c. 1996 Religion News Service

Court case raises questions about religious test for public office

(RNS) Advocates of strict separation between church and state said Tuesday (Oct. 8) that a case pending before the South Carolina Supreme Court raises important questions about what constitutes a religious test for public office.

The court heard oral arguments last week about whether math teacher Herb Silverman was subjected to such a test when his application to become a South Carolina notary public was denied after he crossed out the word”God”from the constitutionally required oath. Silverman’s was the only notary public application denied out of a total of 30,000 applications.

Silverman, an atheist activist, says a state constitutional requirement that public officials acknowledge a”supreme being”is a religious test that violates his right to religious liberty.

The American Civil Liberties Union of South Carolina is supporting Silverman’s claim.”South Carolina’s constitution imposes a religious test (for public office), even if it is a broad requirement that one merely believe in God,”Steven Bates, executive director of the ACLU’s South Carolina office, said in an interview. An ACLU-appointed attorney argued Silverman’s case before the state court.

Several national organizations are watching the case.”You shouldn’t have to have any particular religious view in order to hold public office,”said Joseph Conn, spokesman for Americans United for Separation of Church and State, a church-state separation advocacy group based in Washington.

According to Conn’s group, six states beyond South Carolina still have constitutional language requiring public officials to recognize some sort of religious belief, although most are not enforced. “It’s a little surprising that any state would attempt to impose a religious test for public office at this late date in American history,”he said.

In 1961, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously struck down a provision in Maryland’s constitution that said public officials must declare a”belief in the existence of God.” South Carolina denies that any religious test was imposed on Silverman.

State officials said Silverman’s application lacked the correct number of signatures. The state’s attorney also argued that the application would have been denied no matter which word of the oath had been crossed out, the Reuters news agency reported.

South Carolina’s state court justices did not indicate when they might rule on the case.

Supreme Court declines to review lawsuit against Lutheran denomination

(RNS) A group of Lutheran pastors suing the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) says the U.S. Supreme Court’s refusal this week to review their case will not stop their legal effort to recover money invested in the denomination’s pension fund.

The Supreme Court without comment Monday (Oct. 7) declined to hear an appeal of a Minnesota lower court’s dismissal of the lawsuit against the ELCA and its Board of Pensions. The lawsuit, alleging breach of contract and fiduciary duty, was filed by a group of 48 pastors and Lutheran lay leaders after the board denied their request to withdraw their money from the denomination’s pension fund.

The pastors and lay leaders charged that the denomination”misused and abused”their money from 1988 to 1991, when the ELCA without their consent or complete knowledge divested pension funds from companies doing any business in South Africa. During that time period, the lawsuit argued, the pastors’ personal pension funds suffered a total of $227 million in”underperformance losses.” The Board of Pensions adopted the divestment policy in 1988 in protest of South Africa’s apartheid policy.”The U.S. Supreme Court displayed a wisdom that is embodied in the nation’s Constitution which protects religious organizations from unnecessary government intrusion. With this action, the court has quelled an attempt to entangle the government in church affairs,”said ELCA Board of Pensions President John G. Kapanke in a statement.

However, the Rev. Thomas L. Basich, lead plaintiff in the case, said in an interview Tuesday (Oct. 8) that his coalition now plans to take the legal battle to other states.”We are only closed out in Minnesota, but there are 49 other states,”said Basich, pastor of Advent Lutheran Church in St. Paul. Minn.

Basich emphasized that he and the other plaintiffs all opposed apartheid. However, he said the issue in the case is not whether or not the pastors approved of apartheid, but rather who controls the money in the pension fund.”We the pastors own the money because we earned it,”he said.

Basich said the denomination’s policy”very seriously affected”the amount of money in the pastors’ individual pension accounts as well as the monthly payments received by retirees. He said his coalition wanted to remove their money from the ELCA pension fund so they could invest it elsewhere.

Scottish bishop who resigned says he’ll now marry

(RNS) The Roman Catholic bishop from Scotland who resigned last month after disappearing with a divorced parishioner now says he will marry the woman _ probably in a civil ceremony.

Roderick Wright, the 56-year-old former Bishop of Argyll and the Isles, was quoted in a Scottish newspaper Tuesday (Oct. 8) as saying he and Kathleen Macphee would marry”at a time that is suitable.” Wright also told the The Herald newspaper that he and Macphee will not return to Scotland.”I can’t go back if I love Kathleen,”Wright said, according to an Associated Press report.”I am not going to give her up. Not being a priest is something I’ll have to live with if I’m given the peace and time to do so. But I will always be a Catholic.” Wright’s disappearance last month from his home in Oban in western Scotland shocked church officials and sparked a new debate in Great Britain over the issue of the Catholic Church’s insistence that its priests be celibate.

The uproar increased a few days later when it was disclosed that Wright also had also fathered a 15-year-old son by another woman.

Wright further shocked the church by selling his story to a tabloid newspaper for $23,400 _ which he said he would give to Macphee’s three children from her former marriage.

Wright said he met Macphee in 1976. He said they became close in 1992 at a time when she was fighting cervical cancer.

The former bishop was last reported living in Kendel in northwest England.

Man who set fire to Portland church given five years in prison

(RNS) An African-American man convicted of setting fire to a predominantly black church in Portland, Ore., has been sentenced to five years in prison in a case that drew national attention.

Antoine Jamar Dean, 21, wept as U.S. District Judge Malcolm Marsh read the sentence Monday (Oct. 7). Dean also apologized to his family, the church and all African-Americans.”I want everyone, and mostly Afro-American brothers and sisters across the country, to know,”Dean said,”that I was blind and had my eyes set on big money instead of realizing how hard it is for us Afro-Americans, how hard we struggle in life and try to get above water.” The fire at Immanuel Christian Fellowship last spring attracted national attention because it came at a time when dozens of predominantly black congregations were going up in flames.

Dean, who has been arrested about 20 times since 1988, was reportedly offered $10,000 by a prison inmate with whom he had once been jailed to set fire to the church. The Oregonian of Portland newspaper has reported that the inmate, who is also black, has a history of paying others to commit crimes, which he would then tell prison officials about in the hope of getting reward money or more favorable treatment.

Quote of the day: Will Dodson, director of government relations for the Southern Baptist Christian Life Commission

(RNS) Will Dodson, Southern Baptist Christian Life Commission director of government relations, has criticized both President Clinton and Republican presidential nominee Bob Dole for failing to address moral issues during their Oct. 6 debate. He told Baptist Press, the official news service of the Southern Baptist Convention:”This debate was more significant for what the candidates did not talk about than it was for what they did talk about. They did not talk nearly enough about the moral issues over which this nation is divided. Ignoring these issues will not make them go away and will not unite Americans. Their positions on the moral issues in general, abortion in particular and partial-birth abortions especially, are of concern to a large portion of society and should be of concern to all of us.”

MJP END RNS