c. 1997 Religion News Service

Christian Coalition plans racial justice congress

(RNS) The Christian Coalition, continuing its attempt to enlist minorities in its conservative political causes, will hold what it is calling a”historic”Congress on Racial Justice and Reconciliation in Baltimore on Saturday (May 10).

The meeting aims to bridge the gaps between white evangelicals and African-Americans and other minorities by addressing such issues as reconciliation, welfare, drugs and violence.

The Rev. Earl Jackson, the Christian Coalition’s organizer of the congress, said he hopes its participants will”seek to break down the barriers, to bring people together across racial and cultural lines to say these are not black problems or white problems. They’re American problems and Christians must lead the way in coming together to address these problems.” The congress follows other initiatives of the coalition to reach minorities, including assisting congregations whose churches burned in a spate of recent arsons and the Samaritan Project that aims to combat inner-city problems.

Jackson said he hopes to get African-American leaders more involved in racial reconciliation efforts, which are being promoted by predominantly white organizations such as the Southern Baptist Convention and Promise Keepers, an evangelical men’s movement.

Coalition critics question the group’s motives. People for the American Way has launched an advertising campaign countering the effort, specifically criticizing coalition president and religious broadcaster Pat Robertson’s record on racial issues.”Racial reconciliation?”the ad reads.”Who’s kidding who? Don’t be fooled by the `Christian’ Coalition.” Jackson said the religious broadcaster plans to address the closing service of the congress, to be held at a predominantly black Baltimore church, on the same day that Robertson’s Regent University will hold its graduation.

The Regent chancellor’s participation”underscores how important Pat Robertson views the whole issue of racial reconciliation and racial harmony in this nation,”Jackson said.

Mexican, U.S. church leaders urge just economic policies

(RNS) As President Bill Clinton met with Mexican President Ernesto Zedillo this week to shore up economic relations between the two countries, leaders of the United Church of Christ and its Mexican sister church, the Iglesias Cristianas Congregacionales de Mexico, called on the government leaders to embrace”just and equitable”economic programs.”We would like you to know that we U.S. and Mexican Christians, having been challenged by the biblical call for justice and liberation, lift our voices for those who are suffering under the current economic programs and plead that you both begin to work to create a new, just and equitable economic policy,”the two religious leaders said in a Tuesday (May 6) letter to Clinton and Zedillo.

The letter was signed by the Rev. Paul Sherry, president of the United Church of Christ, and the Rev. Daniel Celis Arceo, president of the Mexican church.

Clinton and Zedillo met Wednesday to bolster the two countries’ commitment to the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), which lowers trade and other economic barriers between the U.S. and Mexico. The agreement has been sharply criticized by religious and labor leaders on both sides of the border.

In their letter, the two religious leaders said that NAFTA and related economic policies were leading to the accumulation and retention of wealth by a limited number of people and corporations at the expense of the majority of people. The result, they said, is millions of people becoming further impoverished.

Church of Scotland, facing financial crunch, considers program cutbacks

(RNS) _ The (Presbyterian) Church of Scotland will have to cut some of its programs because it will no longer have the income to support them, a report by denominational leaders said Thursday (May 8).”The Church simply cannot fund all the work that it would like to do, and if it is to live within its means hard decisions about priorities must be taken,” said the report by the denomination’s Board of Stewardship and Finance.”The Church must face up to the harsh reality that new work can only be undertaken if existing work is reduced or eliminated.” The board’s report _ and the”harsh reality”of cutting programs _ will be debated when the church’s General Assembly meets in Edinburgh May 17-23.

The report cited declining membership as the primary cause of the financial woes, even as it noted that congregational giving has increased and the average amount given by each church member has risen 6 per cent.

Membership of the Church of Scotland has declined steadily since 1956, when it peaked at 1,320,091. It has been in decline since then and over the past year dropped another 18,517 members, or 2.64 per cent, from 701,914 to 683,397.

Even though per capita giving has risen to its highest level ever _ $126.44 a year _ and the church’s total income has risen by 4.8 per cent to just over $147.6 million, the reality of the coming financial crunch cannot be disguised, the report said.

It said the”relentless and worrying downward trend”in membership was best illustrated by a separate report on confirmations. That report said between 1993 and 1996, the number of those confirmed _ those young people who had been baptized and brought up in the Church of Scotland and who were going on to accept the responsibilities of adult membership _ had declined by 31 per cent, from 6,499 in 1993 to 4,508 in 1996.

That’s less than half the number recorded in 1986.

Peruvian Protestant leader questions decision to kill hostage-takers

(RNS) The president of the National Protestant Council of Peru says that while he welcomed last month’s safe rescue of 71 of 72 hostages being held by left-wing guerrillas in the home of the Japanese ambassador, it was wrong to kill the 14 guerrillas holding the hostages.”It is true that their (the guerrillas) behavior was wrong, and that their leader Nestor Cerpa did not want to surrender, but, the word of God tells us we do not have the right to kill anyone,”the Rev. Felix Calle said.

Calle said it would have been wiser”to wait for a peaceful solution”to solve the crisis that began Dec. 17, when the band of guerrillas from the Tupac Amaru Revolutionary Movement (MRTA) stormed the ambassador’s home during a pre-Christmas party.”The reaction from young people is negative, and this worries me, because some of them might accept the ideas of the MRTA,”Calle said, according to Ecumenical News International, the Geneva-based religious news agency.”The situation of the country could grow worse and we will not have the peace we so desire,”he added.

But one of the hostages, Gilberto Siura, a member of the Peruvian congress and a well-known Protestant, firmly backed the decision by President Alberto Fujimori to mount the armed rescue operation.”It must have been a very difficult decision (for Fujimori), especially if we take into account the fact that his brother was one of the hostages,”Siura said.

Since the end of the crisis, there have been conflicting news reports in Peru about the seige and its conclusion. Some reports have charged that some of the guerrillas were shot after they threw down their weapons and shouted that they were surrendering. The government has denied the report.

Another report has suggested that Roman Catholic Archbishop Juan Luis Cipriani, a key mediator between the government and the rebels, was used by the security forces to”monitor”guerrilla movements. Cipriani has denied the charges.

Freire, Brazilian educator associated with liberation theology, dies

(RNS) Paulo Freire, a radical Brazilian educator and influential Roman Catholic layman whose theories helped shape liberation theology and the contemporary ecumenical movement, has died in Sao Paolo at age 75. He died Friday (May 2) following a heart attack.

Freire, author of”Pedagogy of the Oppressed,”his 1979 best-seller, was a critic of capitalist social and political systems who advocated”critical consciousness,”or the creation of awareness, particularly among the poor and marginalized.

He believed that ending illiteracy was key to elevating consciousness and ending oppression.

In 1964, Freire was denounced by Brazil’s then-military government as a communist and was jailed for 70 days, after which he went into exile for 16 years. During that period, he worked as a consultant to Chile’s ministry of education, UNESCO and the World Council of Churches. He also taught at Harvard University and the University of Geneva and worked in Nicaragua and Africa.

Freire returned to Brazil in 1980 following a political amnesty, and in 1989 he was named education secretary of Sao Paulo, which has Brazil’s largest school system.

His educational theories have also been employed in the United States by those working with African-American, Hispanic and feminist groups.

In 1985, Freire said of his jailing and exile:”I was punished because I showed that the misery of the starving was not a perversity of God, but as a result of the lack of consciousness of people who live in illiteracy.” In a statement, Konrad Raiser, WCC general secretary, said of Freire:”Pablo Freire deeply influenced the orientation and methodology of ecumenical education; the concept of ecumenical learning has largely benefited from Freire’s insights.” Raiser also noted Freire’s devotion to the Christian faith, his commitment to ecumenism and his”strong influence on the development of Latin American liberation theology,”which holds that the church has a responsibility to side with the poor against their rich oppressors.

Quote of the day: Ralph Reed, Christian Coalition executive director

(RNS) Speaking Wednesday (May 7) to the National Religious Broadcasters’ Public Policy Forum meeting in Washington, Ralph Reed, director of the Christian Coalition, addressed the question of what makes a nation great. He said:”In the end, the greatness of America is not measured by her gross national product, or by the Dow Jones industrial average, or by the unemployment rate, or by the collective checkbook balance of her people. The greatness of America is and always will be the moral fiber of her people, the integrity of her leaders and how she treats those who are most innocent and vulnerable in her midst.”

DEA END RNS