c. 1996 Religion News Service

U.N. human-rights panel denounces religious intolerance

(RNS)-The United Nations Commission on Human Rights says it is”alarmed that serious instances of intolerance and discrimination on the grounds of religion or belief”are occurring around the world.

But the resolution, adopted by consensus during the annual meeting of the 53-nation panel, did not name specific places where such acts are occurring.

The resolution, passed this week (April 21-27), called on nations to ensure that their legal systems provide”adequate and effective guarantees of freedom of thought, conscience, religion and belief to all without discrimination.” In addition, the resolution, also without naming specific occurrences, expressed”grave concern”at attacks on religious sites and shrines.

But Amnesty International, the London-based private human-rights agency, attacked the U.N. panel for being soft on many nations where human-rights abuses are being committed.

In a statement issued Friday (April 26) at the end of the six-week meeting of the U.N. panel, Amnesty said too many nations were putting their political and economic interests ahead of justice and human-rights concerns.

It was especially critical of the fact that China escaped censure by the U.N. panel and said France and Germany appeared to have allowed the prospect of trade deals with China to weaken their resolve to condemn Beijing’s human- rights record.”Trade contracts worth millions of U.S. dollars are determining the European Union’s policy on human rights in China,”Amnesty said in a statement released in Geneva, where the U.N. panel met.

Amnesty also deplored the commission’s failure to appoint a special investigator to look into what it called the”worsening human-rights situation”in Colombia and Nigeria.

But commission chairman Gilberto Vergne Saboia defended the panel.”The fact that we don’t adopt a resolution on certain issues doesn’t mean (the) commission hasn’t given it attention,”he told Reuters.

Vatican theologian says birth control pill OK for mentally handicapped

(RNS)-The Rev. Gonzalo Miranda, an influential Roman Catholic Church theologian, said it is morally acceptable to give birth control pills to mentally handicapped women who could be”induced or forced”into sex.

Miranda, who teaches at the Vatican’s Pontifical Academy”Regina Apostolorum”and is secretary of the Catholic University in Rome’s Bioethics Institute, made his comments in an interview with SIR, the news agency of the Italian bishops conference, AP reported.”If there is a serious and imminent risk of violence, it is permitted to administer the pill to women with mental handicaps,”he said in the interview.

But he said such use of the pill should be kept to a minimum because a severely handicapped woman would be given the pill without her consent.

Such cases, he said, should be seen as an”act of defense”and the use of artificial means of contraception remain morally wrong”when it accompanies a desired sexual act”with the intent of avoiding pregnancy.

Pressured PepsiCo announces divestment from Burma

(RNS)-PepsiCo, the parent company of the soft drink bottler Pepsi and the Taco Bell fast-food franchises, under pressure from religious shareholders and pro-democracy human-rights activists, has announced it is withdrawing its investment in Burma (Myanmar).”Pepsi has taken a major step to distance itself from the police state in Burma,”said the Rev. Joseph P. La Mar of the Maryknoll Fathers & Brothers, the U.S.-based Roman Catholic missionary order.

The Maryknolls initiated a shareholder resolution, co-sponsored by 10 other Roman Catholic religious orders and Protestant investors as well as the University of Washington in Seattle. It is calling on PepsiCo to withdraw from the military-ruled nation because of Burma’s human-rights record. The resolution is to be voted on at the company’s stockholder meeting May 1.”We believe the combination of moral persuasion, shareholder and consumer pressure was significant in turning Pepsi around,”said the Rev. David Schilling of the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility, the New York-based umbrella organization of religious investors.

In an April 22 letter to La Mar, Edward V. Lahey, PepsiCo corporate secretary, acknowledged that the activist campaign against the company was part of the reason for the firm’s decision to withdraw.”We’ve decided to sell PepsiCo’s (40 percent) minority stake in our franchise bottler and we expect to finalize the divestiture soon,”the letter said.”As a result, we will have no employees and no assets in the country.” Burma, with a population of 45 million, won independence from Great Britain in 1948. It has been under military rule since and has brutally repressed democratic movements. In 1990, a pro-democracy movement led by Aung San Suu Kyi, then under house arrest by the government, won a general election but was not allowed to rule. Suu Kyi, who was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1991, was freed in 1995.

People For the American Way names a new president

(RNS)-Carole Shields, former chairwoman of People For the American Way’s board of directors, has been named president of the 300,000-member nonpartisan advocacy group.

Shields succeeds Tom Andrews in running the day-to-day operations of the group, which was formed after the 1980 elections as an alternative to the Religious Right.

Andrews, a former Democratic House member from Maine, headed the organization for less than a year. A People For the American Way spokeswoman said Andrews left because of”differing visions”with the board on the group’s future direction.

Shields, of Miami, is the daughter and granddaughter of evangelical Baptist ministers and has been affiliated with People For the American Way since 1992.

She is vice chairman of the Public Health Trust of Dade County, Fla., and serves on the boards of the Dade Community Foundation, Florida International University Foundation, and the Jackson Memorial Hospital Foundation.”My family taught me a valuable lesson that has driven my life’s work-love your neighbor as yourself,”she said in a statement.”Therefore I believe I am obliged to work on behalf of others so that all Americans may have the things that I want for my children: freedom, respect, and the opportunity to succeed.”

Gonzaga University announces new president

(RNS)-The Rev. Edward Glynn has been named the 24th president of Gonzaga University, the 109-year-old Jesuit institution in Spokane, Wash., the school’s board of trustees said Thursday (April 25).

Glynn, 60, was Gonzaga’s academic vice president from 1977 to 1978 and then served as president of St. Peter’s College, Jersey City, N.J. He will end a six-year term as provincial of the Maryland Province of the Society of Jesus in June.”Engaging other cultures and religions in conversation … is a priority of the Society of Jesus around the world and thus will be an institutional priority for Gonzaga precisely as a Catholic, Jesuit university,”Glynn said in a statement.

The Rev. Bernard J. Coughlin, Gonzaga’s president since 1974, will become the school’s chancellor, a new post.

Quote of the day: World Council of Churches Secretary General Konrad Raiser on Chernobyl

(RNS)-The Rev. Konrad Raiser, general secretary of the World Council of Churches, in a statement marking the 10th anniversary of the accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power station in Ukraine that took place the night of April 24-25, 1986:”`Chernobyl’ is today a byword for the grave risks involved in the production and use of nuclear energy. It reminds us we do not control the universe; God does. Humankind’s task now is to care for the earth in such a way that we maintain the integrity of creation. We failed at Chernobyl. I pray God will give us the wisdom and determination to do better in the future. If not, the existence of the whole world is threatened.”

MJP END