c. 1996 Religion News Service

Southern Baptist relief group to help feed North Koreans

(RNS)-A Southern Baptist relief agency plans to feed a flood-ravaged area in North Korea for the next six months after North Korean officials asked for help.”We were asked to help from now until October in the rescue of a city,”said Bill Cashion, a member of a team sent to the region in April by the Baptists’ Cooperative Services International.”We would supply one meal a day to about 50,000 people.” North Korean officials asked the team to provide food to one of a number of cities and villages in the nation’s disaster area, according to Baptist Press, the official news service of the Southern Baptist Convention. The Baptist Press report did not name a specific location for the planned assistance.

As many as 5 million people have been affected by food shortages in flood-stricken areas of North Korea.”This is one of the highest priorities for Southern Baptist relief work,”Cashion said.”From what we saw, literally thousands of people will starve this winter without our help.” The dire situation has prompted the North Korean government to seek outside help, a move the communist country has avoided for many years.

Earlier this year, the U.S government, which does not have diplomatic relations with North Korea, announced plans to contribute $2.2 million to a United Nations food program for famine relief in the region. A number of religious agencies, including World Vision, the evangelical aid agency, and Church World Service, the relief arm of the National Council of Churches, have been granted U.S. licenses to ship aid to North Korea.

Flooding last August caused tons of sand and silt to cover more than 320,000 acres, destroying once-fertile farmland.

In January, Cooperative Services International announced plans to spend $500,000 to send food to the region.”These are people who have suffered massive loss, people who are desperately hungry, and people who-without outside help-will face starvation,”said Cashion.

Cashion’s team included members of the Woman’s Missionary Union and the Brotherhood Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention.

Seventh-day Adventists reaffirm traditional marriage

(RNS)-The Seventh-day Adventist Church, responding to what it called the”controversy in different parts of the world”over the drive to give same-sex partnerships the same social, religious and legal recognition as heterosexual marriages, Tuesday (April 23) issued a statement reaffirming its”strong and continued belief”in traditional Christian marriage.”Marriage was divinely established in Eden and affirmed by Jesus Christ to be both monogamous and heterosexual, a lifelong union of loving companionship between a man and a woman,”the statement said.”To this biblical view of marriage the Seventh-day Adventist Church adheres without reservation, believing that any lowering of this high view is to that extent a lowering of the heavenly ideal,”the statement added.

The statement was issued by the Administrative Committee of the General Conference, the top day-to-day policy-making body of the church. The denomination has 8.6 million members around the world.

Missouri Synod Lutherans blast Clinton on abortion veto, urge override

(RNS)-The Rev. A. L. Barry, president of the 2.6 million-member Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod, has criticized President Clinton for vetoing a bill outlawing a controversial late-term abortion procedure.

In a letter to Clinton, Barry noted that it was unusual for the Missouri Synod to attempt to influence government policy.”In this case, however, your veto of this bill sends a message that our society regards human life as of little value,”Barry wrote.”We view this as a severe violation of the government’s responsibility from God to protect and defend human life.” In a separate letter to members of the U.S. House and Senate, Barry urged lawmakers to vote to override Clinton’s April 10 veto of the legislation. The bill would have banned a rarely-used procedure for late-term abortions in which the fetus is partially extracted, feet first, before the skull is collapsed in the birth canal. Opponents call the procedure”partial-birth”abortion.

Although the bill, as passed by Congress, allowed exceptions to the ban in order to protect the life of the mother, Clinton said he wanted Congress to add a narrowly written exception that would allow for the procedure to be used to protect a woman’s health, as well. When Congress refused, Clinton vetoed the measure.

Update: Churches seek $500,000 to meet Liberian crisis

(RNS)-As an uneasy and fragile truce settled over Monrovia, Liberia, this week, Action by Churches Together (ACT), the coordinating agency of the World Council of Churches and Lutheran World Federation, announced a $500,000 appeal for funds for humanitarian work in Liberia.”It is difficult to make precise plans at present for a response to the Liberian crisis as the future is uncertain and reliable information is in short supply,”ACT said in a memorandum sent this week to member churches in the United States and other countries.

The appeal noted that the group’s compound in Monrovia was”trashed and looted”during the fighting between rival Liberian factions that began April 6.”Vehicles, computers and office equipment were all stolen and valuable records destroyed,”ACT said.

On Wednesday (April 24), the Associated Press reported that American and Liberian officials were exploring ways to shore up the truce that has been in effect since last weekend. But the news agency said it was unclear what the U.S. government might do to aid the 2,000 peacekeepers, mostly Nigerians, patrolling Monrovia.

While foreign relief workers in Monrovia were airlifted out of Liberia shortly after the fighting broke out, groups such as ACT have continued their relief efforts in the countryside, where thousands of refugees are camped, displaced by the six-and-a-half-year civil war in Liberia.

The $500,000 appeal will cover the cost of replacing stolen vehicles, medical supplies, tents, emergency food rations, radio equipment and hiring more staff.

Vandals spray-paint Jewish cemetery in Hungary

(RNS)-Vandals have broken into a Jewish cemetery in Budapest, Hungary, and spray-painted swastikas and Stars of David on a dozen tombstones, the Associated Press said Wednesday (April 24).

It was the second vandalism attack on a Jewish cemetery in Hungary this month.

On April 7, 79 tombstones in a cemetery in the northern Hungarian town of Heves were toppled by vandals.

Hungary, with 150,000 Jews, has one of the largest Jewish populations in eastern and central Europe.

Rwanda genocide trials expected to begin in July

(RNS)-The United Nations tribunal investigating the 1994 genocide in Rwanda is expected to begin its first trials in July, Reuters reported.

Andronico Adede, the tribunal’s registrar, said the first defendants, currently being held in Zambia, are expected to be transferred to the tribunal’s jail in Arusha, Tanzania, early in May. The tribunal’s jail is still under construction.

To date, only 10 Rwandans have been indicted for participating in the three-month killing spree in which more than 500,000 Rwandans were killed.

Bahrain cracks down further on Shiite Muslims

(RNS)-Bahrain has clamped down on its Shiite Muslim opposition following more than a year of unrest in the Persian Gulf island nation.

Bahrain’s ruler, Sheik Isa bin Salman al Khalifa, has established a special council to screen all mosque preachers and make sure they no longer press for political and social reforms, the Associated Press reported Wednesday (April 24).

Bahrain is ruled by Sunni Muslims, although Shiites make up a majority of the nation’s 500,000 citizens.

Until now, Shiites had been free in Bahrain to conduct their own religious activities.

Shiite opposition leaders have demanded the restoration of parliament, dissolved in 1975, and the release from prison of hundreds of Shiite activists. The campaign has turned violent, and 27 people have been killed. Bahrain has charged Shiite Iran with stirring up the trouble.

Quote of the day: University of Dallas professor Tom Edmond on preserving traditional Gospel music.

(RNS)-Tom Edmond, a music professor at the Roman Catholic University of Dallas, is seeking to collect and preserve the rural Protestant Gospel music of 50 years ago that existed primarily in an oral rather than written form. In a recent interview he reflected on his task:”There’s a struggle in this nation now. Like many struggles, it’s one of tradition versus change, and, unfortunately, over the last few decades, change has won over tradition in Gospel music. Gospel music is a way of telling the good news of Christ. When you sing it, you have to rid yourself of the inhibitions that prevent you from becoming closer to God. We can’t lose touch with that now.”

MJP END