistakes when it gave millions in incentives; for-profit projects in doubt.
By Ames Alexander
aalexander@charlotteobserver.com
Posted: Tuesday, May. 26, 2009

INDIAN LAND, S.C. Condos. Shops. Outdoor concerts. Internships to prepare students for careers in broadcasting.

All were to be part of the Inspiration Networks' 93-acre City of Light.

Or so S.C. and Lancaster County officials thought when they gave their blessing – along with at least $5 million in incentives – to the religious broadcaster.

But more than five years after unveiling its plans, Inspiration has delivered on few of its development promises, leaving Lancaster officials disappointed as they try to revive a county with 19 percent unemployment.

Today, the City of Light campus is home to two buildings – both nonprofit projects that don't pay county property taxes.

The fast-growing network, with nearly $80 million in annual revenue, has yet to bring any of the for-profit ventures it promised. County officials now question whether those pieces will ever be built.

U.S. denies letting troops convert Afghans
By Peter Graff
Reuters
Monday, May 4, 2009 5:59 AM

KABUL (Reuters) - The U.S. military denied Monday it has allowed soldiers to try to convert Afghans to Christianity, after a television network showed pictures of soldiers with bibles translated into local languages.

General Order Number 1 from the U.S. military's Central Command forbids active duty troops -- including all those serving in Iraq and Afghanistan -- from trying to convert people to their religion, considered a crime in many Muslim countries.

Qatar-based Al Jazeera television showed footage of a church service at Bagram, the main U.S. base north of the Afghan capital Kabul, in which soldiers had a stack of bibles in the local languages, Pashtu and Dari.

A military chaplain was shown delivering a sermon to other soldiers, saying: "The special forces guys -- they hunt men basically. We do the same things as Christians, we hunt people for Jesus. We do, we hunt them down."

Follow the donations: Charities kept most cash for themselves
In their tax records, charities take credit for sending supplies around the world, even if the goods haven't yet moved an inch
by Robert Anglen - May. 3, 2009 12:00 AM
The Arizona Republic

Each year, more than a million federal employees donate part of their paychecks in the government's annual workplace charity drive, the largest of its kind in the world.

The money given in the Combined Federal Campaign — $273 million last year — is directed to groups that say they fight disease, ease hunger and help the needy. But in some cases, much of the cash that charities collect does not go to charity.

Some charities direct the donated cash to causes other than what donors may have intended.

Charities can make donations to other organizations run by relatives and colleagues.

Charities also can transfer ownership of donated goods to other charities without ever handling the items and claim the goods' value on their tax returns.

Charities can spend most of their donors' cash on salaries, perks and other expenses.

The transfers of cash and goods title improve the financial profile presented to donors in the annual charity drive and may help attract more donations, although charities say that's not their intent.

The Combined Federal Campaign assures donors that “only legitimate, accountable, and responsible charitable organizations are admitted” to the program. But limited oversight by the federal campaign and tax loopholes in tax-reporting rules let charities work the system. Because IRS audits are rare, many details of a charity's actions activities aren't revealed.

Beginning today, The Arizona Republic publishes the findings of a yearlong investigation into the controversial practices of a network of charities tied to a Phoenix televangelism ministry, the federal campaign that funnels millions of dollars to them each year and the tax system that makes the activities perfectly legal.

Twittering in Church, With the Pastor's Encouragement
By Bonnie Rochman

John Voelz isn't trying to brag, but it's fair to say he was down with Twitter before most people knew it was a proper noun.

Last year, Voelz, a pastor, was tweeting at a conference outside Nashville about ways to make the church experience more creative — ways to "make it not suck" — when suddenly it hit him: Twitter.

Voelz and David McDonald, the other senior pastor at Westwinds Community Church in Jackson, Mich., spent two weeks educating their congregation about Twitter, the microblogging site that challenges users to communicate in 140 characters or less. They held training sessions where congregants brought in their laptops, iPhones and Blackberrys. They upped the bandwidth in the auditorium.

As expected, banter flourished. Tweets like "Nice shirt JVo" and "So glad they are doing Lenny Kravitz" flashed across three large video screens. But there was heartfelt stuff, too.

Why the Faithful Approve of Torture

White Evangelical theology bases its view of Christian salvation on the severe pain and suffering undergone by Jesus in his flogging and crucifixion by the Romans. This is called the "penal theory of the atonement"--that is, the way Jesus paid for our sins is by this extreme torture inflicted on him.

For Christian conservatives, severe pain and suffering are central to their theology. This is very clear in the 2002 Mel Gibson movie, The Passion of the Christ. Evangelical Christians flocked to this movie, promoted it and still show it in their churches, despite the fact that it is R-rated for the extraordinary amount of violence in the film. It is, in fact, the highest grossing R-rated movie in the history of film. The flogging of Jesus by the Romans goes on for fully 40 minutes. It is truly the most violent film I have ever seen.

Defecting to Faith
By CHARLES M. BLOW

 

“Most people are religious because they’re raised to be. They’re indoctrinated by their parents.”

So goes the rationale of my nonreligious friends.

Maybe, but a study entitled “Faith in Flux” issued this week by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life questioned nearly 3,000 people and found that most children raised unaffiliated with a religion later chose to join one. Indoctrination be damned. By contrast, only 4 percent of those raised Catholic and 7 percent of those raised Protestant later became unaffiliated.

(It should be noted that about a quarter of the unaffiliated identified as atheist or agnostic, and the rest said that they had no particular religion.)

This is the other side of that study we discussed over here.

God Makes Surprise Visit To Local Church
April 21, 2009 | Issue 45•17

Interrupting Pastor Terry Pridgen's sermon on His unending mercy, God appeared suddenly before His flock as an intense beam of white light, instantly dispersing the earthly forms of those seated in the first two pews. Sources said the remaining congregants had to avert their eyes from their Creator, whose booming celestial voice overwhelmed their worldly senses and humbled their hearts as He politely apologized for not calling first.

"I AM the God of Abraham, the LORD MOST HIGH, who brought you forth from the bondage of Egypt," God said unto church members, many of whom cowered in reverent fear of Him. "Thought I'd just pop in and see how things were going. Please, pretend like I'm not even here."

The Supreme Being then thanked the choir for its "lovely introduction" and took a seat to the right of the altar.

From the teachings of Supply Side Jesus

"If people who call themselves Christians want to see any influence in the culture, then they ought to start following the commands of Jesus and people will be so amazed that they will be attracted to Him," Thomas told me. "The problem isn't political. The problem is moral and spiritual."

Political Pullback for the Christian Right?
By Kathleen Parker
Sunday, April 5, 2009; A17

Is the Christian right finished as a political entity? Or, more to the point, are principled Christians finished with politics?

These questions have been getting fresh air lately as frustrated conservative Christians question the pragmatism -- defined as the compromising of principles -- of the old guard. One might gently call the current debate a generational rift.

So...the papal infallibility thing is...what, based on how it all turns out in the end?

Pope Admits Online News Can Provide Infallible Aid
By RACHEL DONADIO

MADRID — The letter released Thursday in which Pope Benedict XVI admitted that the Vatican had made “mistakes” in handling the case of a Holocaust-denying bishop was unprecedented in its directness, its humanity and its acknowledgment of papal fallibility.

But it also contained two sentences unique in the annals of church history.

“I have been told that consulting the information available on the Internet would have made it possible to perceive the problem early on,” Benedict wrote. “I have learned the lesson that in the future in the Holy See we will have to pay greater attention to that source of news.”

In other words: “Note to the Roman Curia: try Google.”

Religious Leaders Battle Abuse Bill in New York
By PAUL VITELLO

Roman Catholic and Orthodox Jewish officials in New York are mounting an intense lobbying effort to block a bill before the State Legislature that would temporarily lift the statute of limitations for lawsuits alleging the sexual abuse of children.

A perennial proposal that has been quashed in past years by Republicans who controlled the State Senate, the bill is now widely supported by the new Democratic majority in that chamber, and for the first time is given a good chance of passing.

My only beef is that it's temporary...though at the end of the run they would make a permanent extension of the statute of limitations on child abuse from five years after their 18th birthday to ten.

The only group that grew in every U.S. state since the 2001 survey was people saying they had "no" religion; the survey says this group is now 15 percent of the population. Silk said this group is likely responsible for the shrinking percentage of Christians in the United States.

15 Percent of Americans Have No Religion
Fewer Call Themselves Christians; Nondenominational Identification Increases
By Michelle Boorstein
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, March 9, 2009; A04

The percentage of Americans who call themselves Christians has dropped dramatically over the past two decades, and those who do are increasingly identifying themselves without traditional denomination labels, according to a major study of U.S. religion being released today.

Faith-Based Fudging
President Obama fulfilled one campaign promise and violated another recently with an executive order revamping the White House office for religion-based and neighborhood programs.

Maine bishop threatens to punish vocal activist
By DAVID SHARP
The Associated Press
Monday, December 29, 2008; 7:37 PM

PORTLAND, Maine -- The leader of Maine's Roman Catholics has taken the unusual step of threatening to punish an outspoken advocate for people who were sexually abused by priests, possibly by denying him communion.

Paul Kendrick of Freeport has been banned from the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception in Portland, and warned in a letter that if he tries again to contact Portland Bishop Richard Malone he risks losing any right "to participate fully in the sacramental life of the church."

Kendrick, a co-founder of the Maine chapter of the lay reform group Voice of the Faithful, has been a vocal critic of how church leaders have responded to abuse claims and treated victims.

We have a shitload of politicians who do the same thing right here in the good ol' CSofA USofA.

Its reclusive, messianic leader, Joseph Kony, claims to consult spirits and says he aims to establish a theocracy based on the Ten Commandments.

Ugandan Rebels Kill 189 People in 3 Days In NE Congo, U.N. Says
By Stephanie McCrummen
Washington Post Foreign Service
Tuesday, December 30, 2008; A10

NAIROBI, Dec. 29 -- A Ugandan rebel group known for its horrific cruelties has massacred 189 people and kidnapped at least 20 children over three days in northeastern Congo, U.N. officials reported Monday.

The cultlike Lord's Resistance Army carried out the attacks on three villages between Thursday and Saturday, according to Ivo Brandau, a spokesman for the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in the Congolese capital, Kinshasa.

I want to take this seriously. I understand helping homeless folk in this way is something of a religious ritual.

Yet the title still bugs me, because it sounds like religious groups are being targeted, and they are not.

Religious Shelters Feel Squeezed by Rules
By LESLIE KAUFMAN

As temperatures outside were dropping from icy to arctic early Monday evening, volunteers inside the Friends Meeting House off East 15th Street prepared their gym for homeless guests, following a routine that has taken place nightly for more than 25 years.

They arranged green cots in neat lines on the polished wood floor, placed cold cuts and leftover lasagna on pink cloth-covered tables, and set out 14 chairs — 12 for the homeless, 2 for volunteers who share the communal meal, then sleep in the next room.

However, Bush has given religious organization clearance to discriminate by religious beliefs, so this case may not be as open-and-shut as one may think.

Diskeeper argues in its motion that these injunction requests should be struck from the Complaint because Diskeeper is permitted to introduce religious training in the workplace and therefore any injunction which broadly prohibits religious practice in the workplace is unconstitutional. 

Former CIO sues Diskeeper claims he was fired for not participating in Scientology training

[Update: mirrored, and probably more reliable links for complaint and motion to strike. Ray Hill kindly mirrored the documents here, as well. ]

The regulation could appear any day in the Federal Register.

Maybe we need a law to counter the regulation.

Midnight Reg on ‘Right of Conscience’ for Health Workers Moves Forward
by Christina Jewett , ProPublica - December 16, 2008 12:24 pm EST

A controversial midnight regulation expanding health workers' right to take a moral stance against abortion (or any other procedure that rankles their conscience) sailed through final Office of Management and Budget approval this week and, barring an act of Congress, will soon become law.

The rule would deny federal funding to any medical facilities that discipline workers – from secretaries to managed care executives – who refuse to assist in procedures they find morally troubling. It’s one of many midnight regulations we’ve been tracking.

Bad Times Draw Bigger Crowds to Churches
By PAUL VITELLO

The sudden crush of worshipers packing the small evangelical Shelter Rock Church in Manhasset, N.Y. — a Long Island hamlet of yacht clubs and hedge fund managers — forced the pastor to set up an overflow room with closed-circuit TV and 100 folding chairs, which have been filled for six Sundays straight.

In Seattle, the Mars Hill Church, one of the fastest-growing evangelical churches in the country, grew to 7,000 members this fall, up 1,000 in a year. At the Life Christian Church in West Orange, N.J., prayer requests have doubled — almost all of them aimed at getting or keeping jobs.

Like evangelical churches around the country, the three churches have enjoyed steady growth over the last decade. But since September, pastors nationwide say they have seen such a burst of new interest that they find themselves contending with powerful conflicting emotions — deep empathy and quiet excitement — as they re-encounter an old piece of religious lore:

By Election Day, 75 percent of the construction was finished, with the entire exterior nearly done and construction workers planning to lay the water line in the morning. The bishop could taste it. He watched the election returns, felt pride in his country and turned out the light. And during his short sleep, someone set fire to his dream.

Investigators say the cause was arson, but so far they have no suspects or evidence that the crime was rooted in racism.

A Time of Hope, Marred by an Act of Horror
By DAN BARRY

SPRINGFIELD, Mass.

As Election Night made way for a new day, a pastor named Bryant Robinson Jr. clicked off his television to accept a sleep of sweet promise. His mostly black congregation now had two blessings awaiting it in 2009: the inauguration of the first African-American president and the finished construction of a new church.

Give praise.

He could not have been asleep two hours before his telephone rang. It was his brother Andrew, whose home abuts the blessed construction site. “They’re burning our church,” shouted Andrew Robinson, who still doesn’t know why he said “they.”

I had no idea Kay Hagan sued Sen. Dole over that "Godless Americans" ad.

I'd like to see more of that sort of thing. The only way to stop the ugliness and bad campaigning is to make folks pay the cost for doing so. In fact, I'd like the media to be subject to libel, defamation, etc.

At least we can't literally take your "brother" card. Not that there aren't folks who would if they could...

Rabbis' ruling puts thousands of converts in limbo
By LAURIE COPANS
The Associated Press
Saturday, November 1, 2008; 12:18 PM

Three years ago the government formed the conversion authority to set universal standards, headed by Haim Drukman, a respected Orthodox rabbi who had already overseen tens of thousands of conversions over the years...But last March, the state-funded rabbinical court, which has the final say over who is Jewish, reversed her conversion and some 40,000 others overseen by Drukman and his followers.

The rabbis based their ruling on their discovery that a Danish woman whom Drukman converted more than a decade ago did not observe the Sabbath. But the decision was a symptom of a broader struggle.

On one side are ultra-Orthodox hard-liners, who insist converts must embrace their strict interpretation of Judaism for life. On the other side are moderates like Drukman. "There is a commandment to love every Jew and there is a special commandment to love the convert," he says.

Rabbi Eliyahu Ben-Dahan, director of the rabbinical courts, said too many people are being converted who aren't genuinely interested in the religion. "Nobody really checked how many of these 300,000 people really wanted to be Jews," Ben-Dahan said.

The decision also has threatened ties with those American Jews who belong to the more liberal Reform and Conservative denominations. The ruling on conversions is seen as another blow to their struggle for recognition in Israel.